Chapter 13

Thirteen

R uby

My new husband has left me with very little in the way of restrictions. Maxim tells me that I can do what I like, so long as what I like isn't to leave the property—or his presence. Unless I am in my bedroom, in which case Maxim stations himself in a chair outside the bedroom door, or at the foot of the stairs.

I've come to realize that I married my new husband on a Sunday night, because he'd left for work Monday morning. He'd returned early enough to share a tense, and silent dinner with me, before retiring to bed with me. I'd thought if I went to bed early, he would leave me be.

I'd been wrong, and it had been a hard lesson learned. Not only had he joined me in my room immediately after dinner, but he'd brushed my hair, stolen another long kiss that made me question all that I knew about myself, before tucking me into his large chest, rolling me into the bed, and falling quickly asleep. I had struggled, laying beneath his weight, with his arousal resting against my behind. My own pitifully drenched panties were a discomfort I'd been unable to shed for hours as I prayed for the mercy of sleep, only to be denied it.

This routine repeated throughout the rest of the week. Although I'd been careful to put off retiring to the room until late after that first mistake. Like I said, lesson learned.

Now, it's Friday night, and I can't help but wonder what Saturday is going to bring? Does he have a normal Monday-to-Friday, nine-to-five, grind? Or is he a workaholic, spending every chance he gets at the office?

I hope he's the latter. The less time I have to spend with my harsh, and cruel husband, who steals kisses and forces my body to feel things for him that my mind tries stubbornly to reject, the better.

As it is, I've gone through a hefty chunk of the backlist of titles I'd had on my Kindle. Another few weeks of this, and I'll have, quite literally, nothing to do with myself.

But, at least, for now, I have something to do while I sit at the windows—always a different window—and watch the men who patrol the property. It's like nothing I've ever seen before, the marching men who stroll the grounds, always at the ready for what?—war?

What are they watching for, so tense, and on guard? Who is this man I'm married to? This banker with underworld ties?

Tonight is a particularly snowy night. Over this last week, I've learned not only a few Russian words, but that it's mid-February. That means I'd spent just over two months of my life here, most of it in the cellar.

Two months of my life just gone .

Is anyone looking for me? Is my face on posters at the local grocer, pinned to trees and streetlamps?

Do the police think I've run away, considering most of my personal things like clothes, personal products, and my Kindle had all disappeared with me?

Do they think that, with the death of my mother, I'd lost my touch with reality and disappeared into—what? The mist? The ether?

Has anyone even considered my nefarious reality?

The guard with the army green hat pulled low over his ears, the rim of thick fuzz low on his forehead, huddles into his jacket as he makes his third pass outside my window in the study, his eyes meeting the gaze of the man who sits in the window of a small, but quite nice, shed-like building at the entrance of the gated estate.

They do this often. A silent communication relaying the rightness of everything that is so wrong here.

Do they know I'm a prisoner within these walls? Do they know the man they work for kidnapped me? Do they know how terrible the man they serve, with such bizarre loyalty—or maybe it's fear, is?

Do they care?

Still, every time I think of escaping, I'm reminded not only of the fact that the entire property is encased in a high, iron fence I have no hope of climbing—but of the gruesomely ugly things my brother had said. I'm reminded of who these men think my father was, and how that man hurt people. How those people would take their revenge out on me if I presented them with the chance.

I keep my side-eye trained on the window that overlooks the front of the property as I scan the words of my book, not really reading. Beside me, the dog—a purebred Doberman I've come to know is called Simba, is sprawled on the floor.

At first, Simba had terrified me. With his sleek, obviously powerful body and teeth meant for chomping, I'd taken care to keep my distance. But he wore me down, his wise doggy eyes chiseling away at my fear enough for me to offer a pet. That pet turned into frequent strokes and absent ear scratches, before morphing into full-out belly rubs. I'm confident I have a friend here in Simba, at least. Though I'm not sure he'd choose me over my husband.

I count a fourth pass of the man with the green hat, a fourth chin dip to the other who sits behind the glass of the little building I've covertly named ‘The Watch House'. I know, too much Nancy Drew as a child. Too much James Patterson now, a guilty but delicious pleasure, I've indulged alongside all things Nora Roberts , which doesn't help things in my current situation.

My heavy sigh is echoed by a much deeper, much darker one from not far away. It doesn't belong to Simba. I've come to know Simba's sighs well, and this is not his.

Heart kicking in my chest, I turn my head slowly to find my new husband—my keeper—standing just inside the door. His dark eyes are fixed intently on me, and I don't like that I don't know how long he's stood there, watching me.

Unease spreading along the length of my spine, I shoot him a pointed, and unwelcome, glare.

I think his lips twitch, but I can't be sure.

"What do you want?"

He begins to move into the room, closer to me. I feel like a fly caught in the sticky web of a spider.

"I think the better question, wife, is what are you doing?"

I make a point of lifting my Kindle. "Reading."

He gives his head a slow shake. "I don't think so."

Well, crap. The man is on to me.

Still, I'll admit to nothing. "I don't know what you're talking about."

He is standing close enough that I can smell him now. That annoyingly distinguished, and yet thrillingly addictive, mix of cedar and flame. The man is sin in its purest, most dangerous form. A hit straight to the bloodstream. Intoxicating.

I frown at the thought. His eyes hone in on it, the darkness expanding in such a way I fear the void of it. It's so vast, so reaching, the threat it might latch onto me and pull me inside, forever a prisoner to him, feels like a very real possibility.

I need to change the subject.

Think, Ruby. Think.

My eyes drop to the Kindle in my hands. I give it a wave. "Why do I have this?"

"Did you not want it?"

I look to him again. Again, I feel like he might swallow me whole. Fighting my shiver— I'm so terribly aware of him —I say, "I just think it's weird that you took it when you took me."

He slides his hands into his pockets, swaying back on his heels just so. " I didn't take you."

I scowl, then I give my hand a wave in the direction of ‘The Watch House'. "Your lackeys, then."

His eyes never leave my face. I wish they would.

"They didn't take you, either."

"Well, I didn't magically transport myself here," I scoff, my anger flaring. "Fairy godmothers don't drop their girls into a Vipers' den, and then sit back to see how she fares. They definitely don't give the innocent to a big-headed Mafia goon, either. They give them to the prince, and I'm sure I don't have to tell you, that you, dear husband, are no prince."

His movement is so quick, I'm left momentarily speechless, gasping in shock. Simba gives a warning growl, but otherwise does not move.

It's a real feat when I don't swallow my tongue, because never in my life has anyone ever curled their hand around my throat—with pressure.

Never, before him.

Still, I must have swallowed the foolish brave juice , because I don't cower.

Oh no, not me. I glare up at him.

I even consider biting his hand.

He bends so his face is merely an inch from mine. I can taste his breath. Sweet cigar and bitter vodka. It reminds me of Daddy. Grief is a blade to my tender heart.

I sob.

His eyes flare.

"You're right, wife. I'm no thug. I'm a Volkov . I take what I want, when I want it. I hold a kind of power that you couldn't begin to dream of. I've stolen the souls of men, and I'll undoubtedly take more. I built the monster that lives within me, nurturing him with every soul I claimed, every light I snuffed. Every scream I drew from the depths of men far worse than me." The pressure around my throat intensifies enough to have my weeping heart cowering. "I've taken lives, but I did not take you." His eyes sweep my face, landing, and lingering, on my trembling lips. His hold around my throat gentles, his thumb stroking thin, vulnerable skin. His voice softens. "But I am keeping you, Ruby."

Emotion burns my eyes. "Then how did I get here, if you didn't take me?"

"You were a favor."

"I don't understand."

"My brother took you. After your father killed his men, and attempted to kill him, a war was called. He took you as collateral." He pauses, the dark fringe of his thick lashes nearly sweeping high cheekbones as he peers down at me. "And he gave you to me."

I feel rattled and unbalanced. Maybe it's the way he's looking at me. Maybe it's the truth he's unleashed. I can't say, but all the parts of me feel so very raw, so very exposed, to all the jagged parts of him.

"I'm a person." The words fall as a whisper between us. "I have a right to freedom."

"You were never free."

"I was."

"No one is free." He says it gently, like he's telling me a secret that might very well crush my faith. "You were always a puppet, princess. A little worker toy that someone more powerful than you played with. You think you're suddenly a hostage, but you've always been a prisoner. You've always been a captive, contained by a power far greater than you. A master puppeteer hidden behind the scenes of your life, of all the lives of the people who believe they are free. But what were you free to do, really? Choose your clothing, what you eat?—within the means that you could afford, of course, by a job you had to pay to acquire, to a government who steals in the name of the taxes that line the cloak he wears, as he preaches about social programs designed to further imprison the weak of mind and tired of soul? It's a cycle old as time, and you scurried like the rest—running in your hamster wheel, convinced you were getting somewhere." His soft laugh is fringed in disgust. "Your freedom was never more than a smokescreen designed by those smarter than you, to keep you pliable in your prison."

He leans in even closer, his lips brushing my cheek as shattered faith shudders from my body on a weak exhale. "But let me tell you a secret, my little puppet. When the prisoners grow restless, their blinders clearing enough that they begin to see through the shades of compliance—when they remember their strength, and think for a moment, they might break free of their prison—the master puppeteers orchestrate the little civil wars that break out within the prison of society because," he chuckles viciously. "It might be a dog-eat-dog world out there, but there's always a pack of wolves waiting to feast on the carcasses in the aftermath." I squeeze my eyes closed against the ugly picture he paints.

But the whip-like lash of his tongue strikes again. "Your freedom is confined within the laws intended to keep the workers working, the taxed paying, and above all else, the powerful protected." He presses a gentle kiss to my cheek as he murmurs, "You're a prisoner now, but you've been a prisoner always. The only difference, is now, you have the power of a master puppeteer—a bear—at your back."

I turn my face to the side, away from his. I refuse to cry. "You're ugly."

"This world is ugly."

"Not all of it. There is beauty."

He chucks my chin. "There's that smokescreen."

My eyes flash to his. "What?"

"I'm a realist. I see through the beauty that seduces you, the blind, to the reality that lurks. It's when a man learns to see through the veil, that he first tastes power. When he steps through the veil—now, that's when things get interesting."

I stare at him, dumbfounded and struck. As despicable and horrendous as his words are, there is an unfurling deep inside me—an awakening of dormant intuition—that recognizes, however reluctant, that there is truth within them.

Forcing my gaze to hold his, I demand, "So, you'll never let me go?"

"For a Volkov man, the vows of marriage are eternal."

I want to scream. Somehow, I reply calmly, "Is that a no?"

"That is, most definitely, a no." He catches my chin when I attempt to turn my face from his. Again, he leans in, voice pitched dangerously low. The threat weaved within it is unmistakable. "So, you can stop watching the guards every day as you pretend to read, memorizing their routine, noting where they stand, seeking a break in the fence in which you might escape. There is no escaping this, wife. You are, and will always be, mine ." Holding my chin firmly, he drops his lips to mine. I refuse to return his kiss as he moves his lips against mine. He pulls back, his voice rough enough to scrape shivers from my flesh. "My lovely little prisoner."