The flash of his eyes penetrated the dark as he pushed off the dresser, and I couldn’t hold in a flinch when he gripped my face. His voice was low and soft, and it scared me more than if he would have shouted.

“Watch how you speak to me, or you’ll soon find out how sick I really am.”

My breath shook, but I held his stare.

Russian roulette.

One blink, and I’d be dead.

Maybe that would be a quicker demise than what he had in store for me.

His eyes warned, Don’t play games you can’t win.

Mine said, This isn’t a game. It’s hell.

After a tense pause, he released me. “You, Mila, are just a means to an end. I won’t say I didn’t enjoy it though.” His gaze flicked to the TV as my moans grew louder. “Such an enthusiastic kotyonok.”

My stomach turned, but even worse, my heart ached like it was ripped from my chest. I fell for this man. I’d cared, lusted, felt. I closed my eyes as Madame Richie’s laugh crawled from the dark corners of my mind, raising my pulse and the hair on my arms.

I tensed, feeling him walk around my chair.

“To be honest, I expected more from Alexei’s daughter. I’m almost disappointed by how easy it was.”

I opened my eyes in more ways than one. “This is about my papa.”

He chuckled, and the vibration coasted a shiver down my spine. “Give the girl a medal.”

Ronan rested his forearms on the back of my chair, caging me in, and watched while I fucked his fingers onscreen. The soft sound of my breath and my recorded moans filled the room.

He leaned in, his voice a rumble in my ear. “I wonder what your papa would think if he saw this.”

Disgust bit at my veins. He couldn’t be that twisted.

“Shall we find out?”

When he held a cell phone in front of my face, my heart sank at the sight of its sparkly white case. It was mine. I thought it was long gone with my coat, but I knew now, he always had it.

He clicked on a draft message written to my papa to show me the video in the text box.

This wasn’t real.

This couldn’t be happening to me.

Panic expanded in my lungs, clawing and biting at the flesh. My grip tightened around the armrests so hard it hurt.

“Please don’t,” I begged.

His thumb hovered over the send button. “And what will you do for me?”

I understood the insinuation in his voice. Tears ran down my cheeks, my chest heaving with the impossibility of the situation. I was torn in two different directions, but I knew even surrendering my body would be better than my papa seeing that video.

“Anything,” I cried. “I’ll do anything you want.”

“The problem is,” he said softly, nuzzling his face against my hair, “I’ve already seen it all.” His words turned cold and careless. “The novelty has worn off.”

With one press of his finger, the sound of a message sending hit my ears.

My heart dropped to the floor, and I barely heard the toneless, “Whoops,” he taunted against my ear like it was merely an accident, before pulling away from me.

Acid climbed up my throat, and then I leaned over and threw up everything in my stomach onto the Persian rug.

He lowered to his haunches in front of me and wiped some puke from my bottom lip with his thumb. “What am I going to do with you, kotyonok?”

He was no longer a conundrum wearing Versace, indifferent to the blood on his pants and my vomit on his hand. He was a monster dressed like a gentleman.

I brought my tear-filled gaze to his and said three words I’d never said before. “I hate you.”

He smiled. “Took you long enough.”

I shook with humiliation. “Why are you doing this?”

And just like that, his amusement faded, replaced with a ruthless gaze that sucked all warmth from the room. He pulled his phone from his back pocket and shoved it into my face. I turned my head in revulsion at the photo on the screen, but he gripped my cheeks to hold me in place.

I squeezed my eyes shut, the image still burned into my brain.

Blood. So much blood.

Mutilated flesh.

Lifeless eyes.

He was only a boy.

“Your papa isn’t an investor.”

I shook my head, tears running down my cheeks. I didn’t believe my papa was responsible for . . . that. He couldn’t be.

“The boy’s name was Pasha. He was a good kid,” was all Ronan said, but I knew from his tone, somewhere in this man’s black heart, he cared for him.

I opened my eyes. Even though it was grossly unwarranted given the circumstances, I couldn’t help but feel compassion for that boy.

“I’m sor—”

I didn’t get to finish the word because he slapped my face. It wasn’t hard, but it turned my head in surprise nonetheless. I’d never been hit in my life, and the action stunned me speechless.

“I’ve told you before, you’re done with the apologies,” he said harshly.

My phone rang in his back pocket. Ronan watched me, letting it ring and ring, before he swapped the cell in his hand for mine. He answered the call on speaker and rose to his full height.

“Alexei,” he said. “I hope the weather has been nice in Siberia.”

“If you’ve harmed my daughter, I will cut off your cock and shove it down your whore’s throat.” My papa’s voice sliced like a knife through the room, so harsh and foreign it sent a chill down my spine. It felt like I’d been slapped ten times harder than when Ronan hit me a moment ago.

Ronan chuckled. “Creative as always, Alexei. Unfortunately, as you’ve just seen, my cock is much closer to your daughter than where you’re hiding out.”

My gaze settled on the tattoos on my captor’s fingers, and my stomach went cold. He had men who did his bidding, he was outrageously wealthy, and he had apparently been to prison.

What was the word for Russian mafia?

Bratva.

It explained the strange men who came and went from our home, my papa’s secrecy about his work, his refusal to allow me into Russia, and Ivan. It explained red paint leaking from beneath . . . no. I couldn’t go there. It just explained everything. Every suspicion I’d ever had. His secret family now felt like a welcome reprieve.

“She has nothing to do with our business,” Papa snapped.

“Semantics,” Ronan countered drily, his thoughtful eyes on me. “She could be Tatianna’s twin. Must be awkward you fucked a woman who looked just like her.”

The only one who made it awkward was this heartless bastard.

“Mila is nothing like her mother.”

“Now, that I believe,” Ronan drawled, leaning against the dresser. “I’ve heard she was a sadistic bitch.”

My throat tightened.

He was lying. He had to be. Though I couldn’t help but remember the odd reactions in response to her name, including Vera’s terror when she’d looked at me.

No. I wouldn’t let him ruin my mother’s memory—the memory I created at least.

“Enough,” my papa grated. “We both know what you want. I will trade myself for her.”

Understanding became terror that closed my lungs. “No,” I breathed.

I knew what Ronan would do to my papa. I knew I would never see him again. The idea of having to traverse life all alone dropped a heavy weight on my chest.