Chapter 11 – Dimitri
“RUSNAK HEIR’S SECRET REVENGE MARRIAGE.”
I stare at the headline blazing across one of the biggest business newspapers in the country.
Then another.
“LAURENT PRINCESS IN TROUBLE—CAUGHT IN THE SNARE OF brUTAL WARLORD.”
Warlord?
My jaw tightens until it aches.
The scandal explodes overnight. Every major outlet runs the story, each headline worse than the last. I’ve counted more than fifty variations, all circling the same narrative:
Dimitri Rusnak destroys the Laurent heiress out of revenge.
It’s spiraling faster than even I anticipated.
I shove the laptop away and turn toward the window, fingers drilling into the frame.
I should have known.
Of course she’d betray me.
Like father, like daughter.
I don’t know why I let myself forget. Why I chose my damn heart over my head. Why I treated her like something fragile, someone equal—
Instead of the revenge piece she was meant to be.
The witch went behind my back and fed the media everything.
And she doesn’t even have the decency to admit it.
Since last night, she’s been denying it, all wide-eyed innocence. But of everyone who knows the truth, she’s the one with a motive. The one with nothing to lose.
It had to be her.
It must be her.
And yet….
The thought tastes like poison in my mouth.
My brothers know the truth behind this marriage—but of course they wouldn’t leak it. We share the same last name. If my name burns, theirs burn with it. And I trust them with my life; they would never betray me.
Their wives know too, but those women are loyal to a fault. They protect the family name with a ferocity Vivian has never shown me. Whatever stains the Rusnak name stains theirs as well; they wouldn’t risk it.
That leaves the Laurents.
Henri Laurent would never leak something like this.
He’s too obsessed with pretending he still has influence, wealth, reputation. He’s holding up a collapsing empire with pride alone. He wouldn’t willingly expose his daughter as a pawn in a revenge marriage—not when it would drag his own legacy through the mud.
So who does that leave?
Vivian.
Beautiful, fragile-voiced, wide-eyed liar.
She had motive.
Smearing her own name could buy her freedom—paint her as the victim, make the world demand her release from me.
Give her the life she claims she never got to choose.
It had to be her.
It had to be her.
The door bursts open, and Sylvester rushes in. I swivel my chair toward him, already braced for impact. One look at his face tells me everything. It’s bad news.
“Spill,” I snap.
He doesn’t waste a second. “Stock markets are whispering. Investors are pulling out. And now there are rumors spreading through socials about organized crime funding your expansion deals.”
My jaw clenches. Hard.
He steps forward and sets a thick file on my desk. “This is everything we’ve traced so far. It’s spreading fast.”
I flip it open.
Numbers. Screenshots. News excerpts. Financial withdrawals. A projection of losses.
Every line feels like a fist slamming into my ribs.
My jaw tightens. Veins throb under my skin.
This isn’t just gossip—this is a deliberate strike.
A calculated effort to shatter everything I built.
I slam the file shut, breathing through my teeth.
Sylvester’s phone begins to ring, sharp and shrill in the heavy silence.
He answers immediately, pacing as he speaks in low, urgent tones.
I don’t hear a word. My mind is already sprinting ahead—mapping contingencies, shutdown protocols, media reroutes, legal responses.
I need to cut this out before it becomes a cancer that kills everything I’ve fought for.
It takes Sylvester’s measured voice listing PR disasters for me to snap back into the room.
“…another outlet is running with the ‘Mafia heir’ angle. A whistleblower claims financial misconduct—”
My fingers curl into fists.
Of course.
Of course my enemies would wait for an opening this perfect.
A Laurent wife.
A scandalous marriage.
A whisper about revenge.
I close my eyes for a second.
I don’t want to think of her.
I don’t want her name in my head.
But here she is anyway.
Vivian.
Soft-mouthed, wild-tempered, too honest for her own good.
A woman who shouldn’t matter.
I want—more than anything—to believe she’s innocent.
But my entire life has taught me that trust is a luxury for fools.
And the timing…the timing is too perfect.
My enemies have been hunting for a way to drag the Rusnak name into the mud, and marrying a Laurent—already painted as a scandal in high society—gave them the perfect stage.
Whether she meant to help them or not…she opened the door.
And I’m the one paying for it.
The thought circles my mind like a knife. Unfair, irrational, cruel—yes. But it takes root anyway.
And once it settles, it makes perfect, vicious sense.
I no longer care about her feelings.
I no longer care about her intentions.
Whatever I do today—and from now on—will be selfish.
No more thinking about her. No more making space for softness that never should’ve been there in the first place.
“I know what to do.”
The words rip out of me, and before Sylvester can respond, I’m already moving—out of the study, down the hall, toward her room where she’s been hiding since yesterday.
I don’t knock. I don’t slow down. I don’t breathe.
I shove the door open.
She’s on the balcony, wrapped in the cold early morning light. Her skin looks almost translucent, her hair lifting slightly in the breeze. She turns at the sound of the door and walks back inside, her face pale but steady.
“Dimitri?” she says softly, stepping off the balcony threshold. “What’s wrong?”
Her voice is cautious—too cautious. Like she already knows something terrible is coming but can’t yet see its shape.
I stand there, chest rising and falling, trying to contain the storm long enough to speak. But the truth is—I can’t. Not anymore.
I explode.
“Who did you talk to?”
My voice cracks through the room like a whip.
“A journalist? A friend? One of your little society leeches? A photographer?”
She flinches, just slightly, but she doesn’t look away.
Her chin lifts, trembling—but steady.
“I didn’t speak to anyone, Dimitri.”
“Don’t lie to me.”
The words are a snarl.
“Tell me who you called. Who you texted. Who you breathed around. Someone leaked it, and it sure as hell wasn’t my brothers.”
“You think I’d destroy myself just to hurt you?” she shoots back, voice shaking but clear.
I don’t answer. Because I don’t know.
A part of me….
A part of me doesn’t trust her.
Not after everything.
Not after the timing.
Not after the way she’s been pulling away like she’s already planning an escape.
When I finally speak, my voice is ice.
“We’re holding a press conference this evening.”
Vivian jolts as though I struck her. “I don’t want to show up in public right now. Not after everything they’ve said!”
“I wasn’t asking.” I shake my head. “You’ll stand beside me,” I continue, every syllable clipped. “You’ll smile. You’ll defend me. And you’ll make the world believe this marriage is real.”
Her eyes widen, horror spilling across her face. “No. Dimitri, I’m not— I’m not going to let you parade me like—”
“You don’t have a choice,” I cut in.
She stares at me like I’ve become someone she doesn’t recognize. Maybe I have.
“I won’t do it,” she whispers, voice breaking. “I won’t stand there and pretend when you’re accusing me of—”
“You will.” I step closer, my shadow swallowing hers. “You owe me that much.”
“I owe you nothing.” Her defiance flickers—small, but there. “I didn’t leak anything. I’m not going to sell myself for your image.”
My jaw locks. I knew she’d fight. I just don’t care anymore.
“Vivian,” I say softly—dangerously. “If you don’t stand beside me tonight, I will make sure the world believes something far worse than what they’re writing now.”
Her breath catches. Fear ripples through her, fast, sharp, real. I don’t wait for a response.
I turn, walk to the door, and pause only long enough to deliver the final blow without looking back.
“Get dressed. Be ready by seven. Don’t test me again.”
Then I leave her there—shaking, pale, cornered—and I don’t let myself feel a damn thing. I step into the hallway, barely two strides away from her door, before Sylvester appears, blocking my path. His expression is sharp, controlled—too controlled.
“You’re crossing the line,” he says quietly.
I stop. My fingers curl into fists at my sides.
“This isn’t strategy anymore,” Sylvester continues. “It’s punishment. You’re punishing her.”
The words hit harder than I expect.
Because they’re true.
I don’t respond. I can’t.
If I open my mouth, everything inside me—anger, betrayal, the sick ache lodged under my ribs—will spill out.
Sylvester studies me for a beat, waiting for the Dimitri he knows to surface.
He won’t find him today.
“Prepare for a press conference,” I say, my voice flat, deadened, unrecognizable even to my own ears. “It’ll be at seven today. Spread the word. I want it to reach farther than this leak has. Let everyone know we’re telling our side of the story at seven p.m.”
Sylvester inhales sharply, like he wants to argue—but he doesn’t.
He just nods. Slowly. Reluctantly. For a second, I catch the disappointment in his eyes.
Then I push past him and march to my room, every step fueled by fury and cold resolve. If I stop moving, if I let myself think—I’ll break something.
Or go back to her. And I can’t afford either.
Not anymore.
***
The rest of the day drags like chains.
Because instead of running my empire, I’m picking up pieces of my reputation—calling investors, calming boards, assuring partners that the story is a lie.
I don’t assure. I don’t cajole. I command. But look what this leak has reduced me to: begging men who used to tremble when I entered a room.
Pathetic.
My phone buzzes again. Lukin. Of course. As Pakhan, it was only a matter of time before his call comes in.
I answer, and Adrian’s already on the line too, their voices sharp and heavy as they discuss the problem.
“How do you intend to fix this?” Lukin asks.
I tell them the plan—press conference, public unity, force the world to swallow whatever narrative I hand-feed them.
They’re not impressed. Adrian exhales, long and disappointed. “It’s unfair to the girl, Dimitri.”
Unfair. To Vivian? I almost laugh.
How about how her betrayal was unfair to me? Is no one going to bring that up?
I hate how they’ve softened. Ever since they let love into their homes, they’ve turned into men who hesitate—men who explain themselves. Who fold when their women frown. Who let emotion cloud instinct.
I make a silent vow right then:
Never me. Never ever. No woman will ever come close enough to turn me into a soft, mushy bastard who thinks with his heart and his dick instead of his brain.
“Save the sermon,” I say coldly. “I’m not changing my mind. Vivian is my revenge piece, and I intend to use her.”
There’s a long silence on the line. The kind that says they’re judging me. The kind that should bother me—but doesn’t.
Not today. I end the call without waiting for their response. And for the first time since the scandal broke, I feel something like clarity.
If the world wants a villain today? I’ll give them one.
Later that night, as I prepare for the press conference, I catch my own reflection in the mirror. For a moment, I don’t recognize the man staring back.
Sharp jaw, tense shoulders, dead eyes. Cold. Calculated. A man carved out of vengeance and necessity, not flesh.
Everything I swore I’d never become.
Everything I hated in the men who ruined my life years ago.
And yet…here I am. Wearing their face.
I don’t know whether I despise it or accept it.
Whether this version of me is survival—or decay.
But I do know one thing:
It’s the only mask that can save me tonight.
My business. My name. My empire.
All of it hangs on the performance I deliver in the next hour.
And she—Vivian—is part of that performance.
She brought out this monster in me. She opened the door for my enemies. She awakened instincts I spent my whole life burying.
So she better learn to dance with the devil she helped create.
I adjust my cufflinks, straighten my jacket, and meet my own eyes again. No softness. No hesitation. No mercy.
Tonight, Dimitri Rusnak walks onto that stage—and the world will remember exactly who I am.