17
I’ve been away from home for far longer during college, but this time it felt different. Like my life was hanging by the finest thread that could snap at any moment. When I finally catch the sight of the face brick mansion, I feel my stomach turn.
I never really liked this house that much. And after Ana got married and moved out, I would have even less to like about it. In fact, I was thinking of moving out permanently after she got married.
That plan turned out great.
The SUV parks a few feet from the entrance of the house, and the Costa guard in the driver’s seat doesn’t budge.
“Are you just going to wait out here the whole time?” I ask him.
He shrugs. “Boss’s orders.”
Of course. Rolling my eyes, I get out the car, pacing for the front door.
Dimitri’s on guard. He spots me at the door and butts out his cigarette on the brick wall, narrowing his eyes as if he’s not sure he’s seeing right. His mouth opens slightly as I walk past him and into the house, a grin tugging at my lips.
I walk further into the house until I catch sight of Ana in the kitchen, humming along to some pop song while she adds frosting to a tray of cupcakes.
She’s barefoot, wearing shorts, her blonde hair is in a messy bun.
Despite everything, I chew back a smile.
It’s the most carefree I’ve seen her in years.
She lifts her head, sees me, then gasps. “Frey?”
And then she’s running to me, leaping into my arms and almost knocking me to the floor. I laugh as I get pushed back two steps with the force of her hug.
Her green eyes roam my face, and then they start to tear up. “I missed you.”
My chest turns soft. “I’ve only been gone a few days.”
She blinks back the tears. “No, I— it’s…you learnt how to braid your hair without me?”
“Oh.” Instinctively, my hand goes to my hair. The lie comes easy. “Yeah.”
The truth would be too hard to explain.
Her perfectly manicured brows pull together. “Why didn’t you come earlier?”
“I was bonding with my future husband,” I murmur dryly.
There’s a mixture of surprise and optimism in her gaze. “Really?”
“No,” I scoff, reaching for a cupcake. “Who do you think I am?”
“Hey.” She swats at my hand. “I haven’t added sprinkles yet.”
I ignore her, snatching up a cupcake and shoving it into my mouth. “Hungry.”
Her gaze drops to my hands, and her eyes widen before she reaches over to pull my palm into hers. “What happened to your hand?”
“Nothing,” I mutter.
She balls up her fists at her sides. “So he’s starving you and hurting you? Is that it?”
Quite the opposite, actually.
But I don’t blame her for making the assumption.
“I get food,” I say, giving her a flat look. “A little too much if you ask me. I just lost my appetite for a bit. And if he wanted to hurt me he could do way worse than a few cuts. I was being clumsy.”
She sighs, not fully convinced. “How are you?”
“Alive.” I shrug. “You?”
She shifts on her feet. “Well…I have a lot more free time. It’s nice. I signed up for dance classes.”
I lift a brow. “Dance classes?”
“Yeah,” she says, “Ballet.”
Ana used to take ballet classes when she was younger but then our father became stricter about letting her out the house, and she was too embarrassed to ask her ballet instructor to come to the house, so that was it. Now that Papa’s loosening the reigns, she must have decided to take it up again.
I manage a smile. “That’s great.”
I’m happy for her. I am. I just wish her happiness didn’t have to come at the expense of mine.
“You should go see Papa,” she says, going back to tend to her cupcakes. “He’s been holed up in his office the entire week. He hasn’t been eating that much, either.”
I’m pacing to the office before she can finish. I wonder if he knows I’m here. Just to test the waters, I pause outside the doors before knocking twice.
“Come in, Anastasia,” Papa’s baritone voice sounds.
I push open the door, entering the large, dark expanse of my father’s office. He’s sitting at his desk, working through paperwork. It takes a while for him to acknowledge the silence, but as soon he does, he looks up from his desk before his wide-eyed gaze settles on me.
“Hey, Papa.”
His expression falters. “Freya?”
An awkward smile finds my lips. “It’s me.”
And then, before I can fully anticipate it, my father is up from his desk, engulfing me in his chest, his uninjured arm around me. “My lisenok.”
“Papa,” I murmur into his chest. His cologne has been the same for as long as I can remember. Wood and spice and home.
I can’t cry. I won’t. I made the decision, no matter how many times they told me not to do it. On paper, I had a choice. And I chose to marry him.
“Since when do you knock?” he asks.
“I’m learning this thing,” I say, “I think it’s called manners?”
He huffs a laugh, pulling away to set his hands on my shoulders as he scours my face. the seriousness returning to his features.
“There is a way,” he says, his grip on my shoulders tightening, “for you to get out of the marriage.”
My heart thunders in my chest, my throat drying. “How?”
He walks back to his desk, taking a seat. “A Russian is willing to buy out the contract in exchange for a stake in American territory.”
I frown. “Who?”
It’s a while before he decides to respond. “Volkov.”
A shudder runs down my spine. The Volkov brothers have ties to the Bratva in Moscow.
Ten thousand times more lethal than Cosa Nostra.
Rumor is one of them is detained in some high security prison.
I’ve heard of my father speaking about proposing an alliance with Rune Volkov, the older brother, for years.
The latter never seemed interested. Until now, apparently.
I shift my gaze to my father. “And you’re willing to give me to him?”
“He has given me his word.”
“What is his word even worth?”
My father gives me a lukewarm look. “We stick with our own, Freya. They will never accept us.”
I should be happy that my father’s been plotting—that he has a plan to get me out, but somehow, I’m just nervous. Fidgeting with my hands, I take a seat opposite him to stop myself from pacing the room. “So you give me to him, what then? I go to Russia? I stay with him?”
“Yes,” he says, “You go to Russia. You stay with him, and more importantly, you stay safe. Far away from the man who wants to hurt you.”
I swallow. “What does he want in return?”
My father waves a noncommittal hand. “Some land. And information.”
“What information?”
“Information he needs to get his brother out of prison. Information I can give him.”
I give him a blank stare.
He shrugs. “It’s a small price to pay.”
I shake my head. “If I disappear, he’ll just take Ana.”
“No,” he says. “You’ll be declared as dead, and the contract will be terminated. We’ll have paid our dues. On paper, at least.”
“They’ll want to see a dead body as proof.”
“We’ll find one,” he says, simply.
I lift a brow. “One that looks exactly like me?”
“Burnt or destroyed beyond recognition,” he says, “Yes.”
I grimace. I’m going to stage my death? Flee to Russia? A whole new country, where there’s no Ana, or Papa. Only strangers. I’m not even fluent in the language.
I glance up at my father hesitantly. “I need to think about it.”
“What is there to think about?”
“A lot!” I exclaim. “You’re asking me to just drop everything and run to another country.”
He sighs. “I’m only doing it for your safety, lisenok.”
I always knew my father had to be cunning and ruthless for his line of business, but the ease at which he specks of staging a murder—his confidence that it would all work out, makes me wonder how may times he’s done something like this.
I knew my father was not a moral man, but how far is he willing go?
I fidget with the hem of my t-shirt. “Papa.”
“Hmm?”
“Do you know someone called Sof?”
And just like that, a furious flush creeps up my father’s neck. He steels his expression quickly, but not quick enough for me to not catch the momentary slip. “No.”
I know when my father’s lying.
And he’s lying now.
An uneasy feeling settles like acid at the bottom of my stomach. I stand from my seat. “I need to go.”
“Freya,” my father placates, “Stay at home for a while. Don’t go back there. You only have to live with him after marriage.”
I shake my head. “The guard won’t leave without me.”
And I have a feeling that if I’m not back in time, my loving fiancé will tear a war path into our territory and marry me on the spot, so I that have no excuse not to return to his clutches.
? ? ?
It’s dark by the time I arrive back at the penthouse. I enter, setting down the cupcakes Ana packed on the granite counter and taking one out. Just then, something shifts in the darkness.
I’m screaming before I can stop myself.
I catch myself when the tall, hulking shadow takes the form of my future husband.
Placing a hand on my chest as my heartbeat slows, I fix him with a glare. “What are you doing here?!”
“This is my house,” Torren murmurs dryly.
“I know that,” I snap. “Why are you just sitting around in the dark?”
He’s quiet. I wonder if…
“Were you waiting for me?”
He doesn’t reply, looking down at the cupcakes on the counter with an imperceptible frown.
“Want one?” I ask, just to annoy him.
There’s a flash of irritation in his face. “Eat that shit this late and you’ll fuck up your teeth.”
“Oh, sorry, dad.” I roll my eyes, lifting a cupcake to my mouth. “But you’re a bit too late. If I lick it, it’s mine.”
His gaze darkens, and he glances at the cupcake I’m chewing like he wants to incinerate it. I chew back a smile, glancing up at him.
My father’s plan pulses at the forefront of my mind. And I’m happy, because for once, I have an actually plan. An actual, legitimate back-up option. I have leverage over him.
“That meeting tomorrow,” I say, “I’ll go. On one condition.”
His stare is scathing. “I don’t remember giving you an option.”
I lift a brow. “Will you drag me there, then?”
“Yes.”
“Fine,” I huff, “But there’s no saying what I’ll do once we’re there…”
His jaw flexes. “Don’t be fucking difficult, Freya. The meeting needs to show that our relationship with your family is intact. You’ll be at my side.”
As usual, he says it like an order. I ignore his tone, taking another bite of my cupcake. “What do I get in return?”
His gaze narrows. Then he just blanks, as if he’s deciding this entire interaction isn’t worth the trouble. And just like that, he turns, and starts walking away.
I frown. “Are you just going to ignore me?”
No response. I just get the view of his back receding into the apartment.
“Hey,” I say.
Still nothing.
“Hey!”
Flustered, I say the first thing that comes to mind to grab his attention.
“I love you!”
He goes still. Deathly still.
Ha.
My conceit is short lived because he turns. Slowly. Leisurely. And suddenly, I get what I want, and I’m not so sure I want it anymore.
The full weight of that dark stare is on me, devouring me slowly. In the dim light of the night, the whites of his eyes make him look like a predator in the wild. He stalks closer to me, and my pulse kicks up, nerves fluttering up from my stomach.
Unconsciously, stupidly, I take a step back — only for my back to meet the cold surface of the fridge. The chill of the fridge seeps into my shoulder blades. There’s nowhere for me to go. And he’s still stalking closer. With his hands in his pockets.
Oh, no.
I shove the last of my cupcake into my mouth.
He’s in front of me now, and I have no idea what I stirred up. He’s leaning down, so close I feel the warmth radiating from his body, feel his liquor-tinted breath on my cheeks.
His palms come up above me, flat on the surface of the fridge. Caging me in.
His body melts into mine through our clothes, all hardness and ridges. It’s pure friction, and it’s liquid heat collecting at the apex of my thighs.
He likes doing this, I realize. Backing me up into corners. Against surfaces. Pressing up against me. Closing the space between us. Breathing down my neck.
The power play gets him high.
Normally, I’d stare right back at him, but to do that, I’d have to look up at him. It would be submission. I would have to hand over that little pocket of power. So instead, I turn my head, closing my eyes.
He leans further down. My heart thuds in my chest, and I think, for a second, that he’s gotten his fill. That he’ll back up and let me go.
But then I feel something soft and wet on the side of my mouth.
His tongue.
He licks me.
He fucking licks me.
Or more accurately, he licks the cupcake frosting off the side of my mouth.
I whip my gaze up to him, because what the hell?
But amusement just glitters in his dark eyes, the corner of his mouth lifting. A hot white pulse of pleasure, intertwined with bafflement, shoots up my spine. And in that moment, I know, somehow, exactly what he’s thinking.
If I lick it, it’s mine.
Slowly, though, the amusement in his eyes is replaced by something hard and unmoving. “You aren’t getting out of the contract.”
I resist the urge to scoff. “Why would I ask for something so stupid?”
Torren tilts his head, considering me. “And no guns.”
My brows knit. “I don’t want guns.”
He nods. Slowly. And he takes a step back. “You can have anything else, then.”
My mood peaks. “Anything?”
“Anything.”
Wow. I guess hard work really does pay off. I lift my hand in the space between us. “Pinky promise?”
He shoots me a perplexed, slightly annoyed look. I lean forward and hook my pinky into his for a second, before pulling away. He stares down at me with a mixture of impassiveness and confusion lacing his features.
He narrows his eyes. “Why would you believe me if I’ve lied to you before?”
I shrug. “You pinky swore.”
I brush past him, and out of the kitchen, heading for my room. The side of my mouth buzzes, still wet from his tongue.
Now that I have the upper hand, I guess I can play nice.
? ? ?
author?s note:
spoiler for chapter 18 on my instagram @rhianovakauthor and more on my twitter @rhianovakauthor
you can search “torren and freya” on spotify for the book playlist.
see you next chapter 3