Chapter 2 - Alexei
Sofia Rosetti hasn’t spoken since we left the museum. Eleven years of planning, and her silence is the one variable I didn’t account for.
She walks beside me into my house, cream silk dress still pristine despite the circumstances.
The late afternoon wind gusts and toys with her hem, dress riding up just enough to reveal a flash of thigh.
I force my gaze away, furious at my body's immediate response.
This is about revenge, not the way summer light makes her skin glow like porcelain.
Her poise coaxes my anger into flames. I need to make her flinch.
"Do you know what I'm going to do to you?" I ask conversationally, leaning in until our shoulders almost touch.
Her chin lifts slightly, every inch the princess even now. Those blue eyes study me with an intensity that belongs to the predator, not prey. "I imagine you're going to tell me."
The insolence makes my blood sing. Good. I want her to fight. Breaking her will be so much sweeter.
I step in front of her to make her stop and reach across the space between us, my hand finding her throat. Not squeezing, not yet, just claiming. Her pulse flutters beneath my palm like a trapped bird. Such a delicate neck. So fucking easy to crush.
"There's a room waiting for you," I tell her, thumb pressing against where her life beats closest to the surface.
"Concrete walls that have heard a hundred men scream.
A drain that's run red more times than I can count.
" My grip tightens just enough to make breathing work for it.
"I had it cleaned especially for you, printsessa. "
Her pulse jumps, finally, something real, but then impossibly, it steadies. Like she's found her center despite my hand wrapped around her throat. Her fingers clench around her purse, knuckles white against the clasp, the only sign this costs her anything.
"By the time I'm done with you," I continue, leaning close enough that my breath stirs the hair at her temple, "you'll know every inch of that room. Every surface. Every way I can make you bend until you break."
She gasps when I increase the pressure, but her eyes never leave mine. There's fear there, yes, but something else too. Something that makes me want to either kill her or taste her, and I can't decide which urge is stronger.
"The basement has excellent soundproofing," I murmur against her ear. "You can scream as loud as you want. No one will come. No one will save you."
"Like no one saved Mikhail?"
The words hit cold in my veins. My grip loosens involuntarily, and she draws in a shaky breath, color flooding back to her face. I see her catch herself, realize she's shown too much, but it's too late.
"Is that what this is about?" she asks, voice not quite as steady as before. "Revenge for your brother?"
I sit back, studying her while my mind races. This isn't the script. She should be crying, begging, bargaining. Not meeting me word for word like we're sparring.
"Justice," I correct softly, pulling the photo from my jacket. "Look at him."
I shove the picture at her: Mikhail's body, blood pooling beneath him, eyes vacant. Her whole body flinches, and she tries to look away, but I catch her chin, force her to see.
"Eighteen years old," I tell her. "Killed by your psychotic brother because he dared to care about the wrong girl. Look what your family does to people who get too close."
A tear escapes down her cheek before she can stop it. Finally, something breaks through that porcelain composure.
"Then we understand each other," she whispers. "We've both lost brothers to this war."
The comparison makes me want to wrap both hands around her throat and squeeze until she takes it back. "Your brothers are alive."
"Are they?" She meets my gaze, and I see real pain there. "The boy who could sing lost his voice forever. The one who might have been something else learned to love violence instead." Her voice drops. "We all died a little that night."
"Don't." The word comes out as a growl. "Don't you dare compare your family's losses to mine. Mikhail is dead. Not metaphorically changed. Rotting in the ground."
"You're right," she says quietly, and the admission surprises me. "It's not the same. Nothing could be."
I grab her wrist, feeling for her pulse again. Still too steady. Even trained soldiers show more fear when facing death. My thumb presses against the delicate bones, and she winces but doesn't pull away.
"Why aren't you more afraid?" The question escapes before I can cage it.
She looks at where my fingers circle her wrist like a shackle, then back at my face. A tremor runs through her that she can't quite suppress. "What would my fear accomplish?"
"It would be satisfying."
"Then I'm sorry to disappoint you." But her free hand is clenched so tight around her purse that her knuckles are white as bone.
I step aside and walk ahead into the main house, letting her fall in behind me like a good hostage. As we pass through them, I listen intently, waiting for a sign she understands there's no escape from here.
Her breath hitches, just barely. But when I glance back, I see her looking around, studying the security measures with what looks like professional interest. Cameras at every corner. Guards at strategic points. Electronic locks that seal every exit.
"Impressive," she murmurs, and I can't tell if she's mocking me or buying time.
I've been inside her family's compound, walked the marble floors, and I know by comparison my home must look merely functional. We leave beauty to the women, not the architecture.
I'd planned to take her straight to the basement, to begin immediately while her fear was fresh. But something about our conversation has shifted my intentions. I want to unravel her slowly, understand what makes her tick before I take her apart.
"Your room," I tell her as we climb some stairs and follow a corridor, my hand finding the small of her back to guide her forward. She stiffens at the contact, and I feel the tremor run through her, finally, a crack.
She pauses at the threshold. "Not the basement with the convenient drain?"
The dry delivery makes me want to laugh, which pisses me off. This woman should not be making jokes minutes after being taken.
"Would you prefer the basement?" I ask, calling her bluff, pressing my palm harder against her back, feeling the heat of her skin through her dress.
"I'm curious about the discrepancy between threat and execution," she says, but I catch the slight shake in her voice now.
I lean down, lips nearly brushing her ear. "The night is young, kotyonok. We have all the time in the world for both."
She shivers, and satisfaction floods through me. There she is, the frightened girl beneath the brave facade.
The suite I've prepared for her is on the third floor: barren necessity wrapped in security. Rough cotton sheets, basic furniture, a self-contained bathroom. And bars on the windows, electronic locks on the doors. A perfect room for an ex-Rosetti princess.
She takes it all in with that analytical gaze, but I see her hands shake before she clasps them together. "And here I thought you might try to seduce me."
The comment catches me off-guard, and my body responds to the word 'seduce' in ways it shouldn't.
“Maybe I still will,” I say, my voice rougher than I intend.
"Then why the sandpaper sheets?" She runs her fingers along the bedding, and I track the movement like a predator watching prey. "Or is this where the torture begins?"
Fuck. She noticed everything already. The woman misses nothing.
"Psychological warfare," I tell her, moving closer until she has to tilt her head back to maintain eye contact. "Remind you you’re not in your pretty castle anymore."
"Hmm." She moves to the window, testing the bars with fingers that don’t tremble at all. "Kind of defeats the purpose if you tell me about it. Or maybe you're not the monster you pretend to be."
My hand shoots out, spinning her around and pressing her back against the wall. She gasps, and I feel it in my chest. "I am exactly the monster your family created," I tell her coldly, caging her with my arms on either side.
She's breathing faster now, chest rising and falling in a way that draws my attention before I can stop it. "I know," she says simply, and despite the fear I can now see in her eyes, she reaches up and touches the scar along my jawline, the one from that night. "So am I."
The touch burns like acid, and I jerk back. She stays pressed against the wall, hand falling to her side, but something has shifted between us.
"Get comfortable," I tell her, backing toward the door because if I don't leave now, I'll do something I'll regret. Something that has nothing to do with revenge and everything to do with the heat building low in my spine. "Tonight, we begin properly."
"Begin what, exactly?" she asks, and there's a challenge in it despite the way her whole body trembles now.
I don't answer, can't answer. This is a dance, and somehow she knows the steps.
I leave her room, the electronic lock clicking shut with finality. But as I walk down the hallway, I'm off-balance in a way that has nothing to do with her unexpected poise and everything to do with the way she looked pressed against that wall, lips parted, pulse racing in her throat.
In my study, I pour vodka and let myself feel it: the satisfaction of finally holding the last piece of a puzzle eleven years in the making. Sofia Rosetti, caged in my home, awaiting my judgment. Mikhail would appreciate the poetry—the girl who got him killed, now completely at his brother's mercy.
I drink, watching the security monitors that show her room from multiple angles. She's moving through the space methodically now, testing every bar, every lock, searching for exits that don't exist.
Her fingers trace along the walls, pausing at corners, testing the give of the floorboards. Professional. Methodical. Not the panicked searching of a frightened captive, but something else entirely. It makes me lean forward, studying her movements with new interest.
She moves to the vanity, sits down gracefully and begins removing the pins from her hair.
The blonde waves tumble down around her shoulders, and she runs her fingers through them, staring at her reflection.
Then she does something unexpected: she smiles.
Small, private, but real. Like she's already won something I don't understand.
The smile unsettles me more than tears would have.
My phone buzzes. Ekaterina. I let it go to voicemail, focusing instead on the monitor where Sofia is now examining the simple tunics in the closet, running her fingers along the rough fabrics.
I'll listen to my sister's message later. Right now, I need to understand this woman who hasn't broken yet—and why that bothers me more than if she had.
I watch her for another hour, noting her every movement, every expression. She's methodical, careful, learning her cage with the patience of someone already planning her escape. Good. Let her search. There is no way out.