It wasn’t what Anya was hoping for but as she looked across the room and noticed her mother peeking through the door watching the entire interaction, she knew that things were as good as they were going to get.
“
Good morning,” Royal said with a soft smile on her face. She leaned against the door in her plush white robe. The rings under her eyes matched her husband’s and her hair was even wilder than Anya’s.
“
Momma, can I stay home today, please?” Anya asked, moving her pleas to her mother.
“
I don’t even know why you ask when you already know the answer,” Royal said, opening her daughter’s dresser drawer. “Do you want to wear pink or purple today?”
Anya had two favorite colors, and she wore a variation of the two every single day.
“
Pink,” Anya pouted off the bed. She went into her walk-in closet and began to pull out her school uniform.
Dmitry stood up and stretched. “Well, my work here is done. She’s had her teeth brushed and her face washed. The rest is up to you, my dear,” he said as he bent to his wife’s ear.
“
Ummm, thanks,” Royal said, feeling his lips on her neck.
Dmitry heard Anya rustling in the closet and turned back to Royal. “We now have less than one week before the six-week sentence is up, and I can ravage you from head to toe,” he said with a growl.
“
Promises, promises,” Royal said playfully. “I don’t know if you can handle me after six weeks of no sex. I might be too much for you.”
“
Please say that’s a challenge,” Dmitry toyed. “Because, I’m going to make you eat your words.”
Royal turned to him with her daughter’s underwear clutched in her hand. “Well, I have plans of making you eat a lot more than that,” she said suggestively.
“
Are you hungry, Daddy?” Anya asked eavesdropping as she stepped out of the closet with her jacket and skirt for school.
Dmitry cracked a smile at his wife, knowing that they would pick this conversation up later when they were alone. “Starving,” he answered. Turning to his daughter, he smiled and cleared his throat. “That’s why daddy is headed downstairs to fix you breakfast, munchkin.”
“
Can I have pancakes?” Anya asked innocently.
“
You certainly may,” he said, running his hand through her hair. “Any other requests?” he asked as he walked to the door. He looked at his wife and licked his wide, rose-colored lips. “Maybe something different for the lady of the house?”
“
I’ll get back to you,” Royal answered as she swept his body with her eyes.
“
I’ll be looking forward to it,” Dmitry answered as he disappeared behind the door.
Royal bit her lip and turned back to her chores, trying to suppress the laugh that was trapped behind her devious smile. The truth was that she wanted him as badly as he wanted her, but rules were rules. The doctor had ordered the over-sexed pair to absolutely wait until her six-week check-up before they made love again, which meant that all they could do at the present was foreplay each other to death. And in between taking care of now
three
children, running business and normally day-to-day chores, even that was nearly impossible.
***
Hot pancakes cooked directly from daddy’s hand and served up on a little porcelain plate just for Anya was just what the little princess ordered before school. While still pouting because she wasn’t allowed to stay home with her new brothers, she had managed to be in better spirits with the entire family at the kitchen table.
However, the
family
was barely awake.
Dmitry did his normal morning ritual at the head of the table. With a glass of orange juice beside a cup of coffee and a plate full of turkey bacon, fried eggs and toast, he thumbed through his financials on his I-Pad and occasionally looked over at the news playing on the television mounted up on the wall directly in front of them. It took everything in him to focus this morning as his age as well as his children were catching up with him. He remembered a time when such trivial tasks would have neither effected his body nor his psyche but that was many lifetimes ago.
Now, he was much grayer than when his daughter was born five years ago and a little less resilient on just a few hours of sleep. His enormous seven-foot frame was slouched over the table, holding up all 320 pounds of aching muscle. He, too, had forgone his usual dress for silk pajamas and a cotton gray t-shirt – a far cry from the man who normally dressed in three-piece suits. But this was the life that he had chosen, and in truth, regardless of how hard it was at times, he enjoyed it immensely.
His life was peaceful, meaningful and finally worth something.
Drifting off in her own world, Royal sat beside Dmitry stirring her coffee and dozing off to sleep. Still in her robe, she had managed before breakfast and after dressing Anya to pull her hair into a loose ponytail and run hot water over her face to stay awake through breakfast, but that was about all that she could muster. All she could think of was rest and how much of it she had been denied lately.
Where before the babies’ birth, she always was dressed to the teeth by breakfast, now if she dressed at all, she was off to a good start. It was odd, but she didn’t recall Anya’s arrival
even with post-partum
depression being as dramatic as the twins’ arrival, which had been laborious but without the mental exhaustion that she had suffered with her daughter. She could only attribute that to the fact that Ivan wasn’t a part of this pregnancy.
The twins had been a handful to carry and even more difficult to birth. After being in labor for eight hours, she had undergone a well-needed C-section and awoke to Konstantin and Maxim Medlov. Konstantin was the oldest by three minutes, but Maxim was the largest by five ounces. Konstantin was a spitting image of his father with blonde locks and bright blue eyes while Maxim was a spitting image of Ivan and Anya, ironically, with jet black hair and startling almost grayish blue eyes.
They could never get away from the man, no matter how they tried. Ivan’s genes were forever present, always serving as a reminder that he had been on this earth and he had forever impacted their lives. Only, she was in a place in her life where he was not such a moot factor.
At the end of the day, Royal thought both of her children to be beautiful, and she loved them dearly. And in truth, she didn’t mind that two of her children looked like Ivan, because they were nothing like him and everything like their father.
What woman wouldn’t be proud?
With the new additions and all that was still required by Royal, she was thankful for the help that she had around the house. The nanny who was nearly twice her age came in during the day and some evenings. The entire family had learned their lesson about hiring young nannies like Victoria.
Stepan, the family butler helped run the other parts of the house along with maids, and Davyd, their dearest friend and Dmitry’s closest companion, took Anya to school, drove Royal to all of her appointments and to her boutique and ran most of the family’s errands. He was most definitely their rock, more like the grandfather of the bunch than an employee. In fact, Anya had no clue that he wasn’t a Medlov.
Still, no amount of money could help with the true parenting. That was left up to her and Dmitry. And they devoted themselves to the job one hundred percent of the time.
After the nanny from hell, Victoria, had been dismissed over a year ago, Dmitry and Royal had agreed to do some things by themselves. And with a family as complicated as they were, it was best.
Besides, not many people would knowingly work for a mob family – not if they were smart. And everyone who did work for them had been thoroughly checked along with their families, from the nanny to the cook to the yard hands and farmers. No one was allowed on the chateau property without first being cleared by Dmitry himself. He had a guy in the CIA who did a thorough check for everyone and if they didn’t pass the background check, they didn’t get on the property.
Davyd chuckled as he fixed his plate, when the baby monitor sitting in between Dmitry and Royal made a noise. Evidently one of the twins rolled over and cried in their sleep. Immediately, both Royal and Dmitry froze in place, scared to death that the few minutes of peace that they thought they had had been stolen from them.
“
Please go back to sleep,” Royal begged as she put down her cup of coffee.
Dmitry looked at the monitor with a raised brow, waiting for the now familiar long, cry of one of his boys but was let off the hook when they just went back to sleep.
“
Thank God,” Royal said, releasing the tension in her shoulders.
“
I’ve never seen two people so afraid of babies,” Davyd said, sitting down beside Anya. “Good morning, princess.”
“
Good morning, Davyd,” Anya said with a little pout.
“
And what’s the matter with you?” he asked with a thick Russian accent. He doted over her as much as her father did and was just as blind to her games.
“
They won’t let me stay home today,” she tattled in a whisper as she looked over at her parents.
He looked at the couple too. “Well, I’m sure that the boys will be here when you get home,” Davyd whispered back and winked his eye. He looked over Anya at Dmitry. “Do you need anything from town while I’m out this morning?”
“
No,” Dmitry said gruffly. “All I need is a little rest.”
“
Well, Marta will be here in about an hour,” Davyd said, looking at his watch.
“
Forty-five minutes,” Dmitry corrected. “And I plan to sleep for at least eight hours once she gets here.”
Royal smirked. “You’re the one who wanted more children.”
“
Maybe we’ll wait until these can take care of the others before we start up again,” Dmitry answered.
“
Others?
Dmitry, I don’t plan to have any more of your children,” Royal joked. “This shop is currently shut down for business.” She motioned towards her still plump belly.
“
We’ve heard that before,” Davyd said with a chuckle.
“
She knows that she can’t resist my charm,” Dmitry said to Davyd, leaning over to kiss her cheek. “What woman in her right mind could resist a Russian?”
“
Haven’t run into one yet,” Davyd added.
Playfully, Royal pulled away from him. “Your charms have the both of us sleep deprived and me in need of a tummy tuck.”
Anya watched the interaction between her mother and father and laughed too. Turning back to her nearly finished breakfast, she had a curious thought.
“
Uncle Davyd, why don’t you have kids?” she asked suddenly.
Davyd cleared his throat and looked over at Dmitry again.
Kids ask the craziest questions
, he thought to himself. “Well, because I’m not married,” he finally said when he realized Anya was waiting for a response. He knew that while the Medlov family was not normal, Dmitry believed dearly in conservative views regarding his children.
“
Why aren’t you married?” she asked as a follow-up.
Dmitry stuffed the bacon in his mouth and cracked a devious smile. “Because he’s a playboy,” he answered to let Davyd off the hook. He knew that his daughter was far too young to understand their code. Davyd was an old-school Vor, a man of the Thieves-in-Law and he was married to it and it only. He would never marry or have children, even though he had had many opportunities over the years.
“
You mean you’re a playboy like Anatoly?” Anya asked with a grin. “He has had a million girlfriends,
and
he has a problem with commitment.” She had no idea what it meant, but she liked the idea that she had remembered what was said about her brother.
“
Anya, where did you hear that Anatoly was a playboy?” Royal asked concerned.
“
I heard the maid, Clarisse, tell the other maid, Loni, that he was a playboy just the other day,” Anya answered honestly. “What does he like to play? Hide and go seek?”
Dmitry couldn’t help himself although he could see that Royal was turning red. He laughed aloud and hit the table. So did Davyd, but he muffled his laugh in his hand.
“
Priceless,” Dmitry finally chuckled.
Royal cut her eyes at her husband and corrected her daughter. “Your brother is just young. He’s in a
committed
relationship with the nice woman you met, Renee. A playboy means that he can’t commit, or can’t love one person. But he does. It just took him a long time to find someone to love…just like daddy.”
“
I doubt if she even remembers Renee,” Dmitry said, wiping his face with his napkin. He could always count on Anya to cheer him up, and he could always count on Royal to get too serious.
“
I remember her, Daddy. She is the pretty black woman that Ana always brings on family trips with him now,” Anya said, proud that she remembered.
Dmitry raised his brow. “Well, she does remember,” he said impressed.
Royal, however, was focused on another aspect of the conversation. “Who told you that she was black?”
“
We learned about race at school last week,” Anya answered. “Isn’t she black, Mommy?”
Royal nodded. “She’s African-American, just like me, just like
you
.”