Gilded Tears: A Russian Mafia Romance (Kovalyov Bratva Book 2) Nicole Fox (no david read aloud TXT) 📖

“I don’t know,” she admits. “I just don’t see myself in traditional roles. A wife, a mother. But you make it all look so easy.”

“I’ve barely begun being a wife and a mother,” I point out. “I might suck at it.”

“You won’t,” Tamara says, with so much confidence that it makes me curious.

“How can you be so sure?”

Tamara looks at me with a measured expression. “You just have that maternal vibe,” she tells me. “You used to look after me a lot. Every time I freaked about something—mostly boys— you used to talk me down off the ledge. You were always so calm and comforting. It made me feel better.”

“That was Cesar, not me.”

She shakes her head. “No, it was you, Esme. You helped me. And you helped him, too. He leaned on you.”

I frown at that. “He never leaned on me,” I tell her. “I was always the one running to him. The one leaning on him.”

Tamara shrugs like I don’t know what I’m talking about. “I dunno. There was just an air about the two of you,” she says. “It’s like he used to come to you when he was most broken, and you’d just fix him right up again. Even if you didn’t know that’s what you were doing at the time.”

I try and think back to old memories, something that might ring true with what Tamara is telling me.

But I don’t seem to come up with anything.

“I think you’re wrong.”

“I’m not,” she says, shaking her head. “He told me so himself.”

That jolts me. “Um… what?” I ask, wondering if I’d misheard her.

I can’t ever remember the two of them talking. Cesar tended to avoid the house when Tamara was visiting. He’d never been a huge fan. She was too loud and too excitable for him—at least, that’s what he used to tell me.

“Yeah,” she says. “I was spending the weekend one time and I ran into him in the garden.”

“Where was I?”

“If memory serves, you were sleeping off a hangover,” she chuckles. “I’d convinced you to get drunk the night before.”

Plausible enough. That had happened a few times, so it wasn’t like I could pinpoint when exactly this memory occurred. I could have been anywhere between fourteen and sixteen.

Close to the end of Cesar’s life.

“Anyway, I always bounced back much quicker than you did and I got bored in the room,” she continues. “So I went down to explore the gardens and I ran into Cesar.”

“And he… he talked to you?”

“Trust me: he tried hard to avoid me,” she laughs. “Broke my heart, too. I always had a little crush on him.”

“Ew, Tamara!” I say. “He was your cousin, too.”

“I know, I know,” she giggles. “But I was a stupid teenager and it wasn’t like he and I were ever very close.”

I shake my head in dismay. “So…”

“So, he asked me where you were and I told him you were sleeping,” Tamara continues. I find myself clinging to every word. “It was small talk for the first few minutes and then I noticed how—I dunno, how sad he looked.”

“Sad.”

“Very sad,” she confirms. “So I asked him what was wrong and he told me he’d had a rough couple of days. I asked him what he did to cope and he said—and I quote—‘I talk to Esme.’”

I talk to Esme.

Those words do something to my heart that I can’t quite explain.

“He really said that?” I ask quietly

Tamara nods with a small smile. “He really said that,” she repeats.

“Did he… did he say anything else?” I ask. I’m greedy for more information. For the brother I loved. For any scrap of him I can cling to and feel like he’s still with me—some way, somehow.

Tamara gives me a sad smile and I feel my heart drop with disappointment.

“Sorry, hon,” she says gently. “He wasn’t in a very chatty mood. At least, not with me.”

I nod as an image of Cesar floats across my eyes. I see him, not as the man he turned out to be, but the boy he was. All easy smiles and silly anecdotes that he made up just to amuse me.

I used to think he was larger than life. But I realize now that that probably wasn’t very fair to him.

He already had so much pressure from Papa.

He didn’t need more from me.

“You still miss him, don’t you?” Tamara asks, reading my expression.

“Of course,” I say in a choked voice. “I miss him every day. Even…”

I trail off, leaving my sentence unfinished. Thankfully, Tamara doesn’t press me to continue. I sigh and fuss with Phoenix’s little overalls for a few seconds.

“I always envied your connection with him,” Tamara says.

“Because you had a crush on him?” I tease.

She laughs. “No, I mean, just the sibling connection the two of you had. It must have been nice to have someone to rely on no matter what.”

No matter what.

The phrase falls dully against my chest and it makes me feel lonely for a moment.

And then something else hits me suddenly, a realization that I might never have come to if it hadn’t been for Tamara.

He used to come to you when he was most broken, and you’d just fix him right up again.

Maybe subconsciously, those were the moments I lived for, because it made me feel like Cesar needed me.

It made me feel strong, important… special.

And when he died, I felt like I’d failed him.

Because a part of me had always known he was suffering.

And I hadn’t known how to fix him. I tried my best to figure it out, but before I could, I lost him.

“I haven’t had anyone to rely on since Cesar’s death,” I admit, keeping my hand on Phoenix and patting him gently every now and again. It’s almost time for his next feeding.

“Your papa protected you,” Tamara points out.

“No,” I reply, shaking my head. “Papa protected himself and his business. I was only ever a commodity to be sold and bartered when it suited him. Not a person. Just another