I’ve avoided every single person in my home. Including Father. We still haven’t spoken since I slaughtered Anton just over a week ago, and I’m not ready to talk to him. I’m still too volatile. I need to be cool and collected when we speak.
Today, I will talk to him, and then everything will go on as if Diana and Anton never happened. We still have a wedding to plan. I’ve just replaced the bride.
“Mmmm,” Irina murmurs in her sleep, her palm rubbing across my pectoral muscle.
I stroke my fingers through her hair, a smile tilting my lips up. Having her in my bed every night and waking up with her in my arms has been heaven. A devil like myself doesn’t deserve an angel, but I have one anyway. And I’m never letting her go.
“Good morning,” she says, her voice raspy with sleep. She sits up on her elbow and gives me a pretty smile. The sun shines in from the window, causing her blonde locks to light up. I never get tired of looking at her. Never. In fact, she’s fairly distracting in that sense.
“Morning, beautiful.” I lean forward and kiss her plump lips. I’m about to take things further when my phone buzzes from the table. I groan as I grab it up. “What?”
“No way to speak to your father,” Father grunts.
“Good morning, Father.”
I refrain from snapping at him and relax against the pillows. Irina starts kissing my chest, doing her damnedest to improve my mood. She knows how my father ruins my days.
“The honeymoon is over, son. I know you have the young Volkov stowed away in your room. She’s becoming a weakness,” he complains.
“Is this why you called?” I ask, irritation edging in my tone.
“Partly,” he bites out. “But I have more business to discuss. My office in ten.”
“Nope,” I retort. “If it’s important, just say it now. I’m busy.”
The line goes dead for a moment. Irina blinks at me, and when I flash her an encouraging grin, she starts kissing lower down my torso. Her hand grips my erection, and I bite back a groan. My dirty little vixen wraps her lips around my cock, dead set on making me lose my cool while on the phone with my father.
“You’ll announce your engagement this evening,” he says after a minute. “I suggest you find a ring. I want the marriage over and done within a month’s time.”
Irina smiles up at me around my cock, her heavy engagement ring catching the sunlight and nearly blinding me. “I can do that,” I grunt. He doesn’t need to know I stole her away from the estate three days ago, took her into the city, and found her the most expensive ring I could, and then proposed to her in a romantic way as we strolled through the snow on the way to a restaurant. Those moments are just for us. Not for prying eyes or people who use such things against powerful men. Aside from my explosion last week, no one will ever know how utterly obsessed I am with this woman.
No one but her.
“Is that all?” My words come out as a hiss when Irina grips my balls and takes my cock deep in her throat.
“How are the women?”
“Irina has been training them. They’ll be ready and perfect,” I tell him, grunting. Each evening, Irina and I have gone down to check on the women. I work with Stepan, and she the women. She’s smart and teaches them things that could prove useful in The Games. By next winter, those women will be smart, cunning seductresses.
“The other women,” Father says.
“They’re being delivered today. They will be kept on the edge of sanity and make the perfect allure for our more depraved players. And with Irina working with the others, this may be our best Games yet.”
He laughs scornfully. “What does little Irina know about showing them how to take two cocks at once?”
“Not rocket science, Father.”
A growl resounds from his end. “Let’s make sure their cunts are kept tight. A stitch or two will ensure this.”
“Hmmm,” is all I reply. My woman is swallowing my cock, so I’m not completely interested in what my father has to say.
“And, Vlad, maybe I should test drive what they’ve learned so far. I’ll want to have my pick of them,” he grumbles.
Of course he does.
“Darya getting boring?”
Instead of answering, I hear the slapping of flesh. A woman’s scream resounds on the other end, loud enough that Irina pops off my cock and frowns at me.
“Darya is learning how to take a fist in her cunt. She’s fine.”
Irina slowly fucks my cock with her hand, but she’s no longer interested in sucking it as she tries to listen to our conversation.
“Now, are we done?” I snap at him.
“We’ll discuss the rest later. Give my future daughter-in-law my regards.”
I hang up on him without saying bye. “Why are you stopping?”
“What was he doing to her?” she demands, ignoring me. Fire glitters in her blue eyes. It’s one of the things I love about her. She’s a storm beneath her calm exterior. I like unleashing her from time to time.
“Do you really want to know?”
“Yes.”
“I could show you,” I tease.
Her brows lift, but she doesn’t back down from my challenge. “So show me.”
I flash her a wolfish grin before I maul her. Her squeals are adorable as I flip her around and pin her to the bed. When I reach for the lube on the table, she eyes me warily. I make a big show of pouring it all over my hand and smearing the lubricant on my fingers. Her eyes are wide as saucers. “Spread your thighs.”
“Vlad,” she murmurs. “What do you think you’re about to do?”
I run the slick knuckle of my middle finger along her slit, increasing pressure against her clit. “Having fun with you,” I tease.
Her eyes narrow, but she doesn’t tell me no. Even if she did, it’s not like I’m very good at hearing that word anyway. I slide one finger, and then two, into her easily. She lets out a moan when I curl them up and stroke them against her g-spot. I love making her purr like a kitten. Her body yields to my command and obeys so beautifully.
“Vlad…”
“Shhh,” I say as I push a third finger into her cunt.
Her moan is loud, and her eyes have fluttered closed. I rub my thumb against her clit as I ease my pinky in. Her cunt is too tight for me to push past the knuckles and slide any more of my hand in there. It makes me wonder how poor Darya is faring.
“Please…”
“What is it you’re begging for, little shadow?”
“You. I need you.”
I slide my fingers out of her and grab my cock with my slick hand. She moans when I tease her opening. With a quick thrust, I drive into her body. I seek out her mouth with mine and kiss her hard. My hips piston against hers, and I fuck her too rough for the morning. But my sweet girl takes it. She matches my stride and rakes her fingernails painfully down my shoulders.
I bite her lip. She bites my tongue.
I fist her hair. She grabs mine.
We’re hell-bent on climbing inside each other.
Soon, via marriage, we will become one.
And the entire country will fucking quake under our rule.
“Oh God,” she cries out, her orgasm stealing over her.
Her tight cunt clenches around me as she comes, sending me right over the edge. I come inside her, and just like every other day this week, I wonder if I’ll knock her up. I’ve become utterly obsessed with filling her with my cum and getting her pregnant. I want her pregnant and wearing my last name. And since she’s no longer on the pill and officially engaged to me, those things could be in the near future.
Once my cock grows soft and my semen runs out of her, I lift up to look at her. Her eyes blink lazily at me and she smiles. Her smiles will be the death of me.
Or perhaps the beginning.
All these years, I’ve played by the rules of my father’s games.
But then I took Irina and made her mine. Those rules and those games aren’t ones I’m interested in playing.
I have a new game.
And I make the rules.
It’s a game where she and I win.
Each and every goddamned time.
One month later…
“Everything okay?” I ask as I walk over to her.
She stares out the window of the honeymoon suite of our hotel and nods. “It’s bittersweet, you know?”
I come up behind her and hug her. She still wears a wedding dress, and I my tuxedo. The affair was an intimate one, with only our families present. Diana didn’t come. It was passed on via Veniamin Vetrov to Irina that she had other commitments to attend to. But what sweet Irina doesn’t know is I forbade it. Her older sister isn’t welcome in my home ever again. Leonid walked Irina down the aisle, and despite their issues, gave his blessing for me to wed her. A Vasiliev marrying a Volkov was always the plan. There may have been some strife between the two families, but in the end, tradition and power won out.
“I’m sorry. She would have made it if she could,” I offer, squeezing her to me.
She turns in my arms and lifts a brow. “I’m not stupid, Vlad. She wasn’t allowed to come. Let’s not start this marriage off with lies.”
She misses nothing.
I should know better.
Shame, an unusual and foreign feeling, trickles through me. Am I such an asshole I couldn’t allow her this one thing?
I am, unfortunately.
I’ll make it up to her, but it was something I simply wouldn’t renege on.
“Hey,” she murmurs, her palms covering my cheeks. “I understand why she wasn’t allowed to come. But it doesn’t change the fact that it hurt not having my big sister see me on my big day.” Tears glisten in her crystal blue orbs. “I’m happy, though. So very happy with you. I want to do this right. Not like our parents. We’re better than them. Smarter and stronger. You and I, Vasiliev. It’s you and I against our world.”
I relax and lean forward to kiss her forehead. “I’m lucky to have you.”
“Damn right,” she sasses.
Laughing, I pull away and regard my beautiful wife. The word feels strange on my tongue. Most men in our world seem bothered by having a wife, preferring mistresses over the ones who carry their children. I can’t imagine ever fucking another woman. Not when I have this one. She’s everything to me. Gorgeous, fierce, smart as a whip, and best of all: loyal.
It’s time.
To hand her the key to me.
I’ve never fully given myself to another person, but my sun—my Shadow—has earned this right simply by being her.
“Come sit,” I tell her as I motion to a sofa in our suite.
She pulls away and sashays in her glittery white dress that is more sparkly than the snow when the sun peeks through and illuminates it. Maybe it’s the person wearing the dress. She certainly has a glow I’m unable to ignore. As she sits, I walk over to my messenger bag holding my laptop and some pictures I keep with me. I grab the bag and sit beside her.
Ever the patient one, she remains quiet with her hands clasped on her lap. The two rings that tie her to me sit heavy on her dainty finger. I love how loud and expensive they are, practically screaming at anyone with eyes that she’s not only taken, but she’s taken by Vlad fucking Vasiliev.
I pull out the pictures first and hand those to her. She flips through them, chuckling at a few, saying “aww” when she comes across baby pictures, and staring a long time at one of my siblings and me when the twins were babies and I a preschooler. It’s actually my favorite picture because even though you can’t see her in the picture, my mother is holding the twins in her lap. Father, long ago, sliced her head right out of the photo—out of all the photos. But she’s still there, and seeing her hands in the picture helps my memories paint the rest of what she looked like.
“These are sweet,” she says when she finishes.
I take them from her and set them on the coffee table. “I loved my siblings. Father was a prick, and they didn’t have a mother. I looked after them and kept them out of trouble. Vika, as you know, was precocious and ran around terrorizing everyone. But Viktor? He was my little buddy. We did everything together. I loved him so much…love him, rather.”
“I’m sorry for your loss,” she breathes. “I can’t imagine something happening to my sister.”
I pull out my laptop and flip it open. In an encrypted file, I open a series of video clips. The first one is of last year’s V Games. It shows Niko coming up behind my brother, trying to stab him. Then, Kami, a skilled fighter within The Games stabs Niko, but he remains standing. The clock ticking away ends The Games, and then, moments later, it shows Niko getting crushed by the razor twins—big motherfuckers who wear spikes on their clothes—and dying after the event officially ended. We learned later, after I scoured the video footage, Niko Vetrov was ordered to be killed because of my sister—something the Vetrovs obviously don’t know. Vika, Father, Viktor, myself, and now my wife are the only ones who do.
“That’s so brutal,” Irina murmurs.
Instead of answering, I open video conversation after video conversation of Vika planning with Niko to take out Viktor. She would remind him, over and over again, his love affair with her twin was sick and disgusting. That our fathers would only agree to one outcome—she and Niko married, producing heirs left and right. Even in the videos, I could tell my best friend at the time was torn. He loved Vika, I truly believe that, but he loved Viktor more. Essentially, being that they were twins, it was like he could have the best of both worlds. She somehow convinced him to kill Viktor. Luckily, he failed. And as an insurance policy, she made sure Niko would die to cover up all her tracks so his family would not come after her.
Vika would die before she would let Niko sleep around on their marriage with her twin. By getting Niko out of the picture, she got revenge on Viktor. My sister destroys everything she touches.
Irina gasps and her pretty mouth pops open. “Viktor and Niko?” she breathes.
“You know how that would go down in our world, Irina.”
I play a clip of Vika revealing Viktor’s bisexuality to our father. Father went ballistic, even going as far as to strike my sister in a fit of rage before destroying everything in his office. There are more clips of her meeting with the razor twins and paying them money. No doubt her insurance policy if Niko didn’t do her bidding properly. By the time all the clips have ended, I’m furious all over again.
“So, Vika ordered Niko to kill Viktor, but he failed and was ordered to be killed because of it,” she mutters, pointing at the first clip. “But if he failed, how did Viktor die?”
I take her hand and kiss her knuckles. “You take this to your grave, Shadow.”
Her blue eyes become as wide as saucers. “He’s not dead.”
My heart thumps in my chest. Father has planted him right smack dab in the US in a state called Arkansas. Right in the middle of nowhere. Punishment for his spoiled prince. To be a nobody. To have to blend in with normal people.
“He’s very much alive,” I assure her as I open another folder. Inside is information about my brother’s location. “If anything ever happens to me, it is your duty as my wife to make sure he continues to be taken care of.”
She nods emphatically. “Without a doubt, Vlad.”
“Diana can never know this. I know you love her, but nobody knows he is okay. Father faked his death for a reason—to force my brother to live in shame and be alone for the rest of his life.” A growl rumbles through me, hate for my father and Vika brimming to the surface. “But mark my words, Irina, I will bring him back home to me one day. I’ll find a way. I’ll watch and plot and play this fucking game. And one day, when the time is right…” I trail off.
“You’ll go get your brother,” she replies, her blue eyes flaring with ferocity.
“Damn right I will.”
She smiles as she plucks the laptop from my grip and sets it on the table. Then, she straddles my lap with her poufy dress smashed between us. Her brows furrow and an evil glint dances in her gaze. “And Vika?”
“V is for vengeance,” I mutter. “V is for Vetrov.”
She laughs and kisses me quickly. “What did poor Ruslan Vetrov ever do to you to deserve that?”
“Not my problem.”
“Someone ought to send her into The Games,” she grumbles. “She’s horrid. I hate her for what she’s done to your heart.”
That makes two of us.
“With Yegor as a father-in-law, I imagine every day is like The Games with her. Yegor is known for backhanding a viper for talking back. And that’s all Vika knows how to do. Assuredly, her life is hell there, especially now that she has been wed to Ruslan. That kid is a prick like his dad.”
“Good.” Her nostrils flare.
Neither of us speak about the fact that Diana will have the same fate. But unlike my sister, Diana is a much better player. Landing with the Vetrovs, assumedly Ven, unless Yegor decides otherwise, was her best possible outcome. The alternative would have been meeting the same fate as Anton.
Diana was given a pardon because I love her sister.
“These games,” Irina says, frowning. “We’re always playing them.”
I tangle my fingers in her hair and draw her to my mouth. Running my tongue along her pouty bottom lip, I relish in the harsh intake of her breath. “But now we play for the same team.”
“The best team,” she agrees, her hands sliding to my shoulders.
I growl, “The only team.”
We kiss hard and deep, sealing yet another vow.
Irina and I are an unstoppable pair.
Vile.
Vicious.
Villainous.
Vasiliev.