This wasn’t a coincidence. He didn’t just happen to sit like that. Konstantin was a Prime and his appearance was as integral to his magic as my songs were to me. He wanted me to think of sex when I looked at him. It could have been simply habit. It could be calculated, or it could be vanity. Perhaps getting me emotionally engaged served as additional insurance. Perhaps he really was planning to recruit me to the Imperial side. That last thought was alarming.
“You and I are similar,” Konstantin said.
“How so?”
“We are both planners, forced into it by both natural inclination and circumstance. Our families have a similar structure. My older brother is a lot like your Nevada. Smart, competent, slightly scary, with a strong sense of responsibility. Arkadiy fully committed himself to becoming the next Duke. He is our father’s creature through and through. If he had any thought of taking the wheel and steering his life in any other direction, it has long been smothered by duty and destiny. He loves me and cares for me. Although I don’t know if he does it out of genuine affection or because that’s what an older brother should do. Arkadiy strives to be exemplary in every aspect.”
I had no doubt that Nevada genuinely loved me and Arabella and not out of obligation. But this wasn’t about me. This was about gathering as much information about Konstantin as he was willing to give.
“And your younger brother?”
The prince smiled. “He is very much like your Arabella. Mihail never met a rule he didn’t want to rebel against.”
He pronounced the name as Mee-high-eel and as he said it, a little distaste slipped through. Not on the best terms with the younger brother, are we?
“Sometimes his rebellion is justified; other times I think he does it because he’s bored, or because he has fallen into a pattern and that is the way he is comfortable interacting with life. He has a temper, a real one, and the longer he holds it in check, the more violently it eventually explodes. He is two years older than you, but if our parents, Arkadiy, and I perished, he would run our House into the ground in six months.”
Arabella did have a temper, but she was also willing to listen to reason.
“And you?” I asked.
“I’m the mediator. I intercede and soothe. I listen, I flatter when I must, reassure when it’s needed, I threaten, I plan, I take steps, and so on.”
“So what does any of this have to do with Alessandro?”
“Like your family, mine is loud and filled with strong personalities. We function as a unit because once a plan is laid out and agreed on, all of us stick to it. Even Misha, despite his relentless fight against all orders, does as he is told in a crisis. I’ve worked with Alessandro before. Alessandro rejects all plans except his own. He doesn’t rebel, because to rebel against authority one has to recognize it exists in the first place. My distant cousin is an army of one, a world unto himself. He might put himself on a leash for a short while, but he will never let you hold it, and when he decides to charge, all bets are off. In short, if I had to work with him on a daily basis, he would drive me insane within weeks.”
“But you did work with him.” Not that Alessandro told me anything about that—yet another thing we would have to discuss. It just seemed like the logical assumption.
“Briefly, three years ago.” Konstantin leaned forward. “I’ll be blunt. The Imperium would move heaven and earth to recruit a Prime of Alessandro’s caliber. Yet, we’ve made no effort to do so. He’s a liability.”
He was making Alessandro sound like an irrational, petulant man-child. That was so wildly off the mark, it wasn’t even funny. Alessandro was perfectly willing to follow Linus’ orders. He’d changed after Arkan almost killed him, but it was mostly about setting his priorities straight, not altering the core of who he was. There was more there that I would have to dig up.
“So, I ask again, what’s the attraction? Help me solve this puzzle.”
I shrugged. “You saw the Alessandro he wanted you to see and drew the conclusions he wanted you to draw. I see a different Alessandro.”
“How do you know the Alessandro he shows you is the real one?”
Because he loves me. I smiled at him. “I trust him.”
“That’s not an answer.”
I ignored him.
“He is so much trouble, Catalina. Is he worth it?”
“Yes,” I told him. “He is.”
You could always tell how good the meal was by how much talking was done at the table. The family stayed quiet for an entire ten minutes, so the dinner was a resounding success.