In fact, Christina was categorically against her father’s marriage, although five years had passed since their divorce from her mother. However, the stepmother managed to impress her, so she soon changed her mind. Larisa was a sweet, well-mannered, elegant lady who, moreover, endlessly admired her beauty and constantly presented gifts. Christina even sometimes reproached herself by buying these gifts - expensive perfumes, fashion jewelry, vintage accessories and other pleasant things. Was she still such a child? However, she was only eighteen, and, given her modest life experience and the absence of any problems, it was probably worth recognizing that she really was still naive and trusting. The last thing her stepmother bribed was an invitation to visit them in a city residence in Petersburg.

She jokingly called the residence a small old mansion, which she bought at a very successful, according to her story, price, made a stunning designer renovation in it and furnished it in the spirit of the Empire style. Christine was very curious to see what this masterpiece of design thought was. In addition, Larisa buzzed all her ears about her sons, very cute and well-bred boys, who would be just happy to meet their half-sister. Both of them were successful entrepreneurs, just lions of the secular parties, educated, stylish, beautiful, and God knows how wonderful. On this score, Christina tried not to create illusions for herself, because the heart of a loving mother, of course, is not capable of any criticism. However, curiosity overwhelmed her with incredible strength, which she could not resist. Kristina had never been to St. Petersburg, so she didn’t pull back with a response and simply said that she would enjoy going on such a curious journey.

Actually, it all started innocently for Christina, so when she was at the beautiful forged gate of the mansion on the street. M. in the northern capital, she had the most optimistic expectations from future impressions.

***

Luka finally took off his jacket, holding the telephone receiver to his right or left shoulder, carefully hung it on the back of the chair and slightly relaxed his tie. After today's busy schedule, he was incredibly tired, and then the daughter of his partner frankly stuck to him on the phone, already neglecting her business cover. Maybe a couple of years ago he would have been seduced by this, but now the female annoyance and outright vulgarity sated him so much that they were more disgusting than the desire to use girlish accessibility and licentiousness. Only now he could not get rid of her rudely, so for the past half an hour he squeezed some kind of flirting out of himself.

Since his father died and most of his concerns about the inherited state passed on, he practically had no time to rest, and in the last four months, before the new year, there was so much that he barely had enough strength to crawl to bed. How his father coped with all this, he had no idea, and, if it were not for his younger brother, he would not have known how he would have managed. However, he and Matthew’s approaches were, one might say, diametrically opposed. Luka himself was a pedant and a conservative, in everything he clearly followed the instructions of his father left and the course he had planned. Matvey was just a successful bargainer, whom the family business traditions did not soar at all, nevertheless, he managed to retain his share of capital very successfully and, if judged from the outside, without much effort.He took life much easier and seemed to enjoy it, not taking any problems seriously. His superficiality and recklessness balanced Luke’s commitment and his exaggerated demands on absolutely everyone, including himself.

It is not surprising that it was Matvey who sometimes forced Luka to relax, drawing him into all sorts of adventures, and lately he has given a lot to the services of some elite company that provides escort services with high-class intima. Honestly, Luka did not resist for long, although at first the dialogue with prostitutes was a little disgusted with his character, innate disgust and moral views. Nevertheless, the girls whom Matvey chose for him personally didn’t look like prostitutes at first glance, and they really knew how to bring any pleasure, and such a busy person like Luka was very, very satisfied with a business approach to intimate life. Of course, in the office, the entire female half of the staff simply devoured him with his eyes, who frankly, and who blushing and hiding embarrassedly behind the monitors, but he never allowed himself any intrigues at work. Gossip about him, of course, went different, but he wouldn’t know about them if Matvey sometimes didn’t entertain him with another nonsense made up about him, which he overheard when he visited the office of his older brother.

And so, recently, Luka suddenly began to feel that both of them were so fed up with all these girlish charms, that they had already fallen into complete disgust and depravity. The availability of almost all women he knew began to provoke a strong dislike and boredom in addition. Nevertheless, he did not intend to dispel this myth, surrendering to the search for the one that would embody all his ideals like naivety, sincerity, purity and timidity, because he simply did not have free time for that. He just wanted the opposite sex to leave him alone even for a while. He became less and less likely to agree to Matvey’s proposals “to dissolve a little”, and a couple of weeks ago this eventually led to a conversation between the brothers.

“Damn it, it turns out, at twenty-eight, the men in our family begin to grow old, decrepit and stop being interested in women,” said his brother mockingly, stretching out on the sofa and sipping whiskey with ice from a glass. His long chin-length blond wavy hair scattered on a soft armchair covered with thick silk, on which he threw his head, - So in fact, I have nothing left! It is necessary to walk to the maximum while young, and then suddenly I, too, soon will want to change into a business suit, strangle my neck with a tie, leave my friends only old daddy friends and be interested only in family business.

“You certainly wouldn't hurt to get decent clothes,” Luka remarked boredly, pulling out another cigarette for himself, “You walk in some kind of chlamydah.”

- Ept, who would understand fashionable outfit! Do you know how much I gave for these jeans?

- Judging by the number of holes, scuffs, stains of dried paint and threads sticking out in all directions - you got them at best in the second-hand during the season of big discounts, and even some guest worker snagged after a hard winter season.

“Go to hell, bore,” Matvey threw a pillow across the table at his brother and laughed at how Luka caught it with a precise movement of his hand, “Better say what my girls didn’t please you, crap ninja?”

- Whores your girls, no matter how much they pretend to be cute educated girls from good families.

Matvey raised his eyebrows and even sat on the couch in surprise, gazing at his brother with a pompously humiliating look.

- Firs, we pay a lot for them. Of course, these are whores! Who else!

- I’m not only about yours, to be honest, but also about everyone around you who I’m dealing with lately. They are ready to do anything for free, and this makes me sick.

- Oh, that's what's the matter! You have ancestral hunting instincts! Do you want to win unavailable ladies in a fair fight or to achieve them with dances with a tambourine?

Luka was already rather bored with his younger brother's concern, so he was very condescending about all these conversations, preferring to convince himself that in Matvey’s case he should make an allowance for age. He sprawled on a chair in the classic pose of a pompous big boss and sedately, with pleasure he drew on an expensive cigarette, not considering it necessary to respond to such ...