With This Ring

In fact, the jerk didn’t even bother looking at me while we waited for the elevator car to arrive. Instead, he pulled out his phone from his pocket and began to go through what I assumed were messages. When the elevator dinged its arrival, he pushed me in and we were on our way up to the topmost floor. When the doors swished open again, we were in a large waiting room. He pushed me right past his secretary, a short, scraggly haired man that bore an uncanny resemblance to Daniel Radcliffe, gave the impression his boss wheeling in a disheveled woman towards him was an ordinary everyday occurrence. He smiled politely at me as he stood and went ahead to open the double doors to what must be Maxim’s office.

Chapter Seventeen

Freya

“What do you want to eat?” Maxim asked as we got through the wide doors.

I was stunned by Maxim’s office. It was one seamless glass cube, and almost made me feel as though I was suspended in the sky, the landscape of the entire city almost seemed like an unreal painting that he had no doubt spent a fortune to have access to.

“Whoa, this is awesome. You must feel like God up here,” I said in awe.

When I didn’t hear a response, I turned to see him watching me as he stood behind his desk, all regal and powerful, his phone in hand.

“There are loads of high-rises in the city. Go rent the top floor of one of them,” he suggested.

“I’m a struggling jewelry designer. I can barely afford a sublet in the Bronx.”

“You’re richer than you think,” he said softly.

“My dad’s money is not mine and I refuse to get blood on my hands so I can have an office in the sky.”

It was water off a duck’s back. “What do you want to eat?” he repeated.

“Let me see … what’s the most expensive lunch that money can buy?”

“I wouldn’t know.”

“Well, that’s what I want.”

We gazed at each other and for a moment I wondered if he would someday just get fed up with me and put a bullet in my head. Then he pressed the intercom to his phone and I heard his secretary’s voice come through. “Gary, come in,”

A few minutes later, he walked in, a fixed smile on his face. “Yes, Sir.”

“Tell him what you want,” Maxim said and took his seat. He picked up a folder before him and began to flip through the documents inside.

“What’s the most expensive lunch money can buy in this city?” I asked him.

“Ah, uh… I guess I have to look that up.”

“Well that’s what I want, except if it’s a clam or oysters dish. In that case, then skip it and get me the next most expensive option.”

“Yes, Miss Federov,” he responded. Well, well, he knew who I was. He turned his gaze to his boss. “The usual for you, Sir?”

Maxim nodded and his secretary walked away. I rolled my chair towards his polished walnut desk, and stopped at a reasonable distance away. “So are we going to talk?”

“You were the one who asked for this meeting,” he said, lifting those piercing eyes up to meet mine. “Have your say, I have another meeting in thirty minutes.”

I rolled my eyes at his air of arrogance and got straight to the point. “Levan insinuated that what I have always believed about your role in Anna’s death is incorrect. Is that true?”

“What do you know about my involvement?”

“The same thing as the rest of Russia. You ‘handled’ her father, a good man, I might add, to prove yourself to your father.”

“That is true,” he admitted.

Something painful hit me right in the middle of my chest. I had come here with some secret hope in my heart. All traces of civility towards him immediately disappeared and once again we were like vipers, staring each other down.

“So what then am I doing here?”

“I don’t know. What are you doing here?”

I couldn’t believe him. Oh, how I hated him. I turned around with my chair and began to head towards his exit. Just then the door was pushed open and his secretary came in holding a notepad and a pen in his hands. For some reason, I stopped in my tracks.

“Miss Fedorov, the most expensive grilled cheese sandwich is from Serendipity 3. It costs $214 dollars.”

It took my next question for me to understand that I didn’t want to leave just yet. “Why is it so expensive?” I asked.

He referred to his notepad. “The bread itself is baked with Dom Perignon champagne. The filling is caciocavallo podolico, which is a special cheese imported from southern Italy. The rare breed of cows that produce this cheese are bred on the Apennines where they feed on upland grasses and mountain plants like wild fennel, nettles, blueberries, liquorice and myrtle.