Summary:

“You dropped out of college!” Svetlana repeated as she threw her hands up. “You had two semesters left in Boston! You were top of your program! You talked about moving to New York, opening your own firm, taking over the world—and now your big life ambition is sitting on a plush couch in the Canadian tundra waiting for Mr. Real Estate to finish his stock trades?”

Ilya laid his fork down with a deliberate clink against the ceramic plate. He rested his elbows on the table, leaning forward, his blue eyes sharp and terrifyingly clear.

“Sveta,” he began, his tone dropping into that familiar, authority. “In Boston, I woke up at six every morning to run in the freezing rain. I spent eight hours in lectures surrounded by rich idiots who thought they were geniuses because their dads bought a building. I spent four hours every night memorizing financial models I already knew how to build in my sleep, just so some eighty-year-old professor could give me a checkmark on a piece of paper. The point is, why would I fight the world when I can just enjoy the simple pleasures of life? I spent my whole life surviving. Shanya gave me a place where I don’t have to.”