Chapter 4
Ishould feel relief.
The marriage is sealed. The alliance is solid. The Russians are satisfied. Everything went exactly the way it was supposed to. And yet… all I can think about is the look on Elena’s face when I told her the bedroom was hers.
Shock. Not fear. Not disappointment. Just pure, quiet disbelief.
Like no one had ever given her space before.
Like the idea of privacy was a luxury she didn’t quite understand.
She stood there in that white dress—too delicate, too damn beautiful—and stared at me like I’d spoken a language she didn’t know.
It unsettled me more than it should have. I’m not a gentle man. I don’t pretend to be. But I’m not a monster either. Forcing a woman into my bed was never going to be part of this arrangement. I agreed to an alliance, not ownership of her body.
Still… she’s attractive. More than I expected.
Soft lips, wide eyes, a face made for secrets no one has ever allowed her to keep.
But what sticks with me isn’t her beauty.
It’s how perfect she was at the wedding.
Too perfect. The bowed head. The quiet steps.
The practiced smile that didn’t touch her eyes.
The way she followed at my side without being told.
No one is naturally like that. No one moves through life that careful unless life taught them to be.
Something isn’t right.
I sit on the edge of the guest bed, rolling my shoulders, the weight of the day settling into my bones. After a long moment, I pull out my phone and dial the only man who knows how to find answers. Rafe picks up on the second ring.
“Yeah, Boss?”
“I’m calling about Elena Volkov,” I say, voice low. “You finished the background?”
“Everything you asked for. Clean. Too clean, honestly.”
My jaw tightens. “Explain.”
“She completed school with perfect grades. No disciplinary notes. No medical issues. Nothing that raises alarms.”
No medical issues. No behavioral issues. No human issues at all.
“What about signs of abuse?” I ask, surprising myself with the edge in my voice. “Anything?”
A pause on the other end.
“No red flags. No hospital visits, no bruises noted in health records, no complaints. Nothing physical. Nothing emotional that we can track.”
I drag a hand through my hair. Of course it wouldn’t show up on paper. Control rarely leaves bruises.
“Friends?” I push.
“Doesn’t look like she has any,” Rafe says bluntly. “No consistent friend group, no social outings. Any time she’s photographed outside the home, she’s with family—her father, mother, sometimes her cousins. That’s it.”
No friends. No independence. No life outside her father’s shadow.
“She never goes out with people her age?” I ask.
“Nope. No clubs, no girls’ nights, no trips. Nothing.”
“Thank you,” I say quietly.
“Anytime, Boss.”
He hangs up. I lie back on the bed, staring at the ceiling as the truth settles in my chest like ice.
She wasn’t trained to be a good wife. She was trained not to exist without permission.
And the part that should please me—the part that should find comfort in her obedience—doesn’t sit right in my gut.
Not after watching her freeze every time her father looked her way.
Not after noticing that tiny spark in her eye.
It was small, but it was real. A flash of something she keeps buried so deep even she forgets it’s there. I close my eyes and exhale slowly.
What can I do… to see that spark again? What can I do to make her look at me the way she did in that brief heartbeat—like she didn’t know whether to fear me or challenge me?
I shouldn’t want it. I don’t have time to want things. Sleep doesn’t come easy. It never has, but tonight it drags me under faster than usual—weighted by too many questions, too much silence from the woman down the hall.
When my eyes finally close, the darkness shifts. And suddenly I’m ten years old again.
The schoolyard smells like dust and sunshine. Kids crowd around the track, shouting and laughing, all knees and elbows and scraped shins. Dante stands beside me, grinning like he was born to win.
“We’re gonna smoke them,” he says, bouncing on the balls of his feet.
I laugh. “You are. I’ll try to keep up.”
The whistle blows.
We run.
Dante is a blur ahead of me, arms pumping, hair flying, pure joy propelling his feet. I stay a step behind him.
Just one. Always one.
He crosses the finish line first. I cross second. He throws his arms up in victory, and I slap his back, smiling with him like the sun is inside my chest.
“You killed it,” I tell him.
“So did you!” he replies, breathless and proud.
For a moment, everything is perfect. Then my father appears. He walks past me without looking, offering his hand to Dante. “Congratulations, ragazzo. First place. Well done.”
Dante beams. “Thank you, sir.”
My father turns to me, face already pinched. “Time to go. Say goodbye.”
The joy drains from my limbs. I force a smile and clap Dante’s shoulder. “See you tomorrow.”
He frowns a little, noticing the stiffness, but I walk away before he can say anything else.
At home, Mama meets me at the door. She wraps me in a quick hug that smells like lavender and fresh bread.
“How did you do, amore?” she asks.
“I got second place,” I say proudly.
“That’s wonderful—”
“No,” my father snaps, stepping inside behind me. “It is not wonderful. It’s a disgrace.”
My stomach drops.
“Mio marito,” Mama begins softly, “he—”
“Quiet.”
The word slices the air clean in half.
He towers over me. “Second place is failure. Second place is weakness. You need to train harder. Be better. A future Don doesn’t lose.”
“I—”
My voice sticks in my throat, terror pressing down on my lungs.
“Outside,” he orders.
I obey. Hours blur into sweat and dirt and burning lungs. Laps. Sprints. Again. Again. Again.
My legs scream. My chest feels like it’s on fire.
Tears burn behind my eyes, but I don’t let them fall—not while he’s watching.
When he finally stops me, I can barely stand. He crouches down until his face is level with mine, voice cold enough to freeze the sweat on my skin.
“You push harder. Or you will never be Don.”
He turns and walks inside, letting the door slam shut behind him.
The second it closes, I collapse onto the grass, clutching my legs with shaking hands, trying to rub the pain away. I drop my head back against the ground, staring at the sky through a blur.
I’ll never be Don, I think. Not because I’m weak—but because it should be Dante.
It’s always been Dante. And the truth settles warm in my chest, easing the ache for the first time.
I slowed down today. On purpose. Because I don’t want the crown. I never have. I’m built to be second. To protect. To follow where he leads. To make sure he never falls, even if I have to bleed to keep him standing.
A smile cracks through the pain. A small one, but real.
Then my father’s voice thunderbolts across the yard, his silhouette filling the doorway.
“GET UP AND RUN AGAIN!”
The world tilts—
I shoot upright in bed, chest tight, heart punching against my ribs.
Air claws at my throat as I drag in a shaky breath.
It’s been years since that dream crawled out of whatever grave I buried it in.
Years since I felt ten again. Small. Controlled.
Never good enough. I scrub a hand over my face, grounding myself in the present.
My home. My room. Well, not my room but the one I chose for the night.
Maybe that is why I dreamt. But the aftertaste of the past hangs heavy in my mouth.
Why the hell did it come back now? I already know the answer.
Elena.
Standing silent beside her father. Flinching at his touch. Moving through life like someone else wrote her script. Obedient. Perfect. Controlled. Controlled the way I was. My chest tightens again—not from fear, but from anger I can’t quite name.
I swing my feet onto the floor, elbows on my knees, head bowed.
The house is quiet. She’s quiet. But the echo of that spark I saw in her eyes won’t leave me alone.
Maybe that’s why the dream came back. Maybe watching Viktor Volkov command his daughter like a possession stirred something in the parts of me that never healed. Maybe that’s why I can’t stop thinking…
What would it take to bring her fire back? What would it take to make her look at me not like a man she must obey—but like someone she could trust?
I exhale slowly, the weight of the night pressing down on my shoulders.
One thing is certain: I don’t want a docile wife.
I don’t want a ghost shaped by someone else’s demands.
I want the woman I glimpsed for just a heartbeat—the one with a spark behind her eyes.
And I’ll be damned if I let anyone snuff it out.