Page 35 of Used Bratva Bride

“You think I’ll let you go because your father sent one of his dogs to sniff around?” His voice is a dark, angry whisper. “You think that makes a difference to me?”

I try to turn my head, try to push him off, but he’s too strong.

“You don’t understand—”

“No,youdon’t understand.” His grip on my wrists tightens just enough to send a warning shiver through me. “No one is coming for you. Not your father. Not Sophia. No one.”

I squeeze my eyes shut, shaking my head, trying to block out his words.

“They sent someone,” I whisper, my voice breaking. “That means they—”

“That means nothing.” His voice is ice. “James Spade sent a man to check on himself—not you. If he really wanted you back, he’d have stormed this estate with guns blazing. He didn’t. He won’t.”

I hate that his words sting.

I hate that I know he might be right.

My struggles weaken, exhaustion and hopelessness sinking into my limbs.

Mikhail watches me for a moment longer, then finally releases my wrists.

I immediately roll away, scrambling toward the edge of the bed, but I don’t run. There’s nowhere to go.

He exhales sharply, standing up. “Stay here.”

Like I have a choice.

He strides to the door, pulling it open. “Lock it,” he orders the guard outside.

The last thing I see before the door slams shut is his dark, unreadable gaze.

The second the door slams shut, I collapse back onto the bed, my entire body trembling. My pulse is still pounding in my ears, my breath coming in sharp, uneven gasps. Every inch of me feels wrong; like I’m suffocating, drowning, unable to claw my way back to the surface.

I squeeze my eyes shut, trying to block out the feel of Mikhail’s hands on me, the way he effortlessly overpowered me, carried me like I was nothing.

He was right. No one is coming. Maybe I’ve known it all along, but hearing him say it out loud, so certain… it cracks something inside me.

They don’t care.

I curl up, wrapping my arms around myself, as if I can hold my own body together.

I wanted that man outside to be my rescue. Instead, I’m still here.

Still trapped. Still at his mercy.

Chapter Ten - Mikhail

The moment I step into the room, the metallic scent of blood thickens the air. It’s familiar. Comforting.

The man is already on his knees, arms wrenched behind him by two of my men, his face bruised and streaked with sweat.

I exude nothing but cold, merciless authority as I approach. The only sound in the room is the steady drip of water from a rusted pipe and the faint, uneven breaths of the man kneeling before me.

A Spade rat.

The guards had found him lurking on the estate’s perimeter, a little too careful, too deliberate in his movements. He wasn’t just some lost fool. He was watching. Waiting.

For what, Julie?

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