I think about Alina's face when I kissed her. The way she responded despite her fear, despite everything. The way she looked at me in the foyer of her father's house, choosing to trust me even when she had every reason not to.
I think about the pendant around her neck, the panic button she pressed. She called for me. She trusted that I would come.
And I will. I'll tear apart anyone who stands between us.
15
ALINA
The words echo in my head, bouncing around my skull like bullets ricocheting off stone.Kill her and dump the body where he'll find it.
I press my back against the door, my bound wrists throbbing where the zip ties have cut into my skin. Blood trickles down my fingers, warm and sticky, but I barely feel it. All I can feel is the cold certainty settling into my bones.
They're going to kill me.
Not might. Not maybe. They're going to kill me, and the only question is when.
I slide down until I'm sitting on the filthy floor, my knees pulled to my chest. The darkness of the windowless room presses in on all sides, suffocating and absolute. I can't see my hands in front of my face. Can't see anything except the images playing behind my closed eyelids.
Dimitri's face when he kissed me. The heat in his green eyes. The way his hands felt on my body, possessive and gentle at the same time.
My father's face in his study. The cold calculation when he realized I'd found the documents. The way his mask dropped completely, revealing the monster underneath.
Katya's face when she hugged me. My little sister, so relieved I was alive. Does she know what our father did? Does she know he drugged me and handed me over to his enemies?
I touch the pendant at my throat with my bound hands, feeling the smooth metal. Did the signal go through? Is Dimitri coming? Or am I alone in this nightmare, waiting to die in a cabin in the woods where no one will ever find me?
The rational part of my brain, the part that's trying desperately to stay calm, tells me that if Dimitri received the signal, he would have mobilized immediately. He would be searching for me right now. But how would he know where to look? The woods north of the city are vast, full of abandoned cabins and hunting lodges. I could be anywhere.
And even if he does find this place, even if he somehow tracks me here, he'll be walking into a trap. The Kozlov soldiers are waiting for him. They want him to come. They want to use me as bait to draw him out and kill him.
The thought of Dimitri dying because of me, because he tried to save me, makes my chest tight with something that feels like grief.
I barely know him. Just days. That's all we've had. Days of fear and anger and confusion and heat. Days of him being the monster everyone warned me about and also being the man whosaved my life. Who gave me choices when no one else would. Who kissed me like I was precious.
A few short days shouldn't be enough to make me care this much. Shouldn't be enough to make the thought of his death feel like my own.
But it is.
I think about my father, about the documents I found in his study. The proof of his betrayal. He sold me to Sergei knowing that Sergei would die at the wedding. Knowing that I might die too. All for power. All for a larger piece of the Bratva empire.
My own father was willing to sacrifice me.
The betrayal cuts deeper than any physical wound. I've spent my whole life trying to be the daughter he wanted. Obedient. Quiet. Beautiful. Useful. And in the end, I was just another asset to be traded or discarded as needed.
Dimitri was right. My father is not the man I thought he was.
Time passes in the darkness. I don't know how much. It could be minutes or hours. My body aches from sitting on the hard floor, my head still throbs from whatever drug my father used, and my wrists burn where the zip ties cut into flesh.
But I force myself to stay alert. To listen. To think.
If they're going to kill me, I won't make it easy for them. I'll fight. I'll scream. I'll do whatever it takes to survive, even if survival seems impossible.
The voices outside the door have gone quiet. I press my ear against the wood, straining to hear anything. Footsteps. Conversation. Some sign of what's happening.
Nothing.
The silence is almost worse than the threats. At least when they were talking, I knew where they were. What they were planning. Now I'm blind and deaf, trapped in this tiny room with only my fear for company.
