Page 30 of Savage Surrender

“Just talking,” my father’s guard, Peter, said.

“Talkinghere?” I asked, making sure my tone was all business and demanding, not cutesy or inquisitive. I expected answers. I didn’t need to look inviting or bubbly, forcing myself to be a popular extrovert to get them to warm up to me and gossip like I had to act around the students and staff on campus. These men knew damn well who I was. There was no point beating around the bush or keeping up pretenses.

Andre nodded, stroking his hand down his beard as he leered at me. His stare made me feel filthy, like I was a meal to engorge on then shove aside. When Viktor checked me out, he feasted his eyes on me like I was the answer to a famished man desperate for me and me alone. A prize. A reward. Something and someone to savor.

And he had. Just a half hour ago, on his desk, he had.

“Just talking. And checking in,” Andre replied as he continued to stare at me.

Slightly nervous that he could smell a hint of sex on me or that he could somehow know that I’d done something sexy and naughty with another man, I kept my legs closer together and straightened. “Checking in with the guard of your rival?” I retorted.

“Rival?” Andre chuckled, still stroking his gangly beard. “I’m not sure that’ll be true for long.”

You wish.Igor Petrov would never form an alliance with the Ilyin Family. He could lie and cheat and con them into thinking they could be friends. It was why he’d helped the Ilyins capture Lev in some fake show of “the enemy of my enemy is my friend.” My father was the one who’d set Yusef Ilyin’s death into action, a kill Lev had completed. That hit was what made the Ilyins go after the Baranovs, and it was all in some part a duplicitous scheme orchestrated by my father.

“What the hell are you talking about?” I demanded. Glancing at Peter, I caught him smirking and rolling his eyes.

“I’m talking about how I figured I could stop by and check in on my future bride.” Andre grinned, reaching out to caress my arm.

I swatted his hand away, stunned by his words but careful not to reveal how shocked I felt. “That’s nonsense.”

“No, it’s not,” Andre argued.

“Stop making up stupid shit like that,” I warned with all the bravado I could manage. He tried again to feel my arm, and I shoved his hand away.

“I’m not.” He smiled wider, as if my putting up a fight excited him. “According to what I heard, Igor Petrov promised that his one and only daughter would marry an Ilyin. May as well beme.”

No. No fucking way.I refused to let those words sink into my conscious mind.

Absolutely fucking not.

My plan was to get the hell out of this life before I could be promised to someone. I had to kill my father then run with Maxim so we could finally have a life at all.

Andre didn’t say anything else, chuckling at my shocked reaction of gaping at what he’d said. I couldn’t help it. There was no way I could keep up a mask and hide my reactions to this news.

“See you soon, Wife,” he said over his shoulder in farewell.

I stared after him, rooted in place with dread weighing down my stomach. The moment he was gone, I turned toward Peter. “What the fuck is that about? Promised to marry an Ilyin?”

He shrugged and shook his head, feigning ignorance. “First I heard about it.”

“And you didn’t think to tell him he had to be wrong?” They were our rivals! Or they were my father’s rivals.

“I don’t know if he is wrong,” Peter argued. “No one can ever be one step ahead of the Boss or know what he’s planning. Maybe this is how he’ll get rid of you once and for all.”

As a sacrifice to a rival?I shook my head, scared and angry at the possibility of it.Over my dead body.“Then let’s go. Right now.”

He scowled at me, not moving.

“Let’s go to my father and ask him what the hell this is about.”

“No. Not now.” He checked his phone. “George told me that you need to go to a party off campus. Marcus Jameson might be there, and the Boss expects you to get some intel about him.”

“Fuck this party.” I pushed to get past him and enter my apartment.

“No, Irina,” Peter ordered as he followed me inside. “You are to follow orders. The Boss told me to make sure you get to this party and find out what you can.”

I growled, so frustrated and fed up with this that I flung my coat to the nearest chair, not caring whether it landed or fell to the floor.

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