An Aria in Venice: A Musical Interlude Novel (3 page)

“Lis,
did I just hear you confess to reading a romance novel?” A smile slowly forms
on my lips.

“Nah.
I think you heard me say I’m going to get the car now.”

“Looks
like Byron is getting to you.” That would be her hunky, Shemar Moore look-alike
boyfriend she met at a Christmas party we attended last year.

“Yeah,
you would know, Miss Strip Me Bare.”

Picking
up my tutu, I toss it at her. “Low blow, friend of mine. Payback time.”

Lis
picks up my mutilated outfits, stuffs them in my giant bag and gives me one
last grin as she heads out the door, creating a chance for me to check my phone
one final time before we leave. Still, no new pink message bubbles.

Guess
I must’ve pushed my bird’s thorn in too deep, because I’ve obviously crippled
him with my words.

Lis
drops me off at Maggiano’s, my brother and mother’s favorite restaurant.
Walking into the eatery frequented by celebrities on a regular basis always
makes me feel as though I’ve entered one of those Roman baths like the Caesars
always used. Marble columns are in every corner and separate the various
sections in the restaurant. The walls are a light bluish-green color that have
white wainscoting running along the bottom, and the marble boards are covered
in painted on vines and cherries that look real enough to pluck right out of
the design. An arched doorway leads to the V.I.P. section, the place Mother
always reserves whenever we eat here. Boxes of flowers line the edges of the
walls that separate each table. Real flowers. Tons of them. A peppery fragrance
fills the air in here, making me want to sneeze. The Italians don’t believe in
skimping on anything, and my mother couldn’t have picked a place that’s more
representative of her personality than a restaurant where each plate costs more
than my Gucci bag.

As
soon as I walk under the arched entry, I see him ... Nikolai, and he’s texting
someone on his golden Blackberry my mother had custom made for him. A stab of
jealousy hits me, but I refuse to let him see how much his ignoring my last
text bothers me.

You
can do this thing, Adriana. You will not let him see how much he affects you.
You will not turn into one of those women.

Yeah,
sure. I slide through the restaurant, walking around a hundred or so round
tables covered in silky red cloth and make my way over to where Mother, Alek,
and Nikolai sit in back.

Both
my brother and Nikolai stand and greet me as I approach the table. I slide into
survival mode, the part of me that knows how to be positive even when I’m
screaming on the inside. “I think I got the lead role in Seraphine,” I lie,
sitting down and ignoring Nikolai’s cutesy remark about my outfit—stretch
leggings, an oversized tunic, and a fancy brown jacket to make it all look
acceptable, but hardly classy—the clothing I wore just to prove a point to
Mother, as though she’ll even notice. I play along, smiling wide and doing my
bubbly thing, even though I’m fuming inside.

“That’s
fantastic, darling,” Mother says to me as she downs another glass of peach
schnapps and turns her attention back to Alek.

“I
was kind of thinking you’d show up for this one,” I say, ignoring the way
Nikolai is staring at my profile.

“You
got the role. There was no need for me to be there to make you nervous. You’ve
always done much better on your own.” So she hasn’t heard about my moment of
insanity. Right now, I’m barely an afterthought. She and Alek are passing
annoyed glances at one another. Seems all they ever do lately is argue. This
time the subject of my dysfunctional family’s conversation is my brother’s
girlfriend. That would be his ex-girlfriend, Nadya, a fashion victim and money
piranha whom I couldn’t stand the moment I first laid eyes on her. I agree with
my brother’s decision, and I wish Nikolai would quit staring at me that way
when he thinks Mother and Alek aren’t paying us any mind.

At
once Alek perks up, his gaze focused on a group of people all decked out in
black who are walking through the main area. At first, I think someone must’ve
died and that he’s about to head over to their table and offer his condolences.
Nope. These must be the designers Mother hired, the group that’ll be working to
create an entire line of ballerina costumes based on all things Gothic. That
sounds so freaking awesome! I must meet them. I have to. In a past life, I’m
pretty sure I was either a designer or a journalist.

“Excuse
me,” Alek says to no one in particular at the table, his gaze locked on the
really pretty female with the dark hair and expressive eyes walking among them.
I’m assuming she must be the new designer, Erin Angelo. He stands and heads
over in their direction. The temptation is too much. Why does my brother get to
have all the fun? So, I stand and trail behind him. Turning around at the
halfway point, my brother harasses me for a minute just before we reach their
group, but even his alpha-brother type ‘A’ personality can’t keep me away from
that table. And specifically, he can’t stop the gorgeous site filling my
eyeballs, caressing them with sweetness as I drink in the man candy sitting at
the head of the only rectangular shaped table in the restaurant. I move around
Alek and head straight toward the guy wearing the royal blue shirt, the only
one among the group who has dared to wear a splash of color on his clothing.

“I’m
Adriana Dostovsky.” I hold out my hand to him, and oh-my-God, he has eyes that
give Nikolai a run for the most intriguing blue irises ever … and they are only
the beginning.

Dark
blond hair that’s wavy and swept back from his face reminds me of one of those
broody stars from the 60’s that Mother loves so much. The chiseled jawline and
sculpted nose makes me think there’s Roman blood somewhere along his family
ancestry. His shirt fits well enough to show off broad shoulders and well-toned
abs. However, the thing holding my attention right now happens to be his lip
ring, a silver hoop situated right in the middle of his full bottom lip,
something that looks pretty cool on my other roommate, Jojo, but is insanely
sensual on this man. When he opens his heart-shaped mouth, something gold on
his tongue glitters in the light. Up until that point, my imagination had done
a pretty good job of behaving itself, but as soon as the tongue ring appears in
this picture, I set my thoughts free. My imagination is creating some pretty
raw images of what he might be able to do with his chosen combination of,
eh-em, body jewelry. Italy’s known for its achy-hot designers, but this guy
sets a bar so high that I don’t think many other rock stars of design will
stand a chance of tilting his podium.

And
then, he introduces himself.

Or
rather, he greets me by using another woman’s name.

“Ciao,
Juliette,” he responds, and I’m not sure whether I should be annoyed or
flattered. “Luca Martuccio.”

“I
said Adriana, not Juliette.” Right. Maybe he needs a little work in the manners
department.

“Yes,
I know,” he answers. “A ray of sunshine such as yours can only possess
uniqueness in a name as equally beautiful as the sun rising over the sea.” His
gaze locks on mine. “A girl who has an ocean swimming inside her eyes.” Hmm.
He’s obviously a player, but then, I get a mischievous smile highlighted by
dimples and a genuine earnestness inside his eyes.

Wow!
He’s a professional, even better than my brother ... and Nikolai. Coming from
anyone else, such remarks might be considered lame, like top of the line silly,
too. But on this man, the authenticity in his words, the way he stares into my
eyes as he wraps that tongue—highlighted by the flash of the gold ring embedded
in the tip—around each gorgeously accented syllable triggers something in me
that’s hard to explain.

Suddenly,
I’m glad I combed those bangs back off my face just before leaving the theater.
I would never have wanted to take a chance on missing out on the way Luca
Martuccio is staring at me right now.

Nikolai

I
am an ass.

I
know this, yes.

She
is very much like a little sister to me, a baby, a girl who should be protected
... especially from someone like me.

The
Piazza Del Duomo sits in the heart of Milan. All sections inside the rectangle
lead up to the Duomo cathedral sitting at the far end of the area. This part of
the city, along with the Galleria Del Vittorio, Milan’s largest shopping
district, always fills me with wonder and intrigue as I walk through the
cobblestone streets. It is almost as though I can feel the history and can see
the workers laying the brick work to one of the grandest buildings in the
world. Normally the distractions would be a good enough reason to forget my
problems. The scent of coffee drifts from inside corner one. Rose petal
fragrances fill the air as we walk around corner two and enter the arch leading
into the Galleria’s hundreds of shops. The scent of food envelops me next. There’s
always some kind of aroma drifting inside the air of Milan. However, thoughts
of her perfect breasts, her hips that are dangerously curvy for a dancer, and
the desire in her eyes haunt me. Not even the ancient beauty of Milan can rival
such a memory.

I
have watched her move from a little girl, falling on her ass each time she
tries to do a pirouette, to a woman with a body that turns heads anytime she
enters a building or walks down the street. I have marveled over the way she
has learned how to handle an automobile to mastering the art of using her
body—that stacked steeple I do believe was created by some kind of goddess bent
on torturing me—to the art of using her innocence to entrap a man. But Adriana
Dostovsky does not want just anyone, no. She is not that type of woman, and I
know she will make some lucky bastard extremely happy someday. No, my comrade
Alek’s little sister has her mind hell bent on having one man ... me.

The
way she fired off at Ines Barilla’s offhanded remark stirred something inside
me. She has spirit, guts, and passion. In all my twenty-four years, I have
never met anyone like her before. I’ve never been around a woman who intrigues
me half as much, or turns me on in such a way that is almost painful.
Rein
in your thoughts, Kolya.
What do you do when the flat-chested baby sister
of the man who saved you from life itself suddenly turns into a woman, one who
has the curves of a goddess? You turn away. That is what you do. There is only
one problem, though. I cannot.

The
more I try to resist Adriana, the harder she tries to do things to get my
attention. She wraps me up in a place where only the images of her sweet lips,
so perfectly full, and her exciting blue eyes, filled with innocence, rake over
me. She pulls me under her spell, piercing my heart through to the core, and
killing me with every single gesture I make to deny her the chance to give me
her heart. In turn, I lose the ability to restore my own faith in the word.
Life has ripped me out of one hell—the confines of a Russian overlord who was
hell bent on keeping me as slave to pleasure—and tossed me straight into
another … a place where the most perfect life dangles before my eyes, only to
be held at bay, teasing me with its vicious reminder that Adriana deserves a
hell of a lot more than to be caught up in the fucked up world of someone like
me.

“Nikolai,
you’re miles away from me, hon. Where’d you go?” Katerina Dostovsky asks me,
her gray eyes scanning over my face. We’re standing in front of one of her
favorite bistros as we wait for my lead dancer, Mikhail, to arrive. The hustle
of life in Milan moves around us in full swing on this day. Not even the beauty
of the Galleria can sway my thoughts away from her ... my Rishka, the fighting
spirit, a nickname she earned long ago.

Glancing
into her mother’s gray eyes, I see the resemblance between the two. Suddenly,
guilt assaults me. Eight years ago, this woman risked everything to rescue her
family and me—a child stolen from his life, what seems like an eternity
ago—from the streets of Moscow. She bravely brought us into this life of
beautiful people, things, and cities here in Italia. “Did you hear me,
Nikolai?” she asks again.

I
turn back to Adriana’s mother, the woman who has been both my rescuer and
protector over the years. For this reason alone, I manage to move my traitorous
thoughts of her daughter away from the depths of my mind … although, I know it
will not last long. “I am here. I promise.” I give her a smile that does not
reach my eyes. In return, she narrows hers. Nothing escapes her keen gaze. I
suspect that is how she has risen from the hardships of a no-name life in
Houston, Texas, to become the wife of a Russian overlord, and finally to own a
repertory company she only recently established using Aleksandr’s skills as a
Maestro and mine as a ballet dancer.

Stopping
in front of
The Caffe Florian
, she places her hand over mine, preventing
me from opening the door. I turn to her and guard my eyes, a little trick the
Phoenix—the man responsible for inducting Alek and me into a Russian
gang—taught all his disciples to do. “I’m not quite ready to sit among the
chatty just yet. Since your new dancer doesn’t seem to be able to tell time, I
think we’ll continue walking.” Nodding, I obey as we turn and head through the
plaza, the sun beaming a warm welcome as the rays start to shine from inside
the storm clouds.

“I
know there’s more to this sudden mood swing of yours than you’re saying.” She
places her arm through mine as we walk along Milan’s cobblestone streets,
stopping every so often to admire a Gucci bag here, Adriana’s favorite brand,
and a scarf designed by Fendi there, Katerina’s preferred house. Women. I
should think I will never understand the fascination with shoes and bags; and
especially Katerina, whom I do believe owns a part of every single fashion
house here in Milan. The woman has a room in her villa, which sits beside Lake
Como, built specifically for housing her clothing.

“I
am fine, really,” I lie, keeping my gaze focused straight ahead. I can feel her
sharp gaze studying my profile. Right away, she stops and turns to me. Everyone
else in the plaza walks around us. Katerina commands attention in this way, no
matter where she goes. Now, I understand where her daughter has inherited her
ability to do the same thing.

“Your
happiness, Nikolai, means just as much to me as my own children’s does. You do
know this, I hope.”

I
wish I could tell her that I believe in comfy, cozy little endings. I believe
that someday I will forget all the things I suffered at the hands of a mad
man—animalistic acts that not even my greatest enemy should have been put
through, let alone a thirteen-year-old boy on the verge of becoming a man. My
life has not been the same, will never be again. If it weren’t for Alek and his
mother, then I would have been tied up and left to die inside that bedchamber,
destined to be no more than a toy, a dog ... a whore. I owe only honesty and
good intentions to the people who saved me.

“Katerina,
I am fine. I am only anxious about meeting our new lead dancer. Be assured and
happy now, all right?” I give her my best imitation of a smile, the kind I use
to get what I want from women, and yes, even a few men every so often.

Katerina
narrows her eyes, gives me a knowing side-glance along with a twisted smile,
and says, “I’ll accept that gorgeous grin of yours for now. I know you, Nik. As
well as I do my own contradictory self.” We lock gazes and hold them, speaking
a load of words in the silence drifting between us.
Does she know me?
I
sometimes wonder if I even recognize myself, the Nikolai that’s buried under
layers of hate, mistrust, and heartache; feelings I just sometimes do not
understand.

I
am lost, and it does not even matter I have been found by a wonderful family.
You
do not deserve them, Kolya. Nor do you deserve her ... Rishka, not even as an
afterthought.
If I do not stop these voices, I think I will go insane.

Later
tonight, I plan to meet up with Alek. We will go out and help him settle into
this breakup with Nadya, the best move he has made since he decided to create a
symphonic production based on one of the most controversial arrangements of all
time,
Requiem for a Dream
. Then, I can do what I always do best … I can
drown my traitorous thoughts inside the warm arms of a woman.