Claim

30

Lyon took a deep breath as he rode the Waldorf’s elevator to the Gold Terrace suite Kira had rented for his mother. He hadn’t entirely planned for the conversation ahead — he’d half expected his mother to turn him away — but when the desk clerk had called to tell her Lyon was here to see her, she’d told them to send him up.

Now he was scrambling for words, although they probably wouldn’t matter. This would likely be the last conversation he ever had with his mother.

The elevator stopped and the doors slid open to a wide silent hall. There were only a handful of doors on this floor, likely suites like the ones his mother now occupied. He knocked on the suite number given to him by the clerk and a moment later the door opened to reveal his mother.

She studied him for a long moment, as if rethinking her decision to invite him up, then opened the door to allow him entry.

“Mother.” He walked in and looked around. The living room was nice, spacious by hotel room standards, if not as spacious as the suites Lyon was accustomed to occupying.

Still, it had been generous of Kira to arrange for such nice accommodations — the luxury furnishings, the terrace that overlooked the city — under the circumstances.

He liked that about his wife — her elegance, her good manners.

Everywhere except in bed, where she was as dirty and voracious as Lyon.

He liked that too.

“Would you like a drink?” his mother asked, shaking the ice in a half-full glass of clear liquid Lyon assumed was vodka.

“A little early for me.” He wanted to be clearheaded for the conversation ahead, to say nothing of the celebratory dinner at Ludis that evening and his wedding in the morning.

“Suit yourself.” She sat on the gray sofa and crossed her legs, clad in loose but tailored white pants. “You’ve changed since I left America.”

“It’s been years,” he said. “I’ve grown up.”

She drained the last of her drink and made her way to the bar to get another one. “Yes, yes. I know you think I should have stayed in touch, but we both know we’ve never had that kind of relationship. Why pretend?”

“Why not work to build that kind of relationship?” Lyon asked with genuine curiosity. His mother was right: they’d never been close, but not because Lyon didn’t wish it.

She filled the glass with vodka and returned to the sofa. “It wasn’t work that was missing in our relationship. It was a certain kind of…” She looked up as she searched for the word. “Chemistry.”

“Chemistry?”

She shrugged. “Do you assume that because I gave birth to you we’re well suited to friendship?” She sighed heavily. “The burdens placed on mothers never end. We carry you in our bodies, ruin those same bodies giving birth to you, endure years of sacrifice and ingratitude, and after all that we’re expected to feel warmth toward you, to have a natural affinity for you no matter your personality or ours. It’s inhumane really.”

It shouldn’t have hurt. Not after all these years. He was a man. A man with a wife and a child on the way. A man who had fought and killed to build his future.

But it did. He wouldn’t lie to himself.

It hurt.

“Is that why you never cared for me?” he asked. “Because our personalities weren’t well suited?”

“What other reason do you need?” she asked. “You were always your father’s son.”

Lyon remembered the frosty silences between his parents. “I take it you didn’t have a natural affinity for him either?”

She waved away the question. “Times were different then. It was the Cold War. We did what we had to do to further our own interests and we didn’t complain about it. We saw life as the business it is and we didn’t expect it to treat us with care.”

“So why bother coming back?” he said. “Or was that just for Vadim?”

He was gratified by the split-second flinch that crossed her features before they settled back into the mask of boredom she’d worn since she appeared in their living room.

“Vadim thought it would be a good idea,” she said. “Although I admit to being curious.”

“About?”

“What kind of man you’d become beyond the stories of the Lion, what kind of woman you’d married in Viktor’s daughter.” A smirk lifted the corners of her mouth. “I must admit to being surprised when I heard. She was always such an arrogant little thing. It wasn’t until I met her that it made sense.”