5. ISABELLA

Chapter 5

ISABELLA

I'm in awe as I drive my brand-new SUV toward my house in Back Bay. I've driven around race tracks, off-road, and under supervision around Back Bay. But I've never driven my own car without a bodyguard intimidating me in the passenger seat.

Andrey's phone rings. "I have to take this."

He starts talking in Russian. I feel a twinge of guilt at not telling him I can understand every word he says. But I don't see the point, as this will all be over soon—just a few more hours.

Still, it's rude to listen to other people's conversations. I let my mind drift back to three nights ago. I had just lost my virginity to the most gorgeous, sexy man I'd ever seen. I'd never expected my first time to be like that. It was explosive and mind-blowing.

I was ready to go for round three when Andrey told me to get dressed and prepare to leave in a couple of minutes, then told me we were off to Vegas to get married. Earlier, before the sex, we'd both discovered that our families were trying to marry us off to people we didn't know.

Up until I objected to his plan about getting married and his pointing out I could be pregnant, he told me he wasn't just the manager of the club like I thought. He owned the fucking club. He was Andrey Belov, who was soon to be the Belov Bratva Pakhan.

That's when I had to go and throw my father's name around and found out there was no need for us to go to Vegas. After all, I'd just met and given my virginity to my mysterious fiance of eighteen years. If karma were a person, I'd fucking hunt her down and kill her.

Three Nights Ago - Andrey's Apartment

"Welcome to your new home, princess," Andrey says as the elevator to the penthouse ascends in one of Boston's newest and most sought-after apartment buildings. "Tomorrow, I'll have someone take you to buy some new clothes." He smiles at me. "You'll need to pick out a wedding dress too for our wedding that will take place the morning of your twenty-first."

I remain silent as I'm still reeling at finding out Andrey is the man I dubbed Quasimodo. The son of Ivan Belov, who was the voice on the other end of my father's conference call earlier that day, discussing my engagement. An engagement that had been set when I was fucking three years old and was still trying to eat earthworms.

I have to stop shaking my head or pinching myself, trying to wake up from the nightmare. But it's not a dream, just the story of my fucking life. My life has been one giant gilded cage and an overbearingly suffocatingly protective father that has controlled every aspect of my fucking life: my education, my social circle, and now, my husband. Fuck they even had the date of my wedding planned.

Rubbing my temples, I move like a zombie through Andrey's super modern apartment, not really seeing it or caring much what it looks like. I'm not going to be here that long as I just put the strap of my purse over my shoulder. What I do take note of are the guards, the windows, the doors, and various places that could be blind spots for potential cameras.

I'm trying not to get lost in broody thoughts of why my father would set up this union. What was in it for my father when he sealed my fate by promising me to Andrey Belov?

Jesus! Who even does archaic shit like this? Betrothing your child when they can't even make a decision yet? How do you just seal someone's fate without batting an eye over their potential hopes and dreams? More importantly, how could I have been so blind as not to have seen this coming? Because he's my dad! I trusted him.

What a fucking joke when he was the one that always said: Everyone's a potential enemy, Isabella. All it takes is the right circumstance. Yeah, like pawning your twenty-one-year-old virgin daughter off to the Belovs to become a Bratva queen. He may as well have given me to Satan, although I'm thinking I'd rather my father have done that.

But then again, I've heard that Ivan Belov is Satan, and I'm sure his son Andrey is fast following in his daddy's footsteps with an impressive body count and criminal record piling up.

I glance at Andrey, and he's staring at me expectantly, holding his hand out like an usher pointing to a doorway. Shit! Did he say something? I've been so lost in my misery that I haven't heard a word he's said since I learned who the fuck he was.

How did one of the most exciting nights of my life, when I ventured out to snatch my first taste of freedom, end up here?

I glance around the room. It's nice. Big king-size bed, bathroom off to one side, balcony off to the other… Mm, that's interesting.

I walk to the double glass doors and open them, covertly taking note of the lock on the door just in case Andrey decides to lock it and pocket the key when he leaves the room. However, we're on the twenty-sixth floor. I'm sure he doesn't think there is any reason to do so. What am I going to do? Call Uber Copter?

I give a soft snort at that. Uber Copter. That actually wouldn't be a bad idea for rich people. I step out, glancing over the Boston Harbor. The dark sea shimmers with lights reflecting off buildings spotlighted by the heavy silver moon hanging in the sky.

It figures it would be a full moon. All the living dead and creatures of hell are out tonight. As if on cue, the one creature from hell I had the misfortune of literally running into comes to stand beside me.

Andrey leans his hands on the balcony, staring out over the sea. "I love this view."

"I can see it would be the perfect spot to howl at the moon," I mumble.

He tilts his head. "Sorry?" He frowns. "I didn't hear what you said."

"I said it's the perfect spot to stare at the full moon." I raise my voice like I'm talking to a deaf person or how we Americans typically talk to people who don't speak English, and we think they can't hear properly.

Andrey turns to me, leaning his hip against the railing and folding his arms over his broad, muscular chest. His silver eyes glint off the moon's glow, while his thick, straight, inky black hair blends with night.

A mixture of light and dark! Fuck why does he have to be so gorgeous? Why couldn't he have been more like Quasimodo? Maybe then my damn traitorous body wouldn't burn with desire every time he looks at me.

Great! Now I've got the Rocky Horror Picture show on my mind and the song Touch-A Touch-A Touch Me. I can't stop thinking about oiling him up and rubbing him down. Stop! Stop! Jesus, Isabella, get a grip. I've tasted blood, and I want more… Aggggghhhhhh!

Nope! Stop, brain, for fuck sake, STOP! The man is my next jailer, only ten times worse than my father and about a million times more dangerous. So now is not the time to get an annoying catchy tune stuck in my head or think about doing the time warp. However, if I could time-warp back a couple of hours, I would make sure I don't get bulldozed by Andrey Belov.

A picture of a man with hazel eyes flashes through my mind. He was at least an inch taller than Andrey. I think of him as Tom Ford. He was gallant and had given me his Tom Ford bomber jacket after my cream silk top turned to a sheer film showing off my lacy white underwear after cocktails and vodka rained down on me.

I remember his eyes and the way he carried himself. I suppress a shudder. He was even more gorgeous than Andrey. But he also seemed to be a lot more lethal. There was something about the way the man moved—an air of confidence. The man knew that even though he was in a den of lions, he was the alpha.

Maybe I should've offered him my V-card. I don't think he'd have insisted we get married because he'd deflowered me. Fuck, I hate that word. Deflowered! It makes me feel like I have daisies and shit growing out from my nether bits.

"Isabella?" Andrey's voice draws my attention. "You're far away. What are you thinking about?"

"Tom Ford," I answer honestly, and I see Andrey's shoulders stiffen. "Do you think you could get me my new bomber jacket along with the underwear I left in the bathroom of your office back at the Velvet Lounge?" I start walking toward the room. "Actually, you know what. I'll call an Uber and go get it myself."

I dig through my bag, looking for my phone. Uh! I scratch some more. Where the fuck is my phone?

"Looking for this?" Andrey reaches into his back pocket and holds up my phone.

"Why do you have my phone?" My eyes narrow accusingly. "Are you going to yank out my eyeball and cut off my thumb to get into it?"

"Is that really what you think of me?" Andrey frowns, tapping my phone in the palm of his hand.

"Isn't that what you do?" I ask back.

"Only if the circumstances require it," Andrey tells me coldly and clinically. He holds out his fall. "You can make one call only, but not to your father."

"If I give you bail money, will you let me go?" I see him shake his head slowly in reference to me being jailed in his penthouse—Crime: Giving Andrey Belov my virginity.

"Funny," Andrey says. "Make your call, princess."

He leans back against the railing, watching me, looking like he has no intention of giving me any privacy.

"Do you mind?" I ask him, and he raises his eyebrows curiously. "A bit of privacy!"

"Sorry, but I can't do that," Andrey tells me. "So, make your call. You have ten minutes." He glances at his wristwatch. "Starting now."

"Are you fucking kidding me?" I gape at him. "I have no privacy and a time limit?"

"Nine minutes," Andrey ignores my outrage and ticks off another minute.

I turn my back on him, walk to the opposite end of the balcony, and dial Stacy's number. It rings three times, and she answers.

"Isabella, where the fuck are you?" Stacy asks. She sounds like she's whispering, and I can barely hear her through all the noise in the background.

"Where the fuck did you go?" I lower my voice and hiss at her. "Thanks to you, I've landed right in enemy territory."

"What?" Stacy asks, confused. There's a pause. "Izzy, are you in trouble? Have you been kidnapped?" Another pause. I can see Stacy posing like a little meerkat as she starts to go through possible scenarios. "Oh no! Is it James or your father?" Another quick pause. "Shit, it's not Genevra, is it?"

"No, none of those," I tell her. "Where are you?"

"I snuck back into the Velvet Lounge looking for you," Stacy tells me.

"What do you mean snuck back in?" My eyes narrow suspiciously.

"Well, I'm kinda banned from the place, and the bouncers saw me…" Stacy starts to explain.

"You should've told me that!" I growl. "God, we could've gone straight to Vegas."

"I know how much you wanted to go there," Stacy tells me. "Where are you?"

"Not there anymore," I tell her.

I hear Andrey clear his throat, and I turn to see him tapping his expensive wristwatch. I suddenly have the urge to rip it off his wrist and fling it off the balcony.

"I have to go, Stace," I say. "I'll call you soon."

Before I say goodbye, the phone is rudely snatched from my hand, and the call is cut.

"Rude!" I turn and glare at him. "How fucking dare you?"

"I think you've had enough time to alert your friend to your whereabouts," Andrey tells her and starts to fiddle with her phone.

"What are you doing?" I look at him in disbelief.

"Just changing your passcode setting so I don't have to take out your eyeball or cut off your thumb," Andrey tells me with a grin.

"You can't do that!" I try to grab my phone, but he pulls it out of my reach.

"You bastard!" I'm seething now. I turn and storm back into the room, throwing my purse on the bed as I head to the bathroom. "I'm going to have a bath and then try to get some sleep." I stop at the bathroom door and turn to look at him and then the bedroom door pointedly. "You can go now."

He stands staring at me for a while before nodding and walking to the door with my phone in his hand. I couldn't take it with me anyway. Because when I leave here, I'm disappearing for good. I'm thinking maybe Switzerland, where I'll change my name to Heidi!

He stops at the door frame. "You have two options for how you want to start our life together, princess." Andrey holds my eyes. "The easy way is by acknowledging that this is your life now. Or the hard way." He raises an eyebrow and shrugs. "Either way, the fact is you belong to me now, and how you want your days to go is up to you." A warning look flashes in his eyes and resonates in his voice. "But trust me, you don't want to push me or try to defy me. I'm not your father, and you will lose every round. I run things around here whether you accept it first or not. You will do things my way."

"Whatever you say," I reply, saluting him. "You're the big bad, Bratva boss."

Andrey's silent for a few seconds, staring at me before nodding and walking from the room, pulling the door closed behind him. I wait and hear a key turn in the lock.

"Wow, so much for trust!" I shake my head and snort. "As if I'd go through the door anyway with armed guards everywhere."

I raise an eyebrow and glance at the balcony with the door still wide open. Now, the balcony, on the other hand. I walk out onto it and look down, down, down.

"Fuck, that's a long way down." I scan the balconies in neat rows and columns going down the side of the building. "I should be able to make it."

Sixteen years of gymnastics is going to pay off tonight. I look down at my footwear and start kicking my high heels off. "These, however, are not going to get me anywhere."

My eyes scan the room and fall on my purse. I plop down on the bed and pick up my black Gucci purse.

"Sometimes having an over-paranoid protective dickwad of a father pays off." I grin and admire the handwork of my fixer.

Everyone needs a fixer, Isabella. Your go-to person who "fixes" things for you. I'm not too sure exactly what he meant by that, but James said it was someone who could make things like my purse for me. Someone who'd blend in anyway, and no one was even aware that he was your fixer.

I admire my purse. "Well, my fixer is a genius engineer, computer hacker, and dog trainer, and if I were James Bond, Davey would be my Q."

From the outside, my purse looks like a regular medium-sized black purse with a thick, wide, decorative gold buckle in the front. But the buckle is a lot more than ornamental. It hides some crucial tools a girl should never leave home without. I click the trick lock, and the pouch springs open.

"Well, hello, toolkit and pepper spray." I hold up the items in my hand. There is a small universal two-sided tension wrench, a pick, and a long flat spray bottle. "To think I nearly laughed when Genevra made this little bottle of pepper spray for me."

I look around the room. I need somewhere to put these in case I get a visitor before I'm ready to leave. I open the drawer beside the bed and stuff them in there. Digging back into the gold compartment , I pull out a small gold pocket knife. It has the initials KM engraved on it. It used to belong to my mother. My father gave it to me on my tenth birthday.

I put the knife with the rest of the items before turning back to my purse. I click the buckle once again. A small compartment with a key in it pops open. I take the key and put it with the rest of the items. Last but not least, I take the wad of cash from my wallet, pop it in the drawer, and shove it closed.

My credit cards get a goodbye kiss before I reset the compartment. "Goodbye, old friends," I say and put the wallet back into my purse.

I look down at my outfit. "Shit, jeans and an oversized cotton shirt of Andrey's is not ideal for balcony hopping."

I glance around the room. I wonder what's in the closets. I walk over to them, yanking on one of the doors. To my surprise, there are women's clothing in them.

"Huh!" I say, and something twinges inside me. I Ignore it. "What do I care if Andrey has some woman living here?"

"Those are my mother's clothes," Andrey's voice has me spinning around.

"Oh… uh…" Busted. I close the cupboard and step back. "Sorry. I was just looking for something to sleep in."

"I brought you this." Andrey throws a giant T-shirt at me with Harvard written on it.

"Is it supposed to impress me?" I ask, holding it out. "I go to Harvard too."

"Your father allows you to go to college?" Andrey asks, and he seems really surprised.

"No! I sneak out every day," I retort sarcastically. "Who do you think pays for it? Santa Clause?"

"I'm just surprised he'd let you go to a place full of…" Andrey doesn't get to finish, as I add.

"Horny frat boys?" I loop his T-shirt over my arm, trying not to notice that it smells like him.

"I was going to say college students," Andrey tells me. "But yes, I guess it's the same thing."

"My cousin James, who's lived with us since his parents died when he was a kid, is also my bodyguard and constant shadow," I have no idea why I'm explaining this. "He's studying law at Harvard."

"Is that what you're studying?" Andrey asks, and I can see he's genuinely interested.

He's probably already making a note in his head to have me taken out of college. Are Bratva women even allowed to have a degree or brains? Or do they just have to move around as trophies on their husband's arms and their sex toys at night?

"No!" I shake my head, and I see the surprise in his eyes. "My father put me off law. I have no faith or trust in it."

"Ah." Andrey nods. "Because he defends my kind."

"I wouldn't call it defending. I call it manipulating the outcome," I say honestly, and I can't help the disdain and disgust in my voice. "I've seen my father in action in a courtroom. His favorite hook is reasonable doubt. Then, when he's sowed that seed, and he always does, he starts tearing apart the innocent party until he has the criminal looking like the victim."

"Who's to say the person you think is the criminal wasn't the victim?" Andrey says. "Right and wrong are just two sides of the same coin."

"Is this the someone's right is another person's wrong speech?" I raise my brows at him. "Because I've heard it a million times, and each time I know it's just bullshit. Sure, there are two sides to every story, but everyone knows what's morally right or wrong. I don't care who you are." I see him nod as he takes in my words. "People like you do know there's a line between wrong and right. You just like to push it to suit whatever fucked up shit you've done."

He stiffens. "Your father makes sure that everyone gets a chance at being heard. When shit does go down, and people like me are just passing by, we're the first people the blame falls on and, most often than not, the last."

"Exactly," is all I say. "The system is broken, and I don't want to be a part of it just like I don't want to be a part of the dark underbelly— your world !"

"We have to play the hands we're dealt in life," Andrey says, turning to leave. "How you play them is up to you."

"Really?" I look at him in disbelief. "You can't play when someone else has taken your cards."

"You'll get your cards back when I feel you can be trusted." Andrey stares at me for a while and nods. "On that note, I'll say good night."

I don't say a word and watch him go. This time, I don't wait to hear the lock turn.

"Fucking a-hole. I'm not waiting for anyone to give me my cards back. I'm going to be playing with a whole new deck." My heart jolts in excitement, turning back toward the wardrobe.

"I saw some jogging leggings and a compression shirt in his mother's wardrobe." I snort. "Yeah, right. Mother's wardrobe."

I quickly strip off the overly large shirt and jeans. I'm naked beneath it because my white lacy undies are a gooey cocktail-stained mess in Andrey's office bathroom at the Velvet Lounge.

I've just stepped out of my jeans when the bedroom door flies open once again and stops dead still. My eyes widen, staring in surprise at Andrey.