“You know what’s funny?” she says after a few seconds. “For someone who’s all control and intimidation, you don’t scare me.”
“I never wanted to.”
Her smile widens. “Bullshit. You wanted me to easily concede to your plan.”
“Oh, I wanted you to agree. But there are other methods to make you change your mind. I’m still figuring you out a bit.”
“How about common decency and independence?”
“Not after what my brother just did tonight. I’ll allow you to work and whatever you want to do at the bakery, princess, but you’ll never be alone while my brother and father are still breathing.”
Her brows knit, and the teasing in her voice fades. “You can’t really think he?—”
“I don’t think; I know. That accident wasn’t random. The timing was too close, and the damage was too deliberate. Nikolai was sending a message.”
“Jesus,” she whispers. “You make it sound like I’m a target.”
“Because you are.”
“Because ofyou.”
“Because you’re mine.”
For a moment, she just watches me, breathing shallowly like she’s waiting for me to take it back.
I don’t.
Instead, I lean back again. “The sooner you accept that, the safer you’ll be.”
Her expression shifts—part disbelief, and the other reluctant to accept it.
However, that won’t change.
She’d better hope my brother takes me out if she wants something different.
11
Sienna
Two pink lines.
That’s how my night starts and how everything changes.
I stare at the test like maybe if I blink, the lines will disappear.
They don’t.
They just sit there on the bathroom counter, accusing me of not being more responsible and proactive, ruining my sense of control.
It’s been two weeks since the accident. Two weeks since I sat in a hospital bed with Ben pacing the room and cursing like he was seconds away from burning down the city, while the doctors repeatedly told him I was fine.
He’s calmer now, or at least he’s pretending to be. He leaves at odd hours, takes calls behind closed doors, and talks in the low voice that makes my stomach twist because I know he’s planning something, but I dare not ask what that might be.
Men come and go through the house, faces I don’t recognize, some who barely look at me when they pass, but Ben always checks on me. Dinner, water, pain meds, everything.
It’s like he’s afraid that if he doesn’t keep an eye on me, I’ll disappear again, or the small knot in my neck will kill me.
And now this.
