Promised to the Killer: A Dark Mafia Romance by B. B. Hamel

Author:B. B. Hamel [Hamel, B. B.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2022-03-02T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 15

Siena

Maxim drops me off at the Kremlin. “Stay in the room,” he says from the doorway. “I have to go back out.”

I shrug and wrap a blanket around my shoulders as I curl up in a chair next to the windows. He keeps looking at me with this stare halfway between desire and hate, and I can’t blame him. I said some ugly thigs to him back in the car, and I’d hate me too if I were him.

He closes the door. I bite back my tears. Enough crying for one day. Sobbing isn’t going to change a damn thing.

I keep replaying that conversation with Mira. I keep seeing her bruises, over and over again. I did that to her. I caused them to hit her. All because of Maxim. Zita’s the kind of person that thrives on control and power, and I challenged her. She needs to reassert herself somehow, and so she’ll turn to hurting Mira instead of me. She’s sick, and I hate her, but I should’ve seen this coming.

She all but warned me.

I get up and pace. I can’t sit still. I feel nauseous and I hate myself. I tug at my hair and finally get too fed up with being stuck in this room. I head into the hallway and hurry toward the library. It’s the only other safe space I know in this hellish house. This whole home is rich and lavish, but there’s no warmth anywhere. It’s cold, like the real Kremlin.

My heart’s racing, and all I want to do is curl up next to the fireplace with a book. Maybe that’ll keep my mind from Mira and Zita and Maxim and all my problems for a few minutes. Maybe I can escape into a world where I’m not a failure and totally worthless.

I hurry into the library and I’m so single-minded that I don’t notice the man sitting in the high-backed chair in the corner. I stop midway to the shelves when he clears his throat and my heart nearly stops in my chest. I turn to him and sticky sweat drips down my underarms as fear slices along my skin.

It’s Damir Novalov. Maxim’s father. He holds a thick volume in his lap and looks at me over a pair of wire-rimmed glasses. In this context, he looks like a kindly grandfather or an academic, except his eyes carry a cold, hard promise to them, and I feel a chill. I smell decaying paper and a pungent cleaning solution, like someone recently scrubbed the carpet. His father holds me with his eyes, the same look Maxim gave me, but there’s no softening this man.

“I’m sorry,” I blurt out and turn to the door. “I thought it was empty.” I hurry to go.

“Wait,” he says, and his voice is a sharp command.

I stop in my tracks. I don’t want to look back at him. I’m terrified of that monster. He’s like my father, but so much worse.

“Come here for a moment, Siena.”

I turn and take a deep breath.

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