Epilogue
Elizabeth
A month can turn a life into something unrecognizable.
Diomid’d mansion has become a place that feels like home. The staff know my name. The security respects my space. The housekeeper insists I eat breakfast even when my stomach knots with nerves.
And Diomid…he looks at me like I’m the foundation of everything he’s building.
I’m more settled than I ever expected to be after so much chaos. But sometimes, when I walk the halls alone, I feel a ghost of who I was trailing behind me. The careful, quiet Elizabeth who survived by staying small.
She’s fading.
I’m not sure whether that’s liberation or something far more terrifying.
The kitchen has become my sanctuary again. The chef gives me space, watches with a pleased little smile when I bake. Like it’s some miracle that a woman in a Bratva mansion would choose flour and sugar over jewels and gossip.
Today, I’m stirring melted butter into sugar when I hear the door open behind me.
I turn, expecting one of the staff.
It’s my father.
He looks smaller than I remember. Shoulders rounded. Dark circles beneath his eyes like he’s been haunted from the inside out. When he sees me, his mouth trembles and he quickly glances away, unable to face the full weight of what he lost the day I left.
“Elizabeth,” he rasps.
His voice has always been his armor. Commanding, certain, a wall built of orders and tradition. Now it sounds… brittle.
“Father.” I keep stirring.
He takes a hesitant step closer. “I—I came on business. Diomid and I—there are papers to sign. Arrangements to be made.” He swallows hard. His eyes land on the countertop then flicker back to me, finding the soft contentment I haven’t been able to hide since I moved here.
He looks like he might be sick.
“I tried,” he says suddenly. “To do what I thought was right. I never meant for you to be harmed.”
I set the spoon down.
“You didn’t believe her when she told you he made her uncomfortable,” I say. “You didn’t listen.”
His face folds inward with shame. “No,” he whispers. “I didn’t. And I’ll never forgive myself for that.”
“You didn’t believe me. The only witness to what really happened that night. A frightened, twelve year old girl.” My chest tightens.
“I couldn’t. It would have put you at more risk if I had. I wish I could go back, Lizzie—”
I hold up my hand at his use of my nick name. Something he hasn’t called me since that night.
A younger version of me might have reached for him. The current me lets him sit in that pain a moment longer.
“I forgive you,” I tell him finally.
His head snaps up, hope flaring.
“But not for you,” I add. “For Mom. Because she loved you so entirely even when you were an idiot. Enough to want us to move forward without bitterness poisoning us too.”
He looks like he’s been punched. Tears, actual tears, gather in his eyes. I’ve never seen that in my life. Not once. Not even at her funeral.
He turns away to steady himself.
“Thank you,” he manages. “Even if I don’t deserve it.”
“No,” I agree softly. “You don’t. But it’s done now.”
He leaves the kitchen quieter than he entered, like the air itself has absolved him.
I wait until he’s gone before I release a shaky breath.
The cook reappears, wiping her hands on her apron. “That was brave,” she says gently, nodding toward the door. “Healing is a strange kind of courage.”
I shrug, reaching for the old leather-bound journal.
“I’m making her honey-almond torte today,” I tell the cook, flipping to the marked page. “I have a sudden urge to consume every almond in the land.”
“Oh, that one looks delicious.” She smiles warmly. “A family treasure. Something you’ll pass to your daughter one day.”
The words hit me like an unexpected blow.
I freeze.
A daughter.
My heart does a strange, stuttering dance. I press my palm flat against the marble counter as the room sways just slightly.
When was my last—
My pulse starts pounding. Hard.
The cook continues talking about rising agents and almond paste, completely unaware that her comment just ripped open a door in my mind.
I force myself to breathe. To move. To finish spreading the batter into the pan. But everything suddenly feels sharper. Brighter. Fragile.
Later, after my father has left and the cake is cooling and my hands won’t stop trembling, I find Diomid in his office. His shirt sleeves are rolled up revealing tattoos that coil along his forearms as he signs off on some document that probably affects a hundred lives.
He looks up the moment I enter. Sees me. Comes to me.
“What’s wrong, zolotse?” His thumb strokes my jaw, concern tightening his voice.
I swallow around a truth that doesn’t quite fit into words yet.
“I think…” My voice catches. I try again. “I think I might be pregnant.”
The silence isn’t silence, it’s tension. Electricity.
Something in him changes.
His pupils blow wide, and his hand slides from my jaw to the back of my neck, pulling me closer like he needs skin contact to breathe.
“Are you sure?” he growls, voice already darkening into something that promises both protection and possession.
I lift my eyes to his.
“I think so.”
That’s as far as I get.
Because he kisses me like that possibility has lit the fuse on the rest of our lives.
Diomid
The words hit me like a bullet straight to the chest, but instead of pain, it's pure, unfiltered possession that explodes through me.
Pregnant.
My wife, carrying my child. The thought wraps around my brain like a vice, tightening until all I can see is her swollen with proof of how completely I've claimed her. How I've filled her night after night until it took root.
She's mine in a way no one can ever undo now. The whole fucking world will see it, see her belly round with my child, and know she belongs to me. No more questions about her past. Just her, marked by me, forever.
I crush my mouth to hers before she can say another word, devouring her like a starving man.
My hands are everywhere, sliding under her shirt to palm her breasts, already imagining them heavier, fuller with milk for our child.
She moans into the kiss, her body arching into mine instinctively, and fuck, that's all it takes.
I'm rock hard in an instant, my cock straining against my pants like it's been days instead of hours since I was buried inside her.
I can't get enough of this woman. Every time I think I've had my fill, she looks at me with those winter-blue eyes, or smiles that shy little smile, or just breathes in my direction, and I'm gone.
Insatiable. Obsessed. She's ruined me for anything else, turned me into a beast that only wants to rut and claim and protect.
I break the kiss just enough to growl against her lips, "You think you're pregnant? With my child growing inside you?" My voice is rough, edged with the madness she ignites in me.
I back her up against my desk, sweeping papers and a laptop aside with one arm. They crash to the floor, but I don't give a shit. Nothing matters but her.
"I've been filling you up every goddamn night, pumping you full of my cum until your perfect pretty cunt overflows. And now it's taken. You're mine, Elizabeth. This proves it to the whole fucking world."
She gasps as I lift her onto the desk, her legs wrapping around my waist like they were made to lock me in.
Her hands tug at my shirt, nails scraping my skin, and I shudder at the bite of it.
I love when she marks me back. Little scratches, bruises from her grip.
It's my kink, feeling her claim me in return, knowing she's as feral for me as I am for her.
I yank her sweater over her head, exposing those perfect tits that drive me insane, nipples already hard and begging for my mouth.
"Look at you," I rasp, cupping them roughly, thumbs circling the peaks until she whimpers. "These are going to swell and get so fucking sensitive. And I'll suck them every night, make you come apart just from my tongue on them."
Her breath hitches, eyes glazing with the same hunger that's consuming me. I shove her jeans down her thighs and find she isn’t wearing panties, fuck, she knows what that does to me. She is already soaked, her pussy glistening like an invitation.
"Always so wet for me," I murmur, sliding two fingers inside her without warning.
She clenches around them, tight and hot, and my vision tunnels.
God, her cunt is my undoing. Every night, when I sink into her, that velvet grip squeezes me until I black out from the pleasure, stars exploding behind my eyes as I pound into her like a man possessed.
I can't stop, won't stop, not until she's screaming my name and milking every last drop from me.
I free my cock with my other hand, stroking it once, twice as she finishes kicking off her jeans. The head already leaking at the thought of being inside her again.
"You did this," I tell her, voice low and filthy as I line myself up and thrust in deep, bottoming out in one brutal stroke.
She cries out, back arching, and I hold still for a second, savoring the way she flutters around me.
"You took my cum so perfectly, let it take.
Now the world's going to see your belly grow, see how I've marked you inside and out.
No one else gets this. Only me. Only my cock stretching this perfect pussy. "
I start moving then, hard and relentless, the desk creaking under us as I fuck her like it's the first time, like I'll never get enough. Her tits bounce with every thrust, and I lean down to capture one nipple between my teeth, biting just hard enough to make her yelp and tighten around me.
"Fuck, yes," I groan against her skin. "Bite me back, zolotse.
Scratch me. Show me how much you need this.
" She does. Her teeth sink into my shoulder, almost drawing blood, and the sting sends me spiraling higher.
I love the pain mixed with the pleasure, the way it reminds me she's not fragile, she's fire, and I'm the one who gets to burn in her.
"You're insatiable," she whispers, half moan, half accusation, her hips meeting mine thrust for thrust as she leans back on the desk, bracing herself on her elbows.
I glance down at where we meet. My cock sliding in and out of her wet slit, coating those inky black curls with our arousal.
"No," I correct, pounding deeper, my hand sliding between us to circle her clit. "I'm obsessed. With you. With this tight pussy that squeezes me until I can't think straight. I've filled you so many times, and I'll keep doing it. Morning, noon and night, until you're dripping with me always."
Her walls clench at my words, and I feel her climbing, her breaths coming in short, desperate pants.
"Come for me, Elizabeth. Show me how you take what's mine." I lift her leg over my shoulder and drive in deeper, increasing the pressure on her clit.
She shatters then, her cry echoing off the office walls as she comes hard, pulsing around my cock like a vice.
It's too much. The grip, the heat, the way she looks at me like I'm her everything. I follow her over the edge, slamming in one last time and spilling deep, rope after rope, marking her from the inside out.
"Mine," I moan, the word tearing from my throat as pleasure whites out my vision, my body shaking with the force of it.
When we come down, I don't pull out. I stay buried in her, holding her close, my forehead pressed to hers. She's panting, trembling, and I kiss her softly, reverently, because this woman, this fierce, beautiful poisoner who killed for her freedom and chose me in the aftermath, is my entire world.
"I love you," I murmur, the words slipping out unbidden but true. "And if you're carrying our child, I'll protect you both with my life. No one touches what's mine."
She smiles, soft and sated, her hand resting over her belly where our future might already be growing. "I know," she whispers. "And I love you too."
In that moment, with her wrapped around me, I know I've found my forever. Obsession doesn't even cover it anymore. It's devotion, deep and unending. And I'll spend every day proving it to her.