Chapter 8
Lidiya
My legs give out the second I’m through the wings.
Not gracefully. Not in the controlled way the other women exited, all poise and practised smiles.
I go down like a puppet with its strings cut, my knees hitting the floor hard enough to send a jolt up through my spine.
The five-hundred-pound envelope that someone pressed into my palm as I stumbled past is clutched in my hand.
“Miss Kareva.” Madam Orlov says, her hand firm under my elbow. “Can you stand?”
“Give me a second,” I manage, though the words come out thin and reedy.
The holding room is a minefield of animosity and disdainful stares. The rest of the women hate me. Alisha is scowling at me like I stole her boyfriend.
One hundred million pounds.
The number keeps detonating in my skull like a car alarm I can’t switch off.
One hundred million.
“Up,” Madam Orlov says and hauls me up with more strength than she appears to have. “Do not fall.”
“I’m… what… fuck…”
Madam Orlov purses her lips, giving me a shrewd stare. “Indeed. Who are you, Devochka?”
“No one,” I splutter. “I’m just a broke waitress who was talked into this—”
“Yeah, by me!” Alisha growls. “And this is how you repay me?”
“What?” I stammer, frowning at her.
“Hush,” Orlov snaps at Alisha, focused on me and my apparent one hundred million pound status. “You are telling me that you have no idea why two men just waged a war over you that exceeded the GDP of a small nation?”
“No!” My voice cracks. “I signed up for the five hundred quid!” I hold up the envelope like it’s evidence in my own defence. “That’s it. That’s all I came for. I don’t know those men. I don’t know why this happened!”
Orlov studies me for a long moment. I sense that she believes me. My panic is real because it’s fucking real.
“Sit,” she commands, guiding me to a chair. “Drink this.” A glass of water appears, handed to her by the tablet-wielding woman, and I take it with both hands because one isn’t enough to keep it steady. My cardigan with my belongings follows. I pull it on without a conscious thought.
The other women are gathering their things, shooting glances at me that range from curious to venomous. Alisha hasn’t moved. She’s standing three feet away with her arms crossed and her jaw set, radiating the kind of fury that usually precedes a scene.
Going to work tomorrow is going to be awkward as fuck. Perhaps I could quit and find another job in less than a day?
Alisha gives me a death stare and storms out, several of the women following her, the others taking their time, but eventually, we are alone. Madam Orlov is still staring at me.
“I’m sorry,” I mutter.
She snorts in a very unladylike manner. “Why are you apologising? You broke an auction record. You made me even wealthier. But I would be very careful, Devochka. Men, especially men like Damien Voronov, don’t bid a hundred million pounds and expect nothing in return.
You are either worth that much for something you aren’t aware of, or you will be asked to earn it. ”
“Earn it?” I whisper as dread creeps its icy hand down my spine. She doesn’t need to elaborate. “Wait. Voronov?” My debt collector doesn’t just work for the family my father owed, but is one of them? Rage, hot and incandescent, fills my veins.
My hands go cold around the glass. The water sloshes, and I set it down before I drop it.
Every Friday payment. Every threatening visit.
Every sleepless night spent doing sums that never add up.
And now this man—this family—has the audacity to bid a hundred million pounds on me like I’m livestock at a market while simultaneously bleeding me dry week after week for a debt I didn’t create.
I’m going to kill him. I’m going to slash his throat with anything I can get my hands on and watch as he bleeds out at my feet.
My violent thoughts make me croak in horror. That isn’t me.
But the fury doesn’t leave. It just changes shape, coiling tighter, settling into something colder and more useful than a fantasy about throat-slitting.
I press my palms flat against my thighs and breathe through my nose until the red haze recedes enough for rational thought to elbow its way back in.
“You shouldn’t be back here,” Madam Orlov states coldly.
“I go where I please.”
I feel the intense gaze on me before I look up and see those blue eyes staring at me from the doorway.
He is leaning casually against the frame, flicking something over in his hand, something heavy and silver.
He is dressed in a dark suit that looks as if it came off the catwalk, with a crisp white shirt unbuttoned at the collar, showing tattoos that would look sexy on anyone except him.
I hiss at him.
He smiles. Smug and arrogant. “Miss Kareva,” he says, like we’re old friends meeting for brunch. “You look well.”
“You,” I manage, and the word comes out like a blade. “You’re a Voronov.”
He tilts his head, considering this as if I’ve made an interesting observation about his clothes. “Guilty.”
“Every week, your family takes money I don’t have for a debt I didn’t make, and you just—you just spent a hundred million pounds on me like it’s nothing?”
“It’s not nothing. It’s quite a lot, actually. Even by my standards.”
I launch to my feet. The chair crashes against the wall behind me.
Water splashes across the carpet, glass shattering.
My heart hammers against my ribs like it wants to break free, and my fingernails dig half-moons into my palms. My jaw clenches so tight I taste metal, and something wild and feral rises in my throat.
“Is this a joke to you?” I step towards him.
He doesn’t move. Doesn’t flinch. Just keeps flipping that silver thing—a knuckleduster, heavy and brutal—over and over in his fingers like a stress toy.
“Is this some kind of sick power play? You bleed me dry for a hundred pounds a week and then drop a hundred million in a single night?”
“Those are two separate matters.”
“They are not separate! You are the same family! You are the—”
“Miss Kareva,” Madam Orlov clips out. “This is neither the time nor the place.”
I bite my tongue. Arguing with her is pointless. But I fire a look of pure venom at Voronov. I can’t even remember his first name.
The stare he gives me back is dark, possessive, and it flicks the rage switch again. Moving closer to him, I lash out, slapping him across the face so hard, I leave a red mark.
He growls and grips my wrist before I can lower it. “Do that again, solnyshko, and you’re going to turn me on.”
“Ugh!” I spit out, my cheeks going red hot. “I am not your sunshine!”
I try to yank my arm back, but his grip is too strong. But in a way that doesn’t hurt, merely restrains.
In its own way, it’s even more frightening than if he were bruising me.
“Madam Orlov,” he says, without taking his eyes off mine. “I will be taking my companion right now.”
“Of course,” she says, favouring her money over my well-being. “Payment?”
I can’t blame her. I would too. But it still stings.
I’m nothing but a commodity to be sold and bought. “Let go of me,” I say through gritted teeth.
“No.” Simple. Final. Like he’s declining a biscuit, not holding a woman captive by the wrist in a room that smells like Champagne and regret.
“Madame Orlov—take Sable: 63.8 metres, 2019 delivery, Cayman flag, berthed Port Hercule—full transfer of beneficial ownership tonight; my captain will sign her over, and your people can change the name by morning.”
Madame Orlov’s gaze flicks from Damien to me as she licks her lips, her eyes gleaming. “The super yacht—what do you value it at, Mr Voronov?”
“One hundred million. That is the price, isn’t it?”
I gawk at him. A super yacht? That is oligarch territory. Fuck.
Voronov turns, still holding me, and walks. I have two choices: follow or be dragged. My heels click against the floor in a staccato rhythm that sounds like surrender, and I hate every single step. As soon as we leave the staging room, we step over something laid out in the corridor.
A body.
A security guard.
He is groaning, his face bloody like it’s been smashed in with… something.
“I said let go.” I glance back over my shoulder as he pulls me away from the man he beat up.
“And I said no. We’ve established our positions. Shall we move on?”
The corridor narrows. The warm gold sconces blur past as he walks at a pace that forces me into a half-jog to keep in line with him, without my arm being wrenched from its socket.
“Where are you taking me?”
“Dinner.” He says it like I’m being unreasonable for asking. “That is what I paid for. Dinner. Two hours. Your sparkling company.”
“My sparkling company involves me telling you exactly what I think of you and your family for the entire two hours.”
“I’d expect nothing less.”
A sharp voice cuts through the corridor.
“Mr Voronov.”
Damien stops so abruptly, I carry on walking for half a second before I’m yanked to a stop.
A man steps into our path; security by the look of him, suit too tight across his shoulders. An earpiece. The kind of man whose job description is physical.
His gaze flicks over Damien, then lands on me like I’m an item on an invoice.
“Madame Orlov requests you return your companion,” he says, and there’s a faint, insolent emphasis on the last word. Like I’m furniture being relocated.
Damien’s head tilts a fraction. “No.”
The man’s jaw tightens. “The contract.”
“The contract,” Damien repeats mildly, “is between me and Madame Orlov. And I’ve paid.”
“The price is irrelevant if you’re making trouble.”
“Trouble?” Damien’s voice stays conversational, but something changes in the air. It thickens. “You mean like the trouble currently bleeding into her carpet behind us?”
The man’s gaze flicks to the groaning guard on the floor and then back to Damien, unimpressed. “You don’t get to cause scenes in this establishment.”
Damien’s fingers tighten around my wrist. Not painful. Possessive. A warning to me, not him.
“Move,” Damien says.
The man doesn’t.
He steps closer instead, and before I can even process it, his hand comes out and clamps around my upper arm.
Not gentle. Not guiding. Gripping.
A flash of pure, cold terror spikes down my spine.
Damien goes still.
Not the calm stillness from the café. Not boredom.
Predator stillness.
I feel it before I see it—like the temperature drops, like my skin knows what’s about to happen.
“You’re touching her,” Damien says softly.
“I’m removing her,” the man snaps, tightening his grip like he’s proving a point.
My breath catches.
Damien’s free hand comes up, and the silver glint makes my stomach drop.
The knuckleduster.
He’d been flipping it in his hand earlier like it was nothing. Like it was a stress toy.
It isn’t.
“Let go,” Damien says, voice still even. Still reasonable. Like he’s offering a final chance.
The man’s mouth twists. “Or what?”
Damien moves.
It’s not dramatic. Not a wind-up punch like in films. Just a small step into the man’s space and a short, vicious arc of metal.
The knuckleduster connects with the side of his face with a sound that makes my blood turn to ice.
Crack.
The man’s grip on my arm spasms. For half a second, it actually tightens—then it loosens as he staggers back, blinking hard, trying to understand how he’s already lost.
Damien doesn’t give him time to understand.
He hits him again.
The man’s head snaps to the side, blood spurting out of his nose.
I make a choking sound, horrified, and my knees wobble.
Damien catches me with his shoulder without looking at me, as if I’m something he can keep upright as an afterthought.
The man tries to swing back, but he’s too close and too slow, and Damien is built for this. He steps inside the punch and drives his fist into the man’s jaw.
The sound is different this time. Duller. Wet.
The man goes down like his bones have been switched off, hitting the runner carpet with a heavy thud. His arms twitch. His legs kick once, aimless.
He’s conscious. Just barely.
Damien crouches over him, calm as sin, and grips the front of his shirt, hauling him up just enough to speak into his face.
“You don’t put your hands on her,” Damien says, low enough that it feels like it vibrates in my teeth. “You don’t look at her like she belongs to anyone in this building.”
The man’s eyes flick up to mine—wide, shocked, suddenly aware in the way men get aware when they realise they can die in a hallway and no one will blink.
His mouth opens.
Damien straightens, and I realise he hasn’t taken the knuckleduster off. He’s still wearing it, the metal smeared dark at the edges.
He turns back to me.
His eyes are unruffled. Like this—this brutality—cost him nothing.
“Walk,” he says.
My body doesn’t obey.
I’m stuck staring at his hand, at the knuckleduster, at the fact that he didn’t shout or even look angry.
He was… efficient.
“Lidiya.” My name. Sharp. A command that cuts through the fog in my skull. “Walk.”
My legs unlock. I move.
Damien’s hand slides from my wrist to my lower back, steering me forward, placing me precisely where he wants me—close, protected, controlled.
Behind us, the man on the floor groans. A wet, broken sound.
I flinch hard enough to make Damien’s fingers press more firmly into my spine.
“You—” My voice comes out thin. “You just—”
“I warned him,” Damien says simply. “He chose not to listen.”
“That’s not—” I swallow, nausea rising. “That’s not normal.”
“No,” he agrees, like I’ve pointed out an interesting fact. “It isn’t. Most men listen the first time.”
We reach the door at the end of the corridor. He pushes it open with his free hand, and the night air hits me like a slap of damp cold.
For a second, I can’t breathe.
Not because of the cold.
Because the image won’t leave my head: a man’s hand on my arm, and Damien’s response being… metal. Bone. Blood. Immediate consequence.
I shouldn’t feel safer.
I do.
“Get in.” He opens the passenger door of a fancy sports car.
“Make me.”
He is checking out the street like it owes him money. “Get in, or I let go, you run, and your mystery bidder hunts you down and sells you into the sex trade to earn your money’s worth.”
“What?” I roar as he shoves me inside. I fold in headfirst like a cheap suit or risk banging my knees on the hard metal of the frame.
He slaps my arse the way one would slap a horse to make it move, and I gasp, moving my backside away from his hand as quickly as I can and planting it on the soft leather.
“You are an arse!” I hiss, but he has already slammed the door on me.
I calculate my odds. Two seconds to open the door again, dive out and run before he realises I’ve gone.
But what awaits me? What if he was being serious about the other bidder? But what if that is his intention?
Fuck.
Fuck.