1. Katarina
Katarina
Now
“Would it kill you to smile?”
I spear a bitesize piece of steak with my plastic fork before casting my gaze down the twenty-foot dining table to the only other person joining me for dinner.
Chewing on the pre-cut meat, I offer a practiced neutral expression.
Emotions are a weakness the Bratva just love to exploit, their pakhan most of all. I give the old man nothing.
Vasili Barkov’s wrinkles scrunch up his dark, soulless eyes. “I sometimes think I trained you too well, malenkaya plemyannitsa.” Little niece.
“You reap what you sow, Uncle,” I reply in English, even though there are no English speakers within hundreds of miles of this desolate place.
Silverware rattles against porcelain as Vasili sets down his fork.
His head dips briefly as he adjusts his perfectly starched white cuffs beneath his dark blue Armani suit.
The top of his bald head catches the light from the chandelier as he heaves out a bored sigh.
“Is that a threat, Katarina?” he asks, reverting us back to Russian.
When I shrug, my spaghetti strap slips off my shoulder. “Just an observation,” I reply, fixing my thin cotton dress as I glance out at the fat snowflakes floating past the dining hall’s arched stone windows.
The landscape around the pakhan’s Siberian stronghold is bleak.
Trees are winter-bare and if I could see beyond the current blizzard, I wouldn’t see much.
The gothic-style house is protected by high fences and has a vast underground basement that hides enough hardware and supplies to sustain a small army for months, should the need arise.
Beyond my uncle’s country estate, the land is flat and barren. Barren by design. There are no trees or shrubs to disrupt the view or provide cover for anyone foolish enough to attempt to get in. Or out.
I draw my focus back to my present company and the two guards stationed on opposite sides of the room.
They’re amongst the select few who’ve had the pleasure of my company during my enforced exile.
I arch an eyebrow at Vlad, whose arm must surely be aching as he keeps his taser gun trained on me.
I’m currently armed with nothing more dangerous than a plastic fork.
No knife. What the hell does he think I’m going to do?
I roll my bare feet from toe to heel over the timbered floor to stop them going numb with the cold. It’s below zero outside and the house is far too cavernous to heat effectively. Everyone else is wearing layers, but not me. It’s safe to say I’d be dead in an hour if I tried to brave the outdoors.
“Is there a reason for your visit?” I ask my uncle as I fan my long, raven hair across my shoulders. It falls over my back like a silken cloak and keeps away the chill. “Is it Christmas so soon?”
It’s a genuine question. I couldn’t say for sure how long I’ve been held captive. Until my uncle’s arrival yesterday, I’d been confined to a windowless bedroom with no distractions except the sound of my deep sighs and too-loud thoughts.
I’ve endured weeks of sitting with my emotions, reliving all twenty-one years of my pitiful existence in exquisite detail.
I’ve survived unimaginable horrors in my lifetime, but there have been moments of joy too, like the summer I spent here when I was seventeen.
Unlike my current isolation, I’d been joined by other recruits to the Bratva’s army.
It was the first time I’d been allowed to make friends and those young women had become my sestras. Sisters.
Recalling those snatches of happiness are like tiny daggers to my shriveled heart, but the pain is nothing compared to the gut-wrenching flashbacks of my recent time in Chicago.
I’ve been trained to deal with physical torture, but what happened there almost broke me.
Almost. Which is why I don’t dare dwell on it.
The steak knife in Vasili’s hand glints as he sets it down on his plate. “Christmas is three weeks away,” he says.
Which means I’ve been trapped here for two months. Good to know.
Vasili reaches for the bottle of champagne that’s been waiting on ice. His smile is just as chilling. At sixty-eight, he’s kept himself in annoyingly good health. His white hair has receded to the point of surrender, but with broad shoulders, he can easily match the strength of men half his age.
“Tonight is your last night under this roof, Katarina. Worthy of a celebration, don’t you think?”
I refuse to ask the obvious question. He’ll tell me my fate soon enough. I watch him coolly as he removes the foil from the champagne bottle and loosens the wire cage. Gripping the cork, he twists the bottle with ease. There’s a pathetic, controlled pop and only a dribble of foam escapes.
Before Vasili can get up to fill my paper cup, I rise to my feet. Vlad and the other guard Alexei, stiffen, but Vasili raises a hand and I’m not immediately hit with 50,000 volts.
As I stroll down the length of the table, my too-short fingernails trail over polished mahogany and my gaze sweeps casually across the dining hall.
There are so many weapons within easy reach, and that’s discounting the firearms the guards and Vasili are carrying.
There are curtain ties that would make passable garrotes to squeeze the last breath out of my uncle, heavy chair legs that could be fashioned into a club to bludgeon him to death, and plenty of glass and porcelain that would provide sharp edges to slice his throat.
Hating Vasili Barkov is the one emotion I won’t shut down, for reasons I don’t dare acknowledge in his presence. He can never know how deep my grief goes.
As I reach his side, he sits back, amusement rather than alarm dancing in his eyes.
He lets me take the bottle from him to fill a single champagne flute.
I over pour and froth bubbles over the side of the crystal glass, dripping onto the table where he rests his hand, fingers splayed and within reach of his serrated steak knife.
“And there she is,” Vasili says, eyes glinting. “The tiger’s still in there. Untamed.”
“Untamable,” I correct as I turn the stem of the glass between my fingers and thumb. Once separated from the flute, it could easily pierce my uncle’s jugular.
With his head tipped back to observe me and his neck exposed, I have the perfect opportunity to take back control of my life. It’s been a long time coming.
I was two years old when I was ripped from my dead mother’s arms. My father, Vasili’s older brother, had been the pakhan back then and he had four children.
Of the three he shared with my mother, I was the only one to survive when he was overthrown by my uncle and my older, half-brother, Ilya.
I was only allowed to live because I was a girl, and they considered me an asset rather than a liability, a prize to be used and abused.
As assets go, my value saw an unexpected rise earlier this year when heir-apparent, Ilya was killed trying to expand the Barkov empire into the United States.
Vasili has no children of his own, an option taken from him when my father castrated his competitive sibling early in his rein.
That makes me the Barkovs’ only surviving heir. Lucky me.
Unfortunately, killing the old man and claiming the throne isn’t as easy as it may seem.
Even if I could stab Vasili’s throat before one of his guards tasered me, his men wouldn’t automatically switch allegiance.
There are plenty of Bratva brigadiers who see themselves as his successor, and I’m not about to fight to the death for an empire I have no interest in taking over.
All I’ve ever wanted is my freedom. Is that too much to ask?
“Your engagement has been announced,” Vasili tells me. “And if you’re a good girl, I’ll give you back your diamond ring. Call it a wedding gift to you and your fiancé.”
I take a sip of champagne. It’s like swallowing shards of glass as the bubbles burst at the back of my throat. That cursed rock is going to outlast us all.
I stare at my hands, bare of every adornment including my trademark acrylics. I don’t miss the ring but I do miss my claws and what they could do to my uncle’s face. “Do I know him?”
Vasili’s eyes are cold. “Does it matter?” he asks. “The important thing is you get down the aisle before he runs off and marries someone else. Again.”
I raise an eyebrow, aware that I’m revealing my curiosity at the mention of marriage and my exes.
My first engagement ended before I’d even met the asshole.
My second had lasted less than a week. But the third, most recent engagement to Duke Moncrief had given me a three-month reprieve from my uncle’s scheming.
Three months in which to discover that I still had a heart to give, and learn how easily it could shatter.
I set down the champagne flute in front of Vasili and stroll back to my seat. “Duke married Grace?” I ask with my back still turned.
“He did.”
“Good.” And I genuinely mean it. Duke was the lead in some else’s love story. Our engagement was nothing more than a ruse to fool my uncle into thinking I was following orders.
“You weren’t invited to the wedding,” Vasili continues. He waits until I slump back into my chair before he adds, almost as an afterthought, “And obviously, you missed a funeral too.”
My trembling legs are hidden beneath the table, but my eye twitch almost gives me away. I start braiding my hair as a distraction.
“You’re such a disappointment, Katarina,” my uncle scolds.
“Of all the men you could have fucked…” He blows out a breath to punctuate his disgust. “Fortunately for you, I can be a reasonable man as long as you don’t push my patience again.
You will marry Eric Peterson and you’ll do whatever he requires of you.
Bed him. Bear his children. Maybe fucking smile once in a while. ”
Ah, so it’s still the South African he wants me to marry. The billionaire businessman was my uncle’s back-up plan if my engagement to Duke fell through. Fifty-two-year-old, four-times married Eric likes them young, and I’ve recently had a birthday.
“I thought he would have lost interest in me now that I’m a fully-grown adult.”
“You’re old by his tastes, but your flaws are worth overlooking for what could be a lucrative deal for both parties,” he says. He means Eric and himself. I don’t factor into it. “The only deal breaker would be if he were to find out who corrupted you.”
“Corrupted?” I scoff as I pull the hairband from my wrist to tie the end of my braid. “I was never going to be his virgin bride, Uncle. Your men saw to that.”
My uncle has always viewed my sexuality as another weapon to wield on his behalf, and there were certain men he allowed near me. He considered it part of my training.
I smirk over at Vlad as if sharing a secret, and receive his glower in return.
My uncle’s foot soldiers are not on the approved list of men allowed to fuck me, and they would pay for such indiscretions with their lives.
Vlad’s complexion turns as grey as his personality and his grip on the Taser’s trigger tightens.
“Don’t play games, Katarina,” Vasili says, holding back a feigned yawn.
“Vlad doesn’t have the balls to touch you without my permission.
I’m talking about your misdemeanors while you were in the States.
” He picks up the champagne flute I’d left and takes a sip.
“But let’s consider that period of your life dead and buried.
I appreciate your natural instinct will be to cut Eric’s throat the first chance you get, but I strongly advise against it. ”
“Then you sleep with the fucking prick.”
“You will serve your new husband for as long as I have use for him. After which…” He pauses to refill his glass. “You can be the one to dispatch him if you wish. Call it a reward. Something for you to look forward to.”
“There are a few other deaths I’m looking forward to first.”
“I hate to spoil your fantasy, but I’ll die a very old man asleep in my bed. The worst of us don’t meet a just end. It’s the way of the world, I’m afraid.” Vasili pauses to consider what he’s just said and chuckles to himself. “Maybe Killian McConkey was a good one after all. Such a loss.”
There’s no emotion behind his words, which makes them sharp enough to pierce my armor. Killian was better than good. Devastatingly handsome with a wicked tongue and sharper wit. He was darkness and light. He was everything. And he was mine. “Are we done?” I ask, standing up from the table.
“Consider my orders very carefully,” Vasili warns. “I should have beaten you within an inch of your life for opening your legs for the Irish mafia, but I chose not to because you’re my last living relative.”
“You kept me whole because I’m just another whore to you,” I correct him. “And you can’t sell damaged goods.”
His expression hardens. “I buy and sell plenty of whores who give me far less trouble than you, but if that’s how you want to be treated, go ahead and fight me on this. You’ll see exactly what I’m capable of.”
I already know. I might not have suffered directly at my uncle’s hands, but I know what kind of monster he is.
“Tell me you’ll obey me, Katarina,” Vasili persists. “Or I’ll cancel our flight and make my money from you another way.”
I leave a loaded pause, long enough for his face to redden with fury.
Reclaiming control of my life is going to be a long and bitter battle, and remaining in Siberia achieves nothing.
I force my features to soften and smile the sweetest smile.
It goes all the way to my eyes as I imagine slicing Vasili Barkov from clavicle to belly button with his steak knife.
“I won’t let you down, Uncle.”