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“Kolya, you bastard! Are you suggesting he hurt Lia?” Yan sounds disapproving. “She did nothing.” “Whether I hurt her or not is neither of your concern. And since when are you her advocate, Yan?” My tone is more biting than usual. “She’s…innocent, Boss. She did nothing to deserve…” he trails off. “Me?” I finish for him. “I didn’t say that.” “You didn’t have to.” And in a way, he’s right, but being innocent doesn’t exempt her of her fate. However, people
like Yan will still try to alleviate their conscience. I never had that—a conscience, that is—so I don’t worry about it.
She sits upright, and when her gaze meet mine, panic and something else whirls in the depths of the mesmerizing blue. I hate that look. I want to erase it so that it’s not her first reaction to me. It’s been more than a month and she still considers me the villain she painted me as that first time. While I didn’t give a fuck about her labels at the beginning, I now want her to let her guard down when around me, without me having to touch her sexually.
Because even though he’s owned me every night and has taken care of my every need, come morning, I’ve been nothing short of a slut he’s spent his nights with. That’s why I defied him, and that’s why I will now pay.
vicinity and not wish to be closer? “You didn’t have a nightmare last night,” he murmurs. That’s because I had it this morning. I frown. “How do you know I have nightmares? Wait…you watch me when I sleep?” “I do.”
Awwww🤭🤭🤭
“Was your stepmom evil?” A distant nostalgic look fills his eyes. “It was the other way around. My mother was the villain and my stepmom was the real-life Disney princess who didn’t get saved.”
This morning, he feels closer somehow. It could be because he didn’t leave before I woke up or because he told me about himself as normal couples do. Wait. We’re not a couple. Right? Adrian retrieves the ointment and slathers
“Do you know her, Volkov?” the man asks. “No.” Adrian doesn’t look at me, his voice casual. If I thought his earlier words hurt, these ones cut so deep, I feel the knife digging inside. The bridge I felt forming between us this morning dissolves into thin air.
NOOOOO😭😭😭😭
“You should’ve come with me the first time,” Yan mutters under his breath. Maybe so, but if I had, I wouldn’t have been shaken by this wake-up call. Adrian has a fiancée. All blonde and beautiful and Russian. I was only a game to him all this time.
If I had to marry one day, Kristina seemed like the safest and most logical choice. I can see the doubts on her face, but she doesn’t voice them. She wasn’t raised to. For Kristina, being the obedient wife is everything that matters. Unlike my Lenochka, whose feelings are usually written all over her face, Kristina’s are locked under a makeshift façade. “If you’re keeping her as a mistress, let me know.” She fakes a smile. “Have a lovely night.”
Damn
Because tonight, I made irrevocable decisions. Lia isn’t the other woman. She’s the woman. And I’m not my fucking father.
Good 👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻
I twirl on pointe for a few seconds, then jump into Ryan’s arms a fraction of a second early. He extends his hands, but he misses by a breath. It’s a single breath. Just one. Time freezes for a moment and everything turns into white noise. Both of our eyes widen as I land in an unnatural position. Shock ripples through my leg and then a haunting, ugly sound echoes in the air. Pop.
NOOOO WHAT?!?!
In other words, I’ll never be able to be a ballerina again.
😭😭😭😭
My gaze flits to my cast leg supported in the air. My useless broken leg that ended everything. I never got to show the world my Giselle. She was killed before she was even born. And with her death, all of my dreams and my coping mechanisms perished.
It’ll all end soon. The freezing air filters through my flimsy hospital gown as I stare down at the moving cars. They look like ants from this height. At least ten stories up. It’d be easy enough to finish everything, for me not to feel numb and desensitized. One step. One breath. And it’ll be all over. I’ll be free. “Lia.”
Girl don’t do it
“Because I want to.” “I will not be your mistress, Adrian. Never.” “You won’t be.” “But you have a fiancée.” “Not anymore.” My lips part. “W-what?” “I got rid of her.” He takes a step forward. “Now, come down.” I stare at his hand, at the promise he’s offering and what he did. I said I didn’t want to be his mistress and he listened. He got rid of her.
“Scars mean you are alive and strong enough to survive.” He kisses the top of my head. “I’ll worship each of your scars until you’re able to face them, Lenochka.”
😍😍😍😍
However, it seems I’m sacrificing that part of me—the methodical, logical one—more often than not since Lia came into the picture. I do have a plan, though. One that will give Sergei and Igor the reason they need, and, at the same time, give me Lia.
slowly close my eyes, my grip tightening on her hand before I release it and let it rest on the bed. The thought of losing her brings an ache I thought I’d never feel again after Aunt Annika’s death. I will make sure Lia’s fate is different from my stepmother’s. Her career is probably finished for good, though. I spoke to her attending physician and he mentioned that the nature of her fracture is impossible to recover from in the professional sense. Which brings me to the reason behind her accident.
“Did you see it with your own eyes?” I ask Yan, not that I need a reason to get on with my plan. “Yes, sir,” he snarls. “That motherfucker did it on purpose.”
RYAN DIDNT CATCH HER ON PURPOSE???
“We’ll start with the legs, then I’ll make you beg to be killed. Only after you’ve paid for every tear she’s shed will you be allowed the mercy of death.” I shoot him in the tibia, right where her leg broke.
Every day, I wake from a nightmare replaying the moment I fell, the exact moment the haunting sound of my leg breaking echoing in the air. And every time, soothing hands wrap around me, pulling me close to a strong chest. A chest that I’ve grown so used to along with the compassion that comes with it. A compassion I never believed Adrian to be capable of.
Due to my injury, my contract was terminated with the New York City Ballet, and although I got a generous compensation wired to my bank account, I couldn’t care less about it. I have a small fortune that’s able to sustain me for a long time, but it was never about the money for me. Ballet was my defense mechanism against my screwed-up head. Now that I don’t have it anymore, how am I going to stay sane?
“Do you think I’m insane?” I murmur. “I think you’re just in pain.”
From the day he barged into my life until the evening of my accident, he never once spent a night without fucking me. And now that the sexual touch is gone, I feel an emptiness like nothing before. I went years without sex with other people, but it never had the impact these past twenty-one days have. Actually, it’s been twenty-five since that day he fucked me against the wall. And no, I’m not counting. It doesn’t help that he’s getting more attractive, too much for his own good. Or maybe I’m just getting sexually frustrated.
By the time I finish, Adrian is crouching by my side and says with utter calm, “Let’s get you to the doctor.” “Why?” “I think you’re pregnant.”
Pregnant???
By the time he’s finished, I’m breathing so harshly, I can barely focus on what’s going on around me. “What are you doing, Adrian?” “We’re getting married.”
Well that’s one way to do it😂😂😂
Since before I found out about the engagement. Adrian ordered for this dress to be made while he was engaged to Kristina. He’s intended to marry me since then.
Okay that makes it a little better 😍
I hobble toward him and refuse to stare at the slight awe in his eyes, at how his expression lights for a bit before it completely closes off like the rest of him.
stare at Adrian, at the promise of retaliation in his closed off features if I don’t say the words he wants me to. He really shouldn’t have threatened me, because now, I’ll be completely on board with Luca’s plan. If not for anything else, then to get rid of him and the negative influence he has on my life. Ever since he walked into it, I’ve lost complete control and I need to get it back.
😭😭😭😭
Adrian pulls me against his chest as he grabs me by my nape. “You’re mine now, Mrs. Volkov.” I hate having his last name attached to mine. For some reason, it feels like I’ve sold my soul to the devil. Worse, I actually married him.
She’s my bride. My wife. Fucking mine.
😍😍😍
I struggle to keep my cool. I don’t want her to think she’s nothing to me, but if she believes it, so will they. And I fucking need to get her off their radar. It won’t be easy, considering the position I hold in the brotherhood, but if they think she’s only here because of the child, they won’t have any expectations of her and I can keep her safe from this life. Even if it’s only partially.
Ugh then don’t treat her like shit in public
“I see Adrian has a lot to teach you,” Sergei says in a grim tone. “She’s better when mute.” Lia opens her mouth, probably throw a retort, but I squeeze her fingers until she winces. “Will do, Pakhan.”
😭
I look away from him because I refuse to get caught up in his physical beauty, in how attracted I actually am to him. All of those feelings are hormonal and physical reactions. They mean nothing.
“I won’t let you break me,” I manage between strangled pants. “If you wanted an obedient pet, you should’ve gotten a different wife.” My self-worth is the last thing I have, and I will fight till death before I let Adrian take that away, too. “You are my wife, Mrs. Volkov, and I will whip and fuck that fact into your body until you act like it.”
“No! You’ve taken so much from me already. I will not hand you my last pieces. So if you want to whip me to death, do it. I will not say those words, even with my last breath.”
But most of all, I hate the way he holds me to him, even when I turn away from him, as if having me sleep in his arms is his favorite position. Apparently, it’s mine, too, because my nightmares have slowly disappeared since I moved out of my apartment.
or the pillow or my hand if I have to. He lost the right to hear my voice that night. “I thought I was better as a mute.” I push past him and settle in the car, letting the bag fall to my lap.
“You…you don’t think I’m broken?” “So what if you are. It’s what makes you who you are.” My lips part. It’s like he’s saying he likes me just as I am. Broken and all.
He did when he didn’t tell me about his engagement to perfect Kristina. A lie by omission is still a lie, and I’m still not over that. But if I say that, he’ll just twist it around, and I’m not in the mood to acknowledge his previous engagement—I don’t think I ever will be. I hate the inferiority complex that festers on my soul whenever I think of the pretty blonde on his arm instead of me.
She was glowing through the months of her pregnancy, counting days and crossing them off her calendar until the day she’d meet her son.
😍😍😍
I tried ignoring that she never called him our son or our baby, or that she never once referred to him as ours. As if, in a way, she was tolerating me and this marriage only for the child. And while I attempted to let that slide, I don’t like it. I don’t like that she’s been slowly erasing me since the wedding.
feel like an intruder watching the mother and son bonding, and something in my chest aches. It’s probably the pathetic boy in me whom I thought I squashed a long time ago. My own mother never looked at me the way Lia looks at Jeremy. I only had that affection from Aunt Annika, and even she was brutally ripped out of my life.
🥹🥹🥹🥹
Lia trembles in my arms, her lips quivering and her eyes shifty. This is the last thing a woman who just gave birth should go through, and I will make the Rozettis pay for this with blood. “Don’t worry, Lenochka.” I try to make my voice as calm as possible as we descend the stairs. “I’ll protect you.”
NOOOO
don’t usually revel in torture, but I’ll enjoy every fucking second of making those assholes talk before I kill them. No one threatens my family and lives.
think he’s going to leave, but then he lowers his head and captures my lips in a slow kiss. Usually, his kisses are all-consuming, as hard as he fucks and as unforgiving, too, but right now, he’s kissing me with passion that reaches my bones. Like he cares. I kiss him back, lost in the moment, because it seems that I care, too. Fuck. I more than care. He pulls away, a small smile grazing his lips. “I’ve missed you, Lenochka.” And with that, he turns and leaves. I stare at the door after it clicks shut behind him. My mind is bogged down with the realization I had while he was kissing me just
...more
🤭🤭🤭🤭
Even in the darkness, I can make out his murderous expression. “Going somewhere, Lia?” As he advances toward me, I know, I just know that I’ve messed up any chance I had at freedom.
Oh shit
A sob tears from my throat, because I know, I just know that I lost a part of Adrian tonight. The part I fell in love with.
😭😭😭😭😭
At the beginning, I found it hard to keep up with who’s who, so I made a long-ass digital document with Ogla’s help to specify who is who in the Bratva. Surprisingly, Adrian didn’t mind and even told Ogla to assist me. But then again, he fully expects me to stay by his side, so he wouldn’t worry about me making an educational file about his organization.
It was her own document???
