As my boss and I made our way to Viktor’s father’s office to sign the documents for the process, I didn’t know that my life was about to change, and that it wouldn’t be a result of the contracts being finalized but because of you. I was about to see you. I wasn’t at my best. All my fretting had left a pimple on my cheek, and my boss was just as tense. In the elevator she slapped my arms, ordering me to keep them straight. We didn’t need crossed arms or any other hostile body language in this meeting. Neither of us had met Vitali “Veles” Kravets before. He had a reputation, though. Aleksey told me that Veles’s nickname had come from a long-ago fistfight: his defeat had seemed certain, and he lay on the ground looking dead. That made his opponent careless, and, while he basked in his glory, Vitali hit his enemy with a broken bottle. Because of the mess his opponent had made of his forehead, people started calling him Veles, the horned Slavic god, the lord of the underworld who had risen from the dead.

However, our fears were unfounded. The success of our agency had clearly made an impression on Veles, who casually discussed the business landscape with my boss as our lawyers finalized details that had already been reviewed multiple times. There was no sign of Viktor or his wife. If I hadn’t seen evidence of her existence—her signature and Aleksey’s photographs—I might have suspected Lada Kravets was a ghost. Despite the phone messages I’d left for her, she had never called me back. According to my boss, Lada was aware of our progress, and that had to be enough. It was enough for my boss, at least.

The release of tension made my head fall. I tried to stay awake by counting the dead animals that covered the huge office walls. Lion. Wolf. Bear. Exposed predator teeth. Moose antlers. On the back wall an entire crocodile. I had noticed the stick-on label next to it when I entered, the crosses on it telling me that the room had been blessed. A stuffed carp was submerged in the golden tassels of the curtain. The air-conditioning hummed, and the gilded grandfather clock ticked like a somnolent metronome. Occasionally its rhythm was interrupted by chirping from the birdcage, and then a crack would break it entirely. Crunch, like a chestnut smashed under a shoe. Or the shell of a snail. The irregular crunching coming from the corner of the room continued. I was sure I hadn’t heard it before. Out of the corner of my eye, I spotted a man sitting in an armchair watching us. Above your head hung another bear trophy and a stuffed bird with a long beak. You were sitting at a small marble table. On the table was a crystal bowl full of nuts. As you smashed them with a nutcracker, you dropped the shells on the floor. Suddenly I was perfectly awake.