He forced me up into treehouse while tears of shame burned my eyes. How dare he call me that… that vicious word.

I sat down opposite of him in the tiny treehouse. He appeared enormous in it, ridiculous, like a giant in a village for dwarves. But I couldn’t help noticing the way he looked, the tight, broad expanse of his shoulders, the smirk on his face and the passion in his eyes as he stared at me.

“What the hell do you want?” I asked angrily.

“I want,” he hissed, his fist coming toward me, clenched.

I flinched, but he never hit me, just stared at me with those passionate, rage-filled eyes.

“I want an explanation,” he growled.

“A-about what?” Damn me for stuttering. Damn him.

“About kissing my fucking brother, suka,” he said.

Hearing it in Russian hurt even more, because it meant he’d learned it especially for me. Ryker and Max’s families were Italian.

“I couldn’t do anything,” I whispered as he drew closer, his face intimidating. “Papa told me to do it. Why the hell do you care, anyway?”

“I care,” he growled. “Because this is mine. You are mine. Do you understand, slut?”

“I’m not a slut,” I whispered, inches away from his lips, but my stomach fluttered at the thought of being called his.

“You’re my slut,” he whispered in my ear. “My property. Never let him kiss you again. He will never have what’s mine, will he?”

I moaned with my mouth closed and he grunted against my neck, sniffing my neck like an animal. He’d never, ever spoken to me like this before.

“Tell me, Ophelia,” he demanded, and I swallowed thickly, realizing with more shame than I’d ever felt that I was wet between my legs.

“He won’t,” I whispered, and he sucked the skin of my neck between his two rows of perfect teeth.

He bit down and I cried out.

“As long as you remember,” he growled into my skin. “You’re mine. You’re not to be touched by anyone else. And since my fucking brother stole your first kiss, I’m going to take another one of yours.”

“No,” I gasped, but he didn’t give a shit, reaching for my dress, growling orders at me.

In a split second, my no turned into a yes. He pulled me against him and stole my second kiss.

“Open your mouth,” he barked at me. “Open. Now.”

I did, and he took it, his fingers holding my throat as lightly as the touch of a feather. But the way he kissed me was anything but gentle.

He stole things. He was a thief. My second kiss, and my third one. My fourth and my fifth one.

“Ryker,” I moaned against his mouth. “Ryker, please….”

“Please?” he whispered into my ear. “What do you want, little slut?”

“More,” I demanded, spreading my legs for him.

That’s when I heard the first shots being fired.

Bang, bang, bang.

There were moments of silence while we stared wide-eyed at one another.

And then the screaming began. The blood-curdling, gut-wrenching screaming.

I was about to scream myself when I felt Ryker’s palm close over my mouth. He held me firmly in place and pressed his hand so tightly over my mouth I could barely breathe.

Outside, chaos erupted.

Ryker held me still through the sounds that sounded like endless pain and terror. Gunshots. More and more and more. Screaming. Crying. Cursing in Russian. It seemed to take hours—hours upon hours of not being able to move a muscle. Every time I tried to make a move, Ryker stopped me. He kept me safe in his arms as inexplainable tears streamed down my face. What was going on? What was this? Please, oh my God, make it stop.

It didn’t end. Wouldn’t end. Just kept on fucking going until the tears stopped coming, drying on my cheeks as Ryker held me closer, not to hurt me, but because he needed me. We clung together, my body trembling with awful fear and the desperate attempt to stay quiet. His grip firm and smooth, he whispered in my ear, nearly soundlessly, that I would be okay, that he would protect me.

We heard voices all around us, and then, suddenly, there was a face at the door leading into the treehouse.

The man shouted in Russian and Ryker sprang into action, feet sailing through the air and kicking the man in his face, hard. He motioned for me to stay hidden and climbed down the stairs. I listened to the screaming and it was more horrible this time around because I heard them hurting Ryker. And behind all those noises, I heard my mother’s high-pitched scream and my heart froze.

Mamochka. They were hurting Mamochka. Please, don’t let them. On impulse, I ran outside the treehouse. I couldn’t let them keep hurting her, hurting my family. I couldn’t bear the sounds of someone hurting Ryker, the man who’d stolen not just my kisses but my heart as well. So down I went, and I stepped into pure madness.

The air was filled with smoke, a small fire starting on the picnic table. That was the only place that was still. Everywhere else, chaos erupted. People ran, some of them hurt, people I knew, faces I recognized.

I screamed in terror at the sight of it all and tears sprang back into my eyes. There was a family friend on the grass, my papa’s friend from high school. His brains had been blown out all over the other picnic table. I retched at the sight.

I tried to run. I wasn’t proud of it, but I was terrified, and my survival instinct kicked in. But before I could move an inch, a body knocked me to the ground, and I screamed in fright.

“You’re not going anywhere,” an unknown voice whispered in my ear, pulling me up and crossing my arms behind my back.

I resisted, but it didn’t do anything much, and the man twisted me to the side, bringing me to where three others held Ryker and Max.

“Ah!” someone exclaimed with glee, and I stared wildly ahead as a man, no, a boy, came up from behind two guards.

He was tall, dark, and handsome, but he looked young, maybe just a couple of years older than me. He still had that boyish look to him, the one both Ryker and Max had outgrown a couple of summers ago. He wore an expensive suit that didn’t fit him perfectly, which made me think it belonged to somebody else.

“It’s such a pleasure to finally meet Princess Ophelia,” the man mocked as he drew closer.

I stared at him intently, trying to imprint every inch of him into my memory. Once I told Papa what he’d done, he’d be disposed of. And he fucking deserved it.

“Don’t call me that,” I snarled.

“Oh no?” he asked with feigned surprise. “What would you prefer to call me?”

“Nothing,” I grunted, fighting against the man holding my arms back. “I’d prefer it if you didn’t say anything at all.”

“How misfortunate.” He clucked his tongue. “Maybe I’ll call you an orphan.”

My blood chilled in my veins as he looked at his guards, one of whom kicked Ryker in the stomach. I cried out at the sight, and this seemed to spark a sharp interest in the other man’s eyes.

He motioned for his men to step aside and they did, I gasped at the sight that awaited me, the horrible reality before my eyes.

My mother and father were at the bottom of the heap. On top of them, were my siblings. My sister and my two brothers, the baby eternally asleep on top of my little sister. Vladislava….

My eyes watered and I choked back a sob. It couldn’t be true. The blood flooding down the stack of bodies couldn’t be real. The sight of them couldn’t be real. Surely they were all okay; this was just a figment of my imagination. A nightmare.

“No,” I whispered. “Please don’t let it be true.”

“I’m sorry, little orphan,” the handsome young man went on. “Now, I must ask you a very important question.”

He closed the distance between us with several long, meaningful steps, kneeling in front of me and taking my trembling hand in his fingers. He never moved his devilish eyes away from mine as he touched his ice-cold lips to the top of my hand and kissed it.

“My name is Kain,” he said with a wicked smile. “And from today on, you belong to me.”