Chapter 1
Chapter One
The Tsar
The office smelled like fifty-year-old scotch, illegal Cuban cigars, and the kind of money that didn't just talk—it screamed, then silenced the witnesses.
It was a suffocating scent. It coated the back of my throat, tasting like ash and entitlement.
I sat in a leather wingback chair that likely cost more than the house I grew up in, my hands resting loosely on my thighs.
I kept them there, perfectly still, because if I moved them, I might give in to the violent urge to flip the solid mahogany desk in front of me.
Control.
That was the only thing that mattered. It was the only reason I was sitting here, in the inner sanctum of Silas Kensington, instead of on the ice at Blackthorne Arena where I belonged.
"You understand the terms, Mr. Volkov?"
Silas didn't look up from the document in front of him.
He was a small man, physically. Thinning grey hair, a suit that was tailored to hide a soft midsection, and eyes that were dead, shark-like beads.
But he was the General Manager of the Boston Sentinels.
He held the keys to the NHL draft. He held the keys to my entire future.
I didn't blink. The air in the room was stagnant, the thermostat set too high to combat the Vermont winter howling outside the floor-to-ceiling windows. I could feel a bead of sweat tracing the line of my spine, trapped beneath my black compression shirt and the dress shirt I’d been forced to wear.
"I understand," I said. My voice was a low rumble, scraping against the silence. I didn't waste words. I never did.
Silas finally looked up. He took off his reading glasses, twirling them between manicured fingers. He looked at me not like a person, not even like a player, but like a violent animal he was considering buying for a petting zoo. He was assessing the risk of the bite.
"It’s an unusual arrangement," Silas mused, leaning back. "But my daughter… Mila has a unique talent for finding trouble. And with my wife in Paris for the season, and my travel schedule ramping up for the playoffs, I cannot have distractions. I cannot have headlines."
I clenched my jaw so hard a muscle feathered near my ear. Mila Kensington.
I knew who she was. Everyone at Blackthorne University knew who she was.
The Kensington Princess. The walking, talking American Express Black Card.
She was a blur of blonde hair, short skirts, and chaos.
She drove a white G-Wagon she couldn't park, she skipped classes I would kill to attend, and she treated the campus like her personal runway.
She was everything I despised.
She was soft. She was useless. She was noise in a world that required focus.
"You want me to babysit," I said, the word tasting like bile.
"I want you to manage," Silas corrected sharply. "I’ve pulled her housing allowance. I’ve frozen her discretionary funds.
She has nowhere to go. You have a spare room in that…
bunker you and your teammates rent out in the woods.
She stays there. She attends her classes.
She is home by curfew. No parties. No scandals.
No paparazzi shots of her falling out of nightclubs. "
He slid the paper across the desk.
"You keep her on the straight and narrow until graduation in May," Silas said, his voice dropping to a conspiratorial whisper. "And the first-round draft pick is yours. I’ll make the calls. I’ll clear the path. You’ll be a Sentinel, Theo. You’ll be a millionaire before the ink is dry."
I looked at the contract. It was a deal with the devil.
My mother’s face flashed in my mind—haggard, worn down by double shifts and the constant, gnawing fear of eviction.
The draft wasn't just a game to me. It wasn't about glory or puck bunnies or getting my name on a jersey.
It was survival. It was the only way to retroactively save the kid I used to be, shivering in a trailer with no heat.
I needed this.
But the cost was her. Mila.
"And if she refuses?" I asked.
Silas laughed. It was a dry, ugly sound. "She has no money, Theo. She has no cards. She has no friends, only leeches who like her tab. She won’t refuse. She’ll kick and scream, but she’ll fold. She always does."
He underestimated her. Or maybe he just didn't care.
I looked down at my hands. They were scarred, the knuckles enlarged from years of fighting, the skin rough. On my right arm, hidden by the sleeve, was the geometric ink that marked my skin—lines and angles. Order. Structure.
Bringing Mila Kensington into my house was inviting a hurricane into a library. It offended my very nature.
But I picked up the heavy fountain pen. The weight of it felt permanent.
"One rule," I said, my eyes locking with his.
"Oh?"
"I run my house," I said, my voice dropping an octave, turning into the tone I used on the ice when I barked orders at my wingers.
"If she lives under my roof, she follows my protocol.
You don't intervene. You don't undermine me.
If I say she stays in, she stays in. If I take her car keys, they stay taken. "
Silas waved a dismissive hand. "Discipline her however you see fit, Volkov. Just don't break her bones, and don't sleep with her."
The thought was laughable. Touching Mila Kensington would be like touching a live wire wrapped in barbed wire. I had no interest in spoiled little girls who thought the world owed them a living. I liked women who knew the value of silence.
"I have no interest in your daughter, sir," I said coldly.
"Good." Silas checked his watch. "She’s currently at the Theta Chi house. My sources tell me she’s causing a scene. Go collect her. Consider this your first shift."
I signed the paper. The scratch of the nib against the parchment sounded like a lock clicking shut.
I stood up, towering over the desk. At six-foot-five, I filled the room, sucking the oxygen out of it. I didn't offer my hand to shake. I just turned and walked out, the contract folded in my pocket, heading out into the snow to collect the bane of my existence.
Mila
The bass was vibrating in my teeth.
It thumped through the floorboards of the Theta Chi basement, a rhythmic, pounding assault that matched the headache blooming behind my eyes. The air was thick, humid with the smell of three hundred bodies, stale beer, and bad decisions.
It was disgusting. It was loud. It was perfect.
I stood on top of the pool table, my white Valentino heels sinking slightly into the stained green felt.
From up here, the sea of faces looked like a blurry mosaic of hunger.
Guys in backwards caps, girls with eyeliner running down their cheeks, phones held up like lighters at a concert, recording my every move.
Let them look, I thought, a hysterical giggle bubbling in my chest. Look at the Kensington heiress. Look at the mess.
I took another swig from the red solo cup in my hand. It was cheap vodka, burning all the way down, searing my esophagus. I needed the burn. The burn was real. The burn was the only thing that convinced me I wasn't invisible.
"Come on, Mila! Take it off!" someone shouted from the back.
I swayed, catching my balance. My white silk dress was precarious, a slip of fabric held together by spaghetti straps and hope. It was ruined, the hem stained with something dark, but I didn't care. Daddy had cut the cards an hour ago. The text message was still burning a hole in my brain.
Account Frozen. Come home, or figure it out yourself.
Figure it out myself? Fine. I would figure it out. I would burn the whole reputation he cared so much about to the ground.
"You want a show?" I screamed, throwing my arms out. The diamond bracelet on my wrist caught the strobe lights, fracturing the darkness. "Is that what you want? You want to see what a Kensington is worth?"
The crowd roared. They were sharks, and I was chum.
"I’m auctioning it off!" I yelled, the words slurring slightly. The room went semi-quiet, a hush of confusion rippling through the frat boys. "My V-card! Highest bidder takes the Princess home tonight!"
The roar that followed was deafening. It was primal.
My stomach twisted violently. I wanted to vomit. I didn't want this. I didn't want any of them. I wanted to be in my studio, smelling turpentine, looking at the brushstrokes of a master who died three hundred years ago. I wanted to be safe.
But safety was lonely. And I was so tired of being lonely. At least up here, on the table, they saw me. Even if they looked at me with greed, they saw me.
"Five hundred!" a guy in a lacrosse jersey shouted.
"Thousand!" another screamed.
"Daddy’s money can pay for it!" someone laughed cruelly.
I felt tears prick the corners of my eyes, hot and humiliating. I blinked them back, forcing a bright, brittle smile. This was my armor. The smile. The hair. The dress. If I looked perfect, if I acted like I didn't care, they couldn't hurt me.
"Is that all?" I taunted, spinning around, nearly tripping over a pool cue. "I’m worth more than a grand! I’m a limited edition!"
The crowd parted near the stairs.
I didn't notice it at first. I was too busy drowning in the adrenaline and the vodka. But then the energy in the room shifted. It wasn't the rowdy, chaotic energy of a party anymore. It was the sudden, sharp silence of predators sensing a bigger predator entering the water.
The music didn't stop, but people stopped moving.
I squinted through the haze. A figure was moving through the crowd. No, not moving—parting it.
He was massive. He wore a black wool coat that made his shoulders look as wide as a doorway. People scrambled out of his path like he was contagious, or like he was carrying a weapon. He moved with a predatory grace that didn't belong in a sticky frat basement.
He stepped into the circle of light around the pool table, and my breath hitched.
The Tsar.
Theo Volkov.
I’d seen him on campus, of course. Everyone had. He was a myth, a ghost story told by the sorority girls. Don't look him in the eye. He doesn't date. He doesn't speak. He just wins.