Chapter 1
Zariah
My hands firm into tight balls as my brain pounds my temples. This can’t be happening. My papa wouldn’t do this to me. He loves me. It’s not the all-encompassing adoration he bestowed upon my mother, but compared to how women in our community are treated, I’ve always felt like a crystal sparkling in the midday sun in his presence. My waist-length hair, Egyptian-shaped eyes, and pale skin elicits me a tenderness from him his whores will never see. I look like my mother—the woman who brought him to his knees. He says it all the time: when he peers into my eyes, all he sees is her.
Except now. Now he won’t even look at me. The quickest glimpse I got when he told me his decision was full of contempt. He’s not hating me. He’s hating himself. That’s why I can’t understand his decision. Why send me away? Our family is in the midst of the most dangerous war we’ve ever faced. Long bloodshed isn’t uncommon for us. We are feared, loved, and admired for a reason, but this. . . this makes us look weak. He’s selling us out, choosing the easy route. Unlike his brothers, he wants to enter his grave as an old man instead of one just hitting his prime.
If he didn’t do this, if he didn’t side with the enemy, he could still achieve that. I’m not the only one who believes this. My brother rarely goes against any decisions our father makes, but even he is fighting to have this one overturned.
“He will kill her! He doesn’t want Zariah to be his wife; he wants her dead.” My brother waves his hand across the procession of people in my father’s den, watching our exchange with mirth over their usually hard faces. “He wants all of us dead for what happened to Dominique. He thinks we orchestrated the demise of his fiancée. He’s the last man you should be giving youronlydaughter’s hand in marriage to!”
“That’s why I’m doing this, Vaughn. He can protect her better than we can. He’ll keep her safe. Oleg thinks—”
“You’re a fool if you believe a single thing he says!”
My hand darts up to muffle my squeal when my father backhands my younger brother with enough force, his head slings to the side with a sickening crack. Vaughn is younger than any man in this room, but he has maturity in abundance. He’s always one step ahead of our enemies, and the hierarchies in our realm often refer to him as a boy wonder. They believe he’ll lift our entity out of the cloak shrouding it the past decade, and that within a year or two, we’ll be bigger and better than we’ve ever been.
That’s why it is so concerning my father won’t listen to him. Vaughn knows as well as I do that giving my hand in marriage to our number one enemy is the final nail in the coffin of our demise. Oleg Yury isn’t arranging the marriage of his eldest son because he wants him to settle down and produce heirs for a family legacy that’s been running nearly as long as ours. He wants to control him, to lessen Asher’s wish to succeed him as his American-born counterpart did in Vegas eighteen months ago.
He’s saving his own life by ending mine.
When Vaughn attempts to retaliate to my father’s anger, I stand to my feet with the gusto of a woman with a rocket strapped to her back. “No more!”
I’m not objecting to my father’s wish to gift me to Asher Yury, the most feared man in Russia. I’m stopping the downfall of my family’s entity months before it needs to occur. If Vaughn wants to come out of this latest battle alive, he can’t side with me. It will achieve him nothing but death. I’ve amassed my fair share of deaths my first twenty-five years on this earth. I don’t want any more hanging over my head.
“I’ll do it. I’ll marry Asher.”
Despair rings true in my tone. I’m tired of this life. The push, the pull, the to and the fro. I’m so goddamn tired, if it were an option, I would have left years ago. Unfortunately, women can only leave my family two ways: either in a body bag or when gifted to an enemy to smooth volatile waters.
That’s what my father just did. He pledged my hand in marriage to a man who wants me dead. Maybe he did it for a reason. When Asher kills me, perhaps his wish to eradicate my entire family will vanish. I am, for all intents and purposes, the cause of his hatred. His last gift, a woman he requested to spend time with instead of being forced to, was killed on my watch, in my room, supposedly at my request.
None of the above is true, but Asher isn’t aware of that. He came close to the truth six months ago, but I was given a stay of execution when he went to America to tighten ties with an ally he has over there. Rumors began circling a little over a month ago that he was returning to Russia sometime this year, and that his quest for vengeance is greater now than before he left.
My mother would be proud that I’m walking into my death with my head held high. We won’t mention my pride, though. Who has pride when their own flesh and blood refuses to protect them?
“When is the wedding?”
My heart drops into my stomach when my question comes out with a quiver. I grew up in one of the most feared bratva crews in Russia. Before he was challenged for the title, my father was the king of our realm, and I was the princess he forever protected. Clearly, his loss three years ago mislaid more than his crown.
My father’s stark green eyes float from the ground to me. “Oleg requested it be no later than the end of the month.”
You’d think my first rebuttal would be that I can’t plan a wedding in three weeks, but I keep my mouth shut. It’s pointless to argue. Anything is possible with the right amount of money, and the Yurys have more than all their enemies combined. Furthermore, the more I argue, the more likely our wedding date will be pushed forward. The end of the month isn’t ideal, but it gives me plenty of time to prepare my defense before I’m brought before the court known as Asher Yury.
I realize my judgment day is a lot sooner than I’m hoping when my father clicks his fingers two times, summoning Bela into the room. Bela was my childhood nanny; now she’s like a grandmother to me. She raised me after my mother passed away. She’s the only slice of peace I have in the violent world surrounding me. I would have never survived as long as I have if it weren’t for her.
“Help Zariah pack. Oleg has organized transport. They’ll be here within the hour.”
“An hour?” I step closer to my father, certain I’ve heard him wrong. “Papa, please don’t do this. I need more than an hour.”
When he makes his way out of the room without uttering another syllable, I barge through the men paid to keep him safe. With his departure signaling the end of our meeting, I have twenty goons to weave through before I catch him in the hall of our once grand home. It’s not as majestic as the priceless mansion I grew up in when I was a child. We didn’t move. It just lost its grandeur within weeks of my mother passing.
I feel a minimum of three guns on me when I tug on my father’s shoulder to yank him back. I’m not panicked. He just sentenced me to death, so I don’t have time for something as insignificant as worry.
When his eyes land on mine, I mumble, “Why can’t I stay here until the wedding?”
A part of the man I remember from my childhood breaks through the darkness in his eyes when he cups my cheeks so his thumbs can clear away my tears that have yet to fall. As his callused skin scratches mine, he murmurs in English, “Oleg thinks it’s best to settle tension before the wedding.”
I hear the words he isn’t expressing the loudest. “There’s no wedding, is there? You just exchanged my life for yours.” I inhale a ragged breath when I spot a flare in his eyes. He’s not lying, but he’s not being truthful either. It’s as if he doesn’t have a clue what’s going on either. That’s not surprising. Oleg Yury has many enemies. He doesn’t even trust those closest to him—his son included.
