Chapter 4 #2
I sat on the bed and pulled him into my lap, pressing my lips to his curls, inhaling the sweet tang of lavender shampoo and boyhood warmth. I rocked him slowly, letting the fragile sense of calm sink into both of us. “We just... talked. Like grown-ups.”
He twisted up to look at me, eyes wide and searching. “We’re leaving tomorrow, right?”
I nodded, forcing my voice steady. “Six a.m. sharp. The cab’s already booked.”
His face fell, shadowed with worry, confusion, and that heartbreaking little-boy longing.
“Mom... what if I don’t want to go? Greece is.
.. big houses and old people. Here feels.
.. alive. And it’s where my dad is from.
” He climbed onto his knees, hands gripping my shoulders like anchors, whispering like we were plotting a rebellion: “Please, Mom. I want to know him.”
Each word was a dagger twisting inside my chest.
I cupped his little face in my hands, thumbs brushing along the sharp Volkov cheekbones that I both adored and cursed. “We will come back one day,” I promised, voice soft, trembling, but resolute. “But right now... we have to go home. I have... reasons.”
He searched my face, scrutinizing every line, every hesitation, every unspoken truth, and finally nodded, trusting me with the blind, fierce faith only a child can give.
I pulled him into a tight, fierce hug, pressing my face into the back of his neck so he wouldn’t see the tears threatening to spill. “Everything will be fine,” I whispered, shoving all my courage, all my will, into the words. “I’ve got you. Always.”
He clung to me like I was gravity itself, holding on with every ounce of his small, determined body.
Neither of us slept that night.
The dawn came early, pale and brittle.
At exactly 5:47 a.m., we were dressed, bags packed and zipped tight, standing outside in the pre-dawn chill.
The world smelled of frost and stone and promise.
A chartered cab idled at the curb, exhaust curling upward like ghosts, ready to carry us back to a life that felt impossibly fragile.
Vanya shivered, arms wrapped around himself.
I slung my coat over his small shoulders, smoothed the hair from his forehead, and whispered, “Almost time, baby. Almost safe.”
For a heartbeat, he looked at me, eyes wide, vulnerable, and full of trust. I swallowed the lump in my throat, clenched my fists to keep them from trembling, and told myself: we were leaving Lake Como. We were leaving him — for now.
But the shadow of Volkov still lingered in every corner, every cobblestone street, every whisper of the wind. And I knew, deep down, leaving him behind — even for a night — would never really be possible.
I took Vanya’s small hand tight in mine as we stepped forward, muscles coiled, nerves screaming.
Every step felt like wading through molasses, my mind trapped in that smoky suite, replaying Dmitri’s impossible words on a merciless loop.
Marry me.
I made her faint.
I needed a wife.
You’re not leaving.
I shook my head, willing the memories to fade.
He hadn’t recognized me. Ruslan’s masterpiece of deception had held. One more hour, one more turn of the plane’s wheels, and we’d be gone, free, untouchable.
I opened the rear door of the cab, relief beginning to bloom in my chest as Vanya slipped in first. I followed him quickly, shutting the door behind us like I could shut out everything that had just happened.
The cab rolled away from the hotel like any normal morning ride, the city waking in lazy rhythm.
I sat rigid in the back seat, fingers curled around Vanya’s small hand, staring straight ahead while my mind ran in frantic circles.
Seraphina would wake in a few weeks, healthy, furious, and still the perfect alliance bride.
The Orlovs would demand the wedding go ahead the moment she could stand.
If anyone ever discovered Dmitri was the one who put Seraphina in that hospital bed, the entire coast would burn in revenge.
He risked everything—alliances, power, even his own life—because he could not stand the thought of marrying anyone else in his lifetime but me.
Such maddening devotion.
He loved me this much, yet during our marriage, he had shown nothing but hate. Obsessed, yes—but not in the way a normal couple loves.
His obsession was cruel, possessive, and sharpened by what he believed my family had done to his, a poison that twisted every act of his heart.
And yet... a traitorous, shameful part of me wondered:
If he loved me like this, how could he also despise her so completely?
How could a man destroy everything around him for me, and still leave me trembling with fear instead of warmth?
It was maddening. Infuriating. And terrifying.
Because the more I tried to separate devotion from cruelty, love from obsession, the more I realized I couldn’t.
And the part of me that feared for my life also feared what it would mean if he ever truly claimed me, body and soul, without restraint.
And what if I had said yes yesterday?
What if I had walked back into that lounge, dropped to my knees, and told him everything?
“I never died. Ruslan faked it all. This is your son. I still love you, even though I hate you.”
Would those storm-grey eyes have softened? Or would they have glinted with fury and disbelief, calling me a liar and having me shot for the insult?
The cab suddenly veered sharply left, leaving the main coastal road and plunging down a narrow, tree-lined private lane I didn’t recognize.
My blood froze.
“Hey!” I snapped, sitting bolt upright, panic rising in my throat. “This isn’t the way to the airport!”
The driver met my eyes in the rear-view mirror and smiled, slow, deliberate, and ugly in a way that made my stomach drop.
“No, miss Pen. This is the private road to Mr Volkov’s estate.”
Vanya’s hand jerked violently in mine, eyes wide.
I could feel his pulse racing, his tiny body tensing like a spring ready to snap.
I swallowed, forcing a calm I didn’t feel, and whispered to him, “Hold on, baby. Just... hold on.”
Then I turned my attention back to the driver, my pulse spiking with a cocktail of fear and fury. “This better be some joke... or a prank,” I snapped, my voice slicing through the pre-dawn silence like shattered glass.
“Turn around, Mr. Right. Now.” Every syllable was loaded, trembling with rage I couldn’t fully contain.
“Only following orders, ma’am.” The driver’s grin was terrifyingly calm, as he pressed harder on the accelerator. Gravel pinged against the chassis with every tire rotation. “You can write to your husband in Greece and tell him coming home anytime soon just became... complicated.”
My stomach dropped into my boots.
I lunged forward, fingers clawing for the steering wheel. “Stop the car! Right now!”
“Mom!” Vanya’s small voice screamed, yanking me back just as the car fishtailed violently.
The world tilted, trees and hedges streaking into green-and-brown smears. For a horrifying instant, I thought we would roll. My pulse spiked, every nerve ending on fire.
I released the wheel instantly, heart hammering in my throat.
Vanya trembled against me, eyes wide, lips pressed together in rigid fear. I pressed my forehead to the crown of his head, willing him to feel safe even as the world collapsed around us.
“Thank God you listened to your son,” the driver sneered, righting the car with disturbing ease. “Otherwise, we all die, eh?”
I wanted to rip that smirk off his face with my bare hands, and I mean rip. But instead, I sank back, lungs heaving, and held Vanya tighter.
He buried his face in my neck, shivering, small fists digging into my ribs as if to anchor himself to life itself.
“Mom,” he whispered, trembling, “he’s not going to hurt us... right?”
Before I could answer, the driver’s smooth, unsettling voice cut in:
“Mr Dmitri would never hurt a child. You’re very safe, little Vanya.”
The way he said my son’s name—like he’d known it for years—made my skin crawl.
Every instinct screamed run, every molecule of my being screaming that we were deep in a cage with predators.
I swallowed every curse, every scream, every desperate wish to vanish into the morning mist. Vanya had never seen me lose control. I would not let these animals be the first.
“Kidnapping a child and his mother,” I said, voice low and venomous, each word like a shard of ice, “real brave.”
“Just following orders,” he repeated, singsong, almost enjoying himself.
Vanya lifted his head, eyes wide, trembling but defiant. “You said he won’t hurt me because I’m a child. What about my mom?”
The driver’s gaze flicked to the mirror, sharp, assessing. “If your mom behaves,” he said lightly, “she’ll be fine. Tell her to play nice.”
I committed his smug face to memory—every smirk, every cruel line, every gleam of arrogance. One day, he would choke on that grin.
The car slowed as we approached a pair of towering wrought-iron gates, swinging open automatically with a hiss of hydraulics.
Beyond them rose a palace of glass, steel, and stone, perched on the cliff’s edge like a predator surveying the lake.
It was nothing like the old villa I had lived in during the years Dmitri and I were estranged.
That one had been dark wood, velvet, old-world grandeur, history seeping from every wall and floorboard.
This was colder, sharper, a fortress of black marble and smoked glass, brutalist lines cut into the mountain itself.
Floor-to-ceiling windows reflected the dawn in molten gold, waterfalls of wisteria spilling over terraces that jutted impossibly over the void.
Infinity pools seemed to bleed into the horizon, where Lake Como glittered like shattered sapphires.
It was breathtaking. Heavenly. And utterly terrifying—a palace designed to remind you exactly who owned the sky.
The cab rolled to a stop on a courtyard of polished obsidian stone. The driver killed the engine, popped the trunk, and hauled our suitcases out like some rehearsed bellhop at a five-star resort, his movements precise and impersonal.