Page 25 of XV (Fifteen) (War of Roses 1)

I jump instinctively. There’s no hiding it. I’m sure the memory that name triggers unfolds across my face just as strongly as it does in my mind.

It was so long ago that I shouldn’t be able to recall her so clearly. She was thin. Small. Her hair was long and dark, like Vanya’s might have been once. Her upturned eyes were a delicate shade of brown.

And she was in chains.

“I only saw her once.”

There’s no point in lying to him. He knows. There’s something predatory in him that hunts through my pain, drawing the truth out whether I like it or not. Maybe it’s what I think I find lurking beneath all the hate and rage. Desperation?

Do not hate him,Vanya insisted.He wasn’t always this way.

“Where?” His tone makes me suspect he already knows the answer.

“Winthorp Manor,” I croak through my pain. “Robert Sr. had her…in a basement. I was young. Maybe seven? His son had me bring her water—”

“Why?” He slams his fist against the table out of anger more than emphasis.Again,he already knows the answer.

Tasting blood, I tell him. “I don’t know—”

“Did you see her die?”

I blink, thrown off by the question. Do you need to see the killing blow to witness someone die? Not necessarily. Death can be a slow process, tracked only by a steady change in your reflection day after day. Or a look in the eye. I picture the woman, Anna-Natalia. Was she dead then, huddled in chains at the mercy of the Winthorps?

“N-no—”

“Do you want to hear how they did it?”

My heart hammers against my chest as I shake my head emphatically.No.They butchered her, he claims. I’ve seen firsthand what Robert does to animals for sport. He hunts them. Guts them. He shows them no mercy.

Mischa comes in close so that his words slither directly into my ear. “They slit her throat. Then they cut off her hands and sent them to her father in a box. She was sixteen.”

I gag at the imagery. Those beautiful eyes open and unseeing. Her pain. Her fear.

“Her body, they dumped into the river. Unlike you, she was an innocent in this. She was number twelve.”

Twelve. A martyr in a blood war, he said. But the only wars I knew of were the internal ones raging through the Winthorp estate. Father against son. Brother against sister. Gossip. Intrigue. Jealousy. Anna-Natalia Vasilieva never cracked the dinner table chatter.

In fact… The only figure to ever intrude upon the sanctity of the manor was a boy who snuck into my room in the dead of night. His eyes burned through the darkness, his voice a hiss. Even then, so young, I knew he’d kill me. There was a knife in his hand and murder in his soul.

Though, for whatever reason,thatmonster let me go.

But I don’t tell Mischa that. Something he said keeps echoing in my thoughts, intriguing me enough to voice it. “T-twelve?”

He frowns at my pathetic attempts at probing. Still, he tosses me a bone. “Your husband’s family has a long list of sins, Little One,” he tells me. “A very long list. We keep track of the victims related by blood.” Almost gingerly, he fingers a piece of my hair, lifting it for inspection in the dim lighting. I don’t expect the moment he tugs hard, drawing a whine from my lips. “But his transgressions are nothing compared to mine.” He returns to his full height and kicks the leg of my chair. “Get up.”

The world spins when I do. Pain and exhaustion play a violent game for supremacy over my battered body.

I stagger on my feet when he takes my hand and drags me into the hall. Rather than head for the stairs, he shoves me toward the room next door. Oh, God. It’s the one with the bed and another window, nailed shut. A mocking view of an empty field greets me beyond it. Outside, the sky is a dreary, stormy gray. How many days has it been so far? I can’t tell.

“Don’t get any cute ideas, Little One.” Mischa cups my chin, forcing me to face him. “In fact…Idareyou to run from me.”

His eyes glow at the threat of a chase. Here and now, I make the decision never to take him up on that challenge.

“Youdolook like her. You’re just as beautiful,” he admits, almost to himself. His finger drifts up my jawline and comes away red. Meeting my gaze, he swipes his tongue along the pad of it. “But are you worth as much?”

His hands capture the ends of my robe. Aware of my terror, he takes his time, peeling the panels back, relishing how I shudder with every inch of skin revealed. When he finally undoes the sash, I don’t resist. I lift my arms, letting him strip me down to nothing.

Then I watch him toss the satin onto the floor.

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