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CHAPTER ONE
KATYA
“What the hell?!”
There are very few things that can ruin a lovely vacation. And that was the sort of phone call that could ruin not only a vacation, but one’s whole damned life.
I wanted it to be wrong. I wanted to have misheard it.
Honestly, I wanted to cover my damned ears so that I could pretend that I had never heard that string of words in that particular order ever again.
“Please tell me that you’re joking.”
My voice trembled, and I couldn’t even bring myself to hate it in the way that I normally would. I’m not the sort of person that is prone to emotional displays. But, this? This ripped the world right out from underneath of me and tilted everything on its axis.
My skin felt cold. I couldfeelmyself paling as the damnable words came from my family’s assistant straight into my ears once more.
“I’m so sorry Katya… but your mother’s death has been confirmed by our people. Stay where you are, and await further orders. I repeat, stay where you are until Alexei gives orders.”
Moments ago, I had been allowing the September afternoon sun soak into my fair skin.
I had been having my feet rubbed by the hunk now awkwardly pawing at my back. Not the best travel boyfriend that I’ve ever had in my life, but he’s stupid handsome and looksincrediblein a suit so I can’t complain much. Standing at a good foot taller than me and covered in glorious, bulging muscles and tattoos, he certainly looks good being photographed next to me on the beach for my Instagram. He can’t offer me much in the way of conversation, but that’s not what I want him for anyway. He’s not marriage material. Not by half. But, he will do for now.
Certainly good enough in bed to keep me fully satisfied.
What else would one want from a leisurely trip to Valencia, in Spain, if not to have a lot of good sex andsangria?
“What is it, babe?” Derek muttered as his large hands rubbed up and down my biceps. He tried to kiss the cap of my shoulder but the last thing that I want right now is to be touched.
I shrug out of his hold, wading across the pool a couple of inches away from him.
“What the hell happened?! Where is she? Her… her body, where is it? I can go and collect her tonight.” Even as I said the words, I knew that I was not going to be givenpermissionto fly back to Russia tonight and collect her body from whatever pop-up morgue they had her in. I can’t even remember the last time that I was given leave to fly back home to attend toanything. Guilt surges through me at the knowledge that I, being the horrible daughter that I am, have not seen my mother in years. When was our last conversation? Was she alone when it happened? Was she scared?
The thought of her lying there cold and prodded at by strangers is almost more than I can stomach. I might be sick.
Derek tries to grab me again, pulling me by my hips back into the warm, broad expanse of his muscled chest.
“Stop,” I mutter dismissively. Can’t he see that I’m busy right now? Can’t he see that something important is going on right now? I turn my focus back to the phone call. “Does Alexei know? What did he say?”
This time, Derek seems to not want to take no for an answer.
The grip on my hip tightens as he yanks me back toward him. Roughly enough that my phone slips and falls right out of my hand and into the pool.
Whatever my family’s assistant was about to say to me about my brother becomes a gurgly mess.
“What the hell?” I half shout as my palms collide with Derek’s chest.
Something shifts on Derek’s face.
He is no longer the mostly stupid boyfriend that’s been entertaining me for the past couple of months.
No, he just transformed into something darker. Something that I don’t even have time to process before I’m being yanked under the water.
My lungs burn.
For a brief, delusional moment I think that he’s just being petty or something because I ignored him. But then his hand knots roughly into the crown of my long platinum blonde hair and doesn’t budge.
He’s trying to kill me.
