10 Days to Ruin (Ozerov Bratva Book 1)
10 Days to Ruin: Chapter 51

The next three days blur into a kaleidoscope of us.

Morning sunlight filters through bulletproof glass as Sasha hand-feeds me blini smeared with caviar off the blade of his knife. His free palm rests possessively on the swell of my ass, still sore from last night’s adventures, which involved him lifting me onto the counter for a midnight snack that had nothing to do with food.

“Eat,” he orders, black bathrobe hanging open to showcase the roadmap of bite marks I’ve left across his chest. “You’ll need your strength.”

That’s the understatement of the year. It’s a miracle that I’m still vertical—because we’ve spent that much time horizontal.

We’ve christened all of the rooms in his penthouse like we’re on a holy mission to desecrate every possible flat surface. The shower flooded halfway through the fourth round of the morning when I spent a little too long teasing him from my knees. His office chair will carry a squeak for the rest of its life after I rode him through two back-to-back investor calls he barely pretended to pay attention to. Let us not speak of the bedroom, living room couch, or the armchair in the foyer.

It’s not all sex, though. Gifts appear like offerings at my shrine: a first edition Brontë wrapped in silk, diamond earrings shaped like windblown feathers, a handmade leather holster for my pepper spray. He cooks me meals and reads Dostoevsky to me while I soak in his clawfoot tub. When we’re too tired to make love again, he cuddles me in his arms and tells me stories about the tiny moments of stolen happiness he hoarded in his childhood.

The night before New Year’s Eve, he traces constellations on my bare shoulder as snow parades past the windows. “You ever think about having kids?” he murmurs, breath warm against my ear. “Not because we have to—but because we choose to.”

I go rigid. “Why? Trying to move up the timeline for your precious Bratva heir?”

“Don’t be so combative, you little spitfire.” His teeth close gently on my earlobe. “I was just wondering if you’d ever want a tiny you with my temper.”

I flip to face him, knees bracketing his hips. Moonlight catches the silver in his stubble. “Watch yourself, Ozerov. That almost sounded romantic.”

“You prefer transactional?” His hands slide up my thighs. “That’s fine. I can work with transactional.”

But when we crash back onto the pillows forty panting minutes later, he presses a kiss to my forehead so tender it cracks my ribs open.

We’re perfect. He’s perfect.

It’s all so fucking perfect.

Which is why I don’t see the blade coming.

New Year’s Eve arrives with a blizzard. The Met’s ballroom glitters like a snow globe shaken by God Himself. Ice sculptures drip tears and chandeliers weep diamonds. In every corner of the room, waiters circulate amongst the hundreds of guests: every crime lord, politician, and socialite that Sasha and my father, by virtue of this marriage treaty, have now cowed into utter submission.

I’m wearing the dress Sasha commissioned just for this: a blood-red Valentino with a neckline that dips to hell and back. The slit stops just shy of indecency.

Sasha’s knuckles kiss my hip as we pause at the entrance. “Nervous?” he asks, lips grazing my ear.

“Of you? Never.”

That’s a lie. I’m nervous of everything tonight. Not just Sasha, but of all of this. In less than an hour, I’m supposed to pledge my forever to a man who once swore to break me or die trying? I’m supposed to announce an engagement to the world, just a few hundred feet from where Sasha first found me hyperventilating in a bathroom stall?

It’s too neat and dainty. Too seamless. Full-circle moments are for celebrity memoirs, not for real life. I want to believe. I want so, so badly to believe in happily-ever-afters.

I’ve just been scarred too many times to fall for that again.

“Jesus,” Gina breathes when she sees me. She’s here as my other plus-one under protest, swathed in a silver pantsuit that makes her look like a shooting star. “You’re sex on wheels, Ari.”

“Look who’s talking!” I cast around for our missing third wheel. “Where’s Lora?”

Gina points with her champagne glass to a far corner of the room, where Lora, decked out in a pink ball gown with puffy, tulle sleeves, is deep in conversation with Pavel, the Bratva tech whiz Sasha assigned to work with us at The Phoenix. She’s blushing shyly as she giggles at some joke of his.

“It’s disgusting,” Gina says flatly.

I smack her hand. “It’s adorable.”

She rolls her eyes, but then her gaze flits over my shoulder. “Speaking of disgusting…”

When I turn, I see Feliks sauntering in. Sasha even coerced him into wearing a tuxedo for the occasion, which is a miracle in and of itself. Honestly, he looks great. It’s weird to see him not dressed in head to toe tactical gear, but the good kind of weird.

“You clean up nice, Regina,” he remarks as he joins us, eyes raking up and down Gina.

“Call me that again and I’ll castrate you here and now.”

“You shouldn’t talk so dirty in public,” he croons. “Nor should you stare so much. Keep gawking and I might even start to think you’ve got a pulse under that ice queen act of yours.”

“In your dreams, Vasiliev.”

“Every night, ogonyok.”

I can’t possibly roll my eyes hard enough to keep up with Mr. and Mrs. Romantic Denial here, so I turn around to replace where Sasha might’ve snuck off to while they were bickering.

It takes me a moment to spot him and Baba talking by the piano. Both men are wearing smiles that, from this distance at least, look innocent enough. But beneath the surface…

Hush, you psycho. Don’t look for things that aren’t there, I tell myself. This is normal now. This is what happily-ever-after looks like.

My father has a hand clapped on Sasha’s shoulder. But his free hand twitches toward his inner jacket pocket. He pulls out a silver pill case. Even from here, I see two tablets disappear under his tongue. His throat bobs with the dry swallow.

I’m still watching when Baba turns his head… and looks straight at me. When he does, his smile jitters, stutters, almost like a wince. Then he coughs and paints it back on in proper order again.

I shudder and pretend I didn’t see that. I’m being absurdly paranoid; I know that. It’s a big night and I’m understandably nervous. But I’ve got Sasha and Gina and Lora here to celebrate with me. Everything is great, grand, wonderful. Church bells soon to be ringing, fa-la-la, all that good stuff. It would be perfect if I just had my⁠—

“Mama!”

With exquisite timing, my mom floats up to me like the fairy queen I always swore she was. The string of pearls at her throat—the first thing she bought herself after leaving Baba—glows beautifully underneath the chandeliers.

“You came,” I breathe when she’s close.

“Of course I came, silly goose!” She clutches my elbow and gives me a kiss on the cheek. “My baby is getting engaged. I wouldn’t miss it for the world.”

I don’t miss the way her eyes flit toward the crowd before she reins them back in. She’s uncomfortable here, and I get that more than anyone. But she came anyway. For me.

I love her so much it hurts.

“You look like a dream, Mama.”

“Oh, nonsense. This dress was from the clearance rack at Dillard’s, and my left eyeliner is half an inch lower than my right. You’re the dream, sweetheart.” Her lip starts to wobble as she reaches out to gently touch my cheek. “You look… you… Jasmine would’ve…” She cuts herself off.

“We don’t have to go there.” I squeeze her wrist. “Tonight’s about fresh starts.”

Her laugh sounds like shattered crystal. “Of course. My fierce girl.” She tucks a loose curl behind my ear. “Just… be happy, okay? That’s all I’ve ever wanted for you.”

I recognize Sasha’s heat at my back before I even turn to see it’s him. His voice rumbles from over my shoulder. “Belle. You look stunning tonight.”

“Such a charmer,” she says.

“I prefer ‘man moved by beauty.’”

“Did I say ‘charmer’? I meant ‘full of shit.’” Her face cracks into a smile as she pokes him in the ribs. “Said with love, of course.”

Sasha returns her grin. “I’d expect nothing less.”

Then Mama scowls as she wags that finger in his face. “This is a serious Mama Bear warning, though: Hands to self. If you smudge her lipstick before midnight, I’ll come for you.”

His thumb strokes the arch of my hip. “She’s safe with me.”

“Mm. I’ve heard that before.” With a wink, Belle says something about shrimp puffs and goes skipping off.

The second she’s out of earshot, Sasha’s lips brush the hinge of my jaw. “What’s eating you, ptichka?”

I do my best to keep my expression neutral. “Who says anything’s eating me?”

Chuckling, Sasha taps the furrow between my brows. “This says so.” Then he taps my chin. “This says so.” He taps my fidgeting hands, my lip swollen from chewing on it. “And this, and this. All your tells are giving you away.”

“Okay, I get it,” I snap, knocking his hands away from my face. “You know me, I’m an open book, there are no such things as secrets when Sasha Ozerov is around.”

His face darkens for a millisecond before the shade clears. “No,” he rumbles. “No such things as secrets.”

Sighing, I tilt into him, grounding myself in cedarwood cologne with my face against his chest. “Tell me this isn’t the calm before the storm.”

His chuckle rumbles against my spine. “You’re marrying a storm, sweetheart. Best get used to it.”

The hand on my hip slips lower. I arch instinctively, pulse fluttering under his palm.

“Do you trust me?” he murmurs.

I know my answer. It goes against logic. Against instinct. Against every survival gene I ever inherited from Baba…

Yes.

He laughs when he sees my worry lines ease. “That’s what I thought.”

A blast of microphone static silences the room. The string quartet dies mid-note as everyone in attendance turns in unison to see Baba stepping up onto the dais.

His smile is too wide, pupils swallowing the chilly gray of his eyes. “Ladies and gentlemen, friends and colleagues, thank you all for coming.” He clears his throat. “It’s a special night for me as a father. We’re here to celebrate my daughter, Ariel—my last remaining jewel.”

Whiskey sloshes over my knuckles as his hand trembles. It takes everything I have to hide my sneer. Last remaining. As if Jas is just another piece of broken jewelry he misplaced. Sasha’s palm burns against the small of my back, steadying me.

“A man’s legacy…” Baba once again reaches into his breast pocket and pulls out that silver case. Pills rattle as he dry-swallows two more. “A man’s legacy is his children. And tonight, I give mine to a worthy⁠—”

The mic squeals. Someone in the crowd coughs. My skin prickles as Baba sways, sweat glistening on his waxen face. This isn’t the calculated monster who threatened me ten days ago—this is a marionette dangling from his last remaining string.

“Come,” Sasha murmurs, steering me toward the stage. “Let’s go give your father a hand.”

I nod and we start to cut through the crowd in that direction. We’re almost to the foot of the stage when I see him: Uncle Kosti, half-hidden behind an ice sculpture. My uncle’s usually twinkling eyes are red-rimmed. When he sees me, he crooks a finger in my direction. Hurry, he mouths.

I hesitate. My father is on stage, listing badly to one side and murmuring something that the microphone can’t catch. The crowd is murmuring, too, wondering what’s happening.

So am I, to be honest. Why is Kosti looking like that? Why is he hiding, ducked out of sight, and waving his hands to me frantically?

Baba glances down from the stage and sees us waiting. He extends a hand. “Ariana… S-S-Sash…”

I wrench free of Sasha’s grip. “Ari—” he growls.

But I’m already running toward the only man who ever felt like family.

When I reach Uncle Kosti, he grabs my arm hard enough to hurt. He reeks of sweat and his hair is badly mussed. “I can’t do it, koukla. I can’t let you go. Not without—not without knowing. I’ve been trying to-to-to protect you. But I⁠—”

“Uncle Kosti, what’s going on? Are you okay?”

His fingers dig into my arms. It feels freakishly wrong to see this horror painted on his face. “I got a call last night, Ariel. From Jasmine.”

I recoil. Try to, at least. But my uncle doesn’t release his death grip. “Jasmine’s dead, Uncle Kosti.”

“No, dammit. You’re not listening! She’s— I’m— Gamoto, just—Here.” He fumbles with his phone, nearly dropping it before he manages to dump it in my hands.

A voicemail waits on the screen. I press play. A woman’s voice crackles through the speaker.

It’s a sweet voice. Soft, but not timid, and melodic despite the hint of an edge. Almost exactly as I remember—if I scrubbed fifteen years off the ghost in my memories.

“Hi. It’s me. I don’t have long—he always said calls home longer than a minute can be traced, so I want to keep it short. But… I saw the papers. The engagement announcement. She can’t… You have to tell her not to do it. Tell her she can’t trust him. He’s doing it again, the same plan, the same… He said if I ever… She has to know that— And, Kosti… tell her I love her, too. Okay. That’s it. I’m so sorry. I’m so⁠—”

A hand reaches past me and snatches the phone away.

I turn to see those blue eyes I know so well.

Sasha’s face isn’t blank. Isn’t cold. It’s worse: resigned. Almost… sad. One look at him and I can see the whole horrible truth written there. Not every detail, but the bulk of it, the unbearable mass of it, like the hulking silhouette of something that’ll break me if I see it eye-to-eye.

He said if I ever…

His thumb hovers over the voicemail. Deletes it.

She can’t trust him…

His scar glints under chandelier light. The saw-toothed line of a father’s cruelty.

He’s doing it again.

My knees buckle. Sasha catches me, grip bruising. “Ptichka⁠—”

“You knew.” The words shred my throat as surely as that barbed wire did to Sasha’s. “You knew she was alive. And you let me think— You let me believe⁠—”

I can’t finish the sentence. For ten days, I’ve told myself that he’s not the man I thought he was.

I know better now.