Chapter 140 One-hundred & Forty

• ZAKHAR
• I spent last night with Aria in the building, listening to the traffic pass by the building. Locked in the office, we made love again and again. She looked beautiful, even wrapped in a shipping blanket. I told her I would risk her coming out to Long Island for the weekend. I often spend weekends alone in a rented house to wind down from the city. I must have smiled like an oblivious fool when she agreed.
• I enter the penthouse, and instantly, I can tell that something is off. It's too quiet though the staff are about. Sure, they work in silence, but today, they're taking great lengths not to make any noise, as if they're tiptoeing past a sleeping lion. I glance over at the living room couch, and little Mikhail is sitting slumped against it. He stares at a screen in his hands. His sketchbook is closed and untouched, and he has a worried scowl on his face.