Page 46 of Ruthless Bonds

He lowered me to the soft bed and pulled the covers up to my chin.

“What happened?” I mumbled, sleep already taking over again.

“I took care of it.” He brushed my hair behind my ears.

“Does that mean we can go home tomorrow?” I yawned and let my body relax into the mattress.

“No,milaya. You’re not going back there.” His tone was dead serious.

“Hmm.” I rolled onto my side. “Why not?”

“Because we’re getting married, and you’ll be living here with me.”

A chuckle escaped me as I let my eyes flutter closed and surrendered to the pull of sleep. “OK, whatever you say.”

Obviously, I was dreaming.

Dove and I would have a good laugh about this in the morning.

I let myself drift off into dreamland, whereDove had never killed anyone, and I was a filthy rich photographer with a loving husband.

Who just happened to be the most ruthless Bratva boss in all of New York.

Chapter Nine

Alora

I sat on a plush leather sofa, my fingers absently tracing the stitching, as staff members moved around the living area. Gavriil sat across from me reading a newspaper, and I wanted nothing more than to rip it from his hands. Or, even better, for the massive crystal chandelier above him to fall on his head.

He placed the section of the newspaper he was reading down on the coffee table, aligning it with the other already read sections so that it was a neat pile. In the short time I’d been around him, I’d noticed he was always straightening things: his coffee cup handle, the pencils he used to do the crossword puzzle, which he did in under thirty minutes. What kind of lunatic could do a crossword puzzle in that amount of time? And now the newspaper sections were all stacked nice and neat. He picked up a different section of the paper, completely ignoring me.

“How much longer?” I glared at the newspaper blocking my view of his face.

“Soon.” He didn’t bother to look at me and had only given me one-word answers ever since I’d stormed downstairs demanding to talk to Kreos.

I’d woken up from the best sleep of my life to find Nadya in my room. She was humming as she opened the blinds and let the sun in. A tray of breakfast was alsowaiting for me. But before I could take one bite, she’d pulled out a small tape measure and grabbed my hand. When I’d questioned her, she’d said Kreos needed my ring size.

It was then I realized the crazy dream I had last night was, in fact, not a dream.

For some reason, Kreos thought we were getting married.

I had no idea how he came to that conclusion, but I was going to set him straight.

As soon as Gavriil let me see him.

I glanced out the floor-to-ceiling windows toward the garden, where a groundskeeper was trimming the hedges. Armed security guards roamed around the massive estate.

My eyes were drawn to an abstract painting on the wall. It had deep red strokes going up and down with red splotches. It reminded me of blood. Of Dario’s bloody, missing face. I didn’t think I’d ever get that image out of my head. Good fucking riddance. And although Kreos had said last night that he’d taken care of it, a part of me was worried that police were going to show up any second and put me and Dove in handcuffs.

The door to Kreos’ office opened, and an older man with bushy white hair rushed out like he was scared for his life. Gavriil folded the paper, stacked it on top of the others, and waved his hand for me to follow. I followed him, and, as I passed the newspapers, I pushed his neat little stack over.

I stormed into Kreos’ office, hands on my hips. He took one look at me and nodded his head at Gavriil. “Leave us.”

God, even his office was luxurious. To my right,built-in bookshelves took up a majority of the wall space, all stacked with leather-bound books and strange figurines. On the other side was another set of floor-to-ceiling windows. From here, you could see right over to one of the larger buildings we’d passed on our way up last night. It looked like it might be some type of workout facility.

My gaze traveled to the imposing desk that dominated the room and the infuriating man sitting behind it. The scent of leather and sandalwood surrounded me, and I had to stop myself from inhaling deeply. I loved that smell. It reminded me of Kreos.

Who I was insanely mad at.

---