Chapter 1 - THE LANGUAGE HE THOUGHT I DIDN'T KNOW
Z
The question hung between us.
“Who taught you to speak like that?”
I placed the wine bottle on the table and met Nikolai Sokolov's eyes.
“My father.”
“Your father,” he repeated in Russian.
“Yes.”
“What did he do?”
“He taught me not to confuse money with intelligence.”
Roman made a quiet sound beside him. It might have been a laugh, but it died when Nikolai turned his head.
The two guards remained behind me. I could feel their attention pressing against my back, and I knew I had made a mistake by answering the way I had.
Not because I regretted it.
Because I had forgotten, for three seconds, that the people sitting at this table were not ordinary wealthy men with oversized egos. Nikolai Sokolov had built his reputation on making examples of people who embarrassed him. A waitress who insulted him in his own language would ordinarily be a convenient place to begin.
But he didn't order his guards to remove me.
Instead, he pointed at the empty chair across from him.
“Sit.”
“I’m working.”
“Then consider this a conversation about your employment.”
“I would prefer to have it with my manager present.”
Roman leaned forward. “You don't understand who you're speaking to.”
I looked at him.
“I understand perfectly. That's why I asked for my manager.”
For a second, Roman appeared ready to stand.
Nikolai lifted two fingers.
Roman settled back into his chair.
“Your name,” Nikolai said.
“Aria Montgomery.”
“Your real name.”
My stomach tightened.
“That is my real name.”
He studied me as though he had discovered a locked door and was deciding whether it was worth breaking down.
“Where did you learn Russian?”
“At home.”
“Which part of home?”
“Ohio.”
“That doesn't answer my question.”
“It answers the question you asked.”
His mouth almost moved into a smile.
Almost.
Then he switched to a dialect I'd heard only in my father's study and once in a hospital corridor outside Warsaw. The words were old-fashioned, precise, and chosen to test whether my knowledge was merely academic.
I answered in the same dialect.
His eyes sharpened.
Roman stopped pretending not to listen.
Nikolai asked another question, this time about a regional expression that had nearly disappeared from everyday speech. I corrected his pronunciation of one word, then explained why the expression carried a different meaning in formal negotiations than it did in casual conversation.
When I finished, he leaned back.
“Six months?”
“Pardon?”
“You've worked here six months?”
“Seven.”
“And you've spent seven months pretending you don't understand Russian.”
“I have spent seven months doing my job.”
“Why?”
Because I had learned that being underestimated was safer than being remembered.
Because my father had taught me that the most dangerous person in a room was often the one who knew what everyone else was saying.
Because the last time someone discovered what I could understand, my family had paid for it.
I said none of those things.
“Because nobody asked.”
Nikolai glanced at Roman.
Roman's expression had become unreadable.
Then Nikolai said something so quietly that even the guards behind me seemed to miss it.
“Tell me what you heard when we were discussing the shipment.”
My pulse stumbled.
I had hoped he wouldn't ask that.
During the previous twenty minutes, the men at this table had discussed a delayed container, a missing customs document, and a shipment that supposedly contained industrial machinery. Roman had accused a business partner of selling information to a rival organization. Nikolai had replied that suspicion was not proof.
But there had been something else.
A name.
A number.
A destination that had made Roman's face change.
I folded my hands in front of me.
“I heard a business disagreement.”
“That's all?”
“That's all I'm prepared to discuss while I'm standing in a restaurant uniform.”
Nikolai stared at me.
Then, unexpectedly, he laughed once.
It wasn't a warm sound, but it was genuine enough to surprise Roman.
“You're either remarkably brave or remarkably foolish.”
“I'm a waitress who wants to finish her shift and go home.”
“Then perhaps you should have kept your mouth shut.”
“Perhaps you should have kept yours shut first.”
The words escaped before I could stop them.
The room went silent again.
I felt the blood drain from my face.
Nikolai looked at me for a long moment.
Then he turned toward the door.
“Bring Laurent in.”
One guard left.
I remained standing.
“Am I being fired?” I asked.
“No.”
“Arrested?”
“Do you see a police officer?”
“I see two men with guns.”
“Then I suggest you stop asking questions you already know the answers to.”
I should have hated him.
I did hate him, a little.
But beneath his coldness, something had shifted. He wasn't looking at me like a piece of furniture anymore. He was looking at me like a person whose presence complicated a problem he had not anticipated.
That was not necessarily better.
Sometimes being invisible was safer.
Laurent entered two minutes later, pale and sweating.
Nikolai gestured toward me.
“Your waitress speaks Russian.”
Laurent looked at me.
For one awful second, I thought he might deny knowing anything about my background. Instead, he closed his eyes briefly.
“Yes, Mr. Sokolov.”
“How long have you known?”
“I didn't.”
Nikolai's gaze moved back to me.
“Interesting.”
I grabbed the wine bottle.
“Now that the mystery is solved, may I return to work?”
“No,” he said.
My fingers tightened around the bottle.
“Why not?”
“Because the woman who was supposed to interpret this meeting disappeared fourteen hours ago, and you may be the only person in this building who understood the conversation that preceded it.”
I went cold.
“What woman?”
Nikolai's expression hardened.
“Her name was Elena Markovic.”
I knew that name.
Not from the news.
Not from the restaurant.
From a letter my father had hidden inside a book, a letter I had read only after the funeral.
And when Nikolai noticed the recognition on my face, he stopped looking amused.
“Miss Montgomery,” he said softly, “I believe you know more than you've told me.”
I set the bottle down.
For the first time that evening, I had no clever answer.
Because Elena Markovic was not just a missing interpreter.
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She was the last person who had spoken to my father before he died.
And seven years ago, she had told me never to trust a man named Sokolov.
