Page 75 of Poisoned Vows

I’d rather be home with her than here, fretting over what my hackers will find. I’d rather be getting to know her, learning things a husband should know about his wife. Or, alternatively, helping her find out the things that she doesn’t know about herself.

It all makes sense now—her behavior about food, the way she’d never really tried any kind of drink before, her lack of hobbies. She’d never been allowed to develop any type of personality for herself outside of what a man might want her to be—and yet she still had to some extent, even if it was an acerbic one. It occurred to me, as she said all of it, that I could give her the freedom to learn all of that. She could learn who it is that she wants to be—try the things she hasn’t tried.

And if that means she becomes someone you don’t like? Or someone who likes you even less?

This all feels like uncharted territory. I’ve never cared about anyone, really, other than my sister. Marika is the only person who ever aroused a protective instinct in me, who ever made me want to be gentle or careful with my words or actions—until Lilliana. I’d never met a romantic interest who made me feel that way. But now—

She wants nothing to do with me.

I find it hard to believe that can’t be changed. That I can’t find a way to get her to come around.

I hear the sound of a voice coming over the speaker—David’s, the man in charge of my digital team.

“Mr. Vasilev—we have coordinates. But you’re going to need more than just you to get in. This is going to be a bigger operation than that.”

When he brings up the security feed of the building—no,compound, that he traced to coordinates to, I force back an audible groan. It will take a force of men to get in there—and I know that very well, because I know where it is. It belonged to my family, and now Lilliana’s upstart, traitorous father has tried to claim it for his own. A base of operations to run his little mutiny out of.

“I’ll get men together,” I tell him. “Keep eyes on it. I want a count of who you see coming and going, if it’s anyone on the lists of men who worked for us. See if you can find a way to get the cameras shut down, before I go in. Tomorrow night, we’ll stage an attack and see if we can’t put an end to this bullshit.”

“I hear you. I’ll let you know what we find, sir.”

The call ends, and I’m immediately up, texting my driver to let him know I need the car brought around. I’m going home to Lilliana, and she’ll know what I have planned.

I want her to understand what I’m going to do. The freedom I’m going to get for her, as well as for Marika.

She’s not in the living room when I walk in. I feel a twist of anxiety, but my security assured me that there was nothing wrong, that there hadn’t been so much as a peep of hostility or a sign of anyone trying to get onto the penthouse level.

When I find her, it’s out on the balcony of the master suite, and I feel that sharp pang of fear again.

“Lilliana,” I say her name slowly, carefully, as I step out of the open door. I don’t know if she was thinking of jumping or not, but I don’t want to risk startling her so badly she falls. There’s no surviving a drop like that.

“Nikolai.” She doesn’t turn around. Her voice is soft and flat, but it makes something inside of me jolt anyway, hearing her say my name. I want to hear her say it differently. I want to hear it whispered, moaned, screamed in pleasure. Even her biting wit is better than that near-emotionless flatness.

“I have something to tell you.” I step out onto the balcony, still moving in slow, careful steps, like she really is a wild animal, a small rabbit that I don’t want to frighten. She turns to look at me, those blue eyes wide and watery, and she laughs.

“Are you afraid I’m going to jump?” She runs her fingers over the railing. “You look like that’s what you’re thinking.”

“I know you’re emotional right now—”

“Emotional?” She lets out another sharp bark of a laugh. “I’memotional? Oh, Nikolai, you have no idea what I am. But I’m not so desperate yet that I’m going to jump off of this balcony. If I was ready to give up, I’d have done it long before my father tried to sell me off to yours.”

“You can’t blame me for thinking it’s a possibility.”

Her eyes soften the smallest bit then, soft and sad, and she bites her lower lip, dragging it between her teeth. “No,” she says quietly. “I can blame you for a lot, but I suppose not for that.”

“I came to tell you that I’m almost certain I know where your father has gone—where he’s taken Marika and is setting up his next move. My hacking team has tracked his location—”

Lilliana laughs again, more bitterly this time. “Hackers. Tracking. God, I wish I’d never been born into this life. I’d rather be a cashier at a fucking supermarket than have to deal with this shit.”

I look at her, at the hollow expression on her face, and I make a decision that I hadn’t known I was capable of making. “Alright,krolik,” I tell her quietly. “If that’s what you want, then when this is over—you can have that.”

She blinks at me. “What do you mean?”

“I’ll let you go. Give you a divorce. You can live whatever life you want. You can be a cashier or a waitress or a student or a singer. Pick. Have the freedom you want. The life you decided you’d have after you did what your father ordered you to do. You’ve done it, haven’t you? So once this is settled, and I know you’re safe—” I spread my arms. “I’ll open up the trap, little rabbit. You can go back to the woods.”

Lilliana swallows hard. “I don’t believe you,” she says softly.

“I don’t really expect you to. But it’s the truth.” I let out a slow breath. “Your father is a dead man, Lilliana. I will get revenge for both of us. Mine and yours—for my father’s death and my sister’s pain, and yours too. And then you can do what you like.”

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