Page 14 of Ivory Oath

Would my father change his mind about anything if I told him I was pregnant? When I was pregnant with Dante, I was able to convince my father that it would work in his favor. I doubt I can manage that again.

He’d probably just tell Trofim about the baby. Then I’d be cut off from any connection to Mikhail at all. At least this way, I can keep a part of him with me.

“He won’t kill you if you play along, Viviana. Trofim is going to reclaim his rightful place in the Novikov Bratva and he’ll take care of you.”

Between the two of us, I’m the emaciated, dried-out husk. And yet, I almost feel bad for my father.

“If you really think Trofim can beat Mikhail, then you have no idea who you’re up against.”

Disappointment I recognize well settles on his brow. “Just because Mikhail was nice to you doesn’t mean he’s the better leader. Actually,” he adds, “the fact that he was nice to you means he isn’t the better leader. Because a good leader never would have picked up his older brother’s trash.”

I want to be offended, but I don’t have the energy. I’m being held hostage by a man who is going to die trying to overthrow a man who didn’t want me. Who maybe never wanted me to begin with.

What a fucking mess.

“Mikhail isn’t nice to me anymore,” I mumble.

“That’s even more reason for you to grab the lifeline Trofim is throwing you.”

“What lifeline?” I retort. “If you’re talking about this cell, you should look around. I’m dying in here.”

“Because you’re resisting,” he growls. “But if you cooperate, he’ll take care of you. I made him swear he would.”

My poor father. He has the audacity to make deals with dangerous men, but none of the common sense to understand when he’s being played.

Trofim is never going to take care of me. He might keep me alive. He might wield me like a shiny trophy he won back from his brother. But he’ll never take care of me.

“How is he going to take care of me in this cell?”

“He isn’t,” he says. “Tomorrow, he’s unlocking the door.”

I sit up. “He’s going to let me out?”

“For a special event.” He nods slowly. “Tomorrow, you and Trofim get married.”

I could scream and fight. There’s enough anger inside of me that I’m sure I could channel some of it towards leaping off this bed and wrapping the chain dangling from my wrist around my father’s neck.

But he would fight back. As weak as I am, my father would overpower me.

And what would happen to my baby then?

What would happen to Dante?

Mikhail doesn’t know Trofim is alive. He doesn’t know his brother is coming for him. If Mikhail still sends Dante to that boarding school, Trofim could track him down. He could hurt him. He will hurt him if I don’t play along.

There’s no way out. The only choice I have now is whether I fight for myself or fight for my babies.

The decision is easy: I lie back down on the bed and close my eyes.

I listen to my father leave as silently as he arrived and pray that Mikhail will keep Dante close.

7

MIKHAIL

Blood is still pumping rhythmically out of my father’s neck when the door to my office bursts open.

Raoul barges in, ready for anything. Until he almost trips over my father’s body, that is. Then he glances down at the blood on his shoe and the paling corpse and looks like he’s going to be sick.

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