Chapter 6
ANNA
My eyebrows furrowed as I stared at the beautiful piece of high-end jewelry, confused.
Was it a bribe?
A gift?
Some sick joke?
I didn't understand what was happening.
A large center teardrop diamond was flanked by a few small clusters, all placed on a beautiful, polished platinum choker. The diamonds caught the firelight, throwing rainbows across the cream walls.
It was stunning. The kind of thing you'd see behind bulletproof glass in a jewelry store, the kind that cost more than my entire life.
He shifted back only an inch—not far, not nearly far enough—and his hand that was on the wall flew out and wrapped around my throat, his fingers spanning the width of it easily. His thumb dug in just under my jaw, forcing my chin up, exposing the vulnerable line of my neck.
My hands immediately went to my throat, covering it, hiding it from his gaze like I could somehow stop him from choking the life out of me.
My fingers clawed at his wrist, trying to pry him off. "What are you doing?"
"Put your hands down," he demanded gently. My stomach twisted at the contrast between the softness of his words and the steel in his grip.
"No, tell me what you're doing," I ordered, but it came out more like a pathetic plea. Breathless and broken.
"Lower your hands," he said again, his voice dropping an octave.
Not louder, but somehow more commanding. More absolute.
I shook my head. If I obeyed, my life was forfeit. The moment I gave in, the moment I stopped fighting, it was over.
His gaze darkened at my small defiance, and I tried to shrink against the wall, tried to make myself smaller, less threatening, less there.
There had to be a way out, something I could do. Some move I was missing.
"Maya soloveyka, do not make me repeat myself again."
My hands slowly lowered, fear filling my eyes with tears as my bottom lip trembled. I couldn't stop it, couldn't stop the shaking that took over my whole body.
If I obeyed I'd die, but if I didn't, I'd die slowly.
And I was a coward.
God help me, I was a coward who didn't want to suffer.
His warm fingers brushed my skin as he placed the necklace around my throat, the metal cold against my overheated flesh.
It was heavier than it should've been, like a shackle cutting off my air even though it wasn't tight.
The weight distributed evenly—front and back—when the diamonds should have been the heaviest part. The polished platinum in the back felt solid, not hollow.
Too heavy.
He took a step back, and my body was instantly cold from his absence, from the loss of his heat.
My hands went to the necklace. My fingers scrabbling, searching blindly for a clasp so I could remove it.
There was nothing.
No seam, no hinge, no way to open it. The metal was cold and smooth all the way around, seamless, like it had been welded shut.
Panic clawed up my throat.
When I looked back up at him, he was leaning against the couch, his phone in his hand.
The picture of casual arrogance, like he hadn't just put a strange collar on me.
The shrill ring shattered the silence as he waited for whoever was on the other line to answer. One ring. Two. Three.
"How did you get my private number?" My mother's voice echoed in the otherwise silent room, sharp and irritated, and my stomach dropped at the sound of it.
"Senator, this is Darius Ivanov. We need to talk about your upcoming vote." His voice was smooth, professional, all business. Like this was a conference call and not a hostage negotiation.
"Mr. Ivanov." Her voice lowered to an acidic whisper.
The same one she'd used on me when she grabbed my arm and whisper-yelled at me for whatever failings I happened to have in public. It meant she wasn't around people she needed to impress so she felt no need to sugarcoat anything, but she also wasn't alone and didn't want people to overhear.
If she were alone, her voice would be raised, not lowered. "I believe I have already spoken to your associates and explained that you have been outbid."
My heart sank. Outbid.
She'd sold her vote to someone else. Of course she had.
"That's why I'm calling—to up the offer."
"Well, now you have my attention," my mother said with a sickeningly sweet tone to her words. The one she used on donors, on lobbyists, on anyone with deep pockets. "What did you have in mind?"
"It's simple, really. You stick to the original arrangement, but instead of continuing to funnel money to your campaign fund, I'm not going to pay you a cent. You're going to do as you're told as an apology for wasting my time. Then you are going to call my cousin Gregor and beg for forgiveness."
Her shrill laugh pierced through my ears, made my teeth ache.
"And why would I do that?"
"Because I have something that you want."
His words were so steady, so in control, as if everything was pre-planned and he knew exactly how this conversation was going to play out. Like he was reading from a script he'd already written.
"Mr. Ivanov, I do not have time for these silly games. I am a very busy, very important woman, and if you do not stop harassing me, I will have to get the Capitol Police involved."
"Then let me cut to the chase," he said, his voice hardening, all pretense of civility dropping away.
He turned the phone so I could see my mother on the video call.
Her hair was perfectly coiffed, and she was wearing one of her signature orange-red designer pantsuits that she thought gave her a powerful look. They actually made her look like a rotted tomato.
Before either of us said anything, a beep sounded from the necklace—high-pitched, electronic—and in the video, I saw a red glow reflected through the diamonds, bathing my throat in crimson light.
I gasped, my hands flying back to the necklace, feeling for the source of the light, the sound.
It was warm now, humming faintly against my skin.
I knew with a bone-deep certainty that I was fucked.
He turned the phone back to face him, blocking my mother's view of me.
"The necklace around your daughter's delicate throat is now armed.
One press of a button and it'll take her head clean off.
You should be familiar with this technology, Senator.
After all, it's your own military that perfected it. "
The world tilted.
Bomb. He put a bomb around my neck.
"How?" my mother demanded, and I heard it in her voice—not fear for me, not maternal panic, but professional curiosity.
The man—Darius—just smiled the smile of a predator who'd sunk his teeth into his prey.
"Senator, you should know as well as everybody else, we have our ways. And we have people on our payroll. You can call the police if you wish, but how do you know the person you reach isn't taking orders from me? I pay much better than the US government. As you well know."
"You won't get away with this," she said, a strength in her words that should have been reassuring.
But it wasn't concern for me. She was angry that someone had gotten one up on her. Angry that she'd lost control of the situation. Angry at being outmaneuvered.
Not angry that I was going to die.
"I already have," he answered, his voice low, satisfied. "And you know it. I'm sure you need some time to think about this and to make the appropriate arrangements. I'll be in touch. And the next time I call, I expect you to be more respectful."
He disconnected the line and turned back toward me, slipping the phone into his pocket.
My mind raced, thoughts fragmenting, scattering like broken glass.
An explosive around my neck.
A bomb.
Military-grade technology designed to decapitate.
My life depended on my mother valuing my life more than money and power.
I'm dead. I'm already dead.
The thoughts spun faster and faster as my body trembled.
My hands clawed at the necklace, trying to rip it off, feeling for a seam, a weak point, anything. The metal bit into my palms as I pulled, but it didn't budge.
I sank against the wall, my legs no longer able to hold me, my knees hitting the floor hard enough to bruise.
Tears blurred my vision as I fought. Fought to breathe, fought to rip the bomb off my throat. And I was losing.
Darius took a step toward me.
His body blocked the only light as he stood over me, his shadow swallowing me whole.
I opened my mouth to tell him to take it off, to beg or to bribe him with anything—my soul, my body, whatever he wanted.
Terrified screams stole my words as I curled in on myself, realization setting in like ice water rushing into my veins.
I was going to die, and there wasn't a damn thing I could do about it.
"Please," I finally managed, the word barely more than a whisper. "Please, she won't—she doesn't—"
She doesn't love me enough to save me.
Darius crouched down in front of me, close enough that I could see the flecks of gold in the ice blue of his eyes.
He reached out, and I flinched, but he just tucked a strand of purple hair behind my ear—gentle, almost tender.
"I know, maya soloveyka," he murmured, and there was something in his voice that sounded almost like pity. Almost like regret. "That's what I'm counting on."
And somehow, that was worse than everything else.
I opened my mouth and let out a wail of panicked misery.