Page 125 of Devil's Vows

Good luck with that.This one will still learn the shit show never ends—it just morphs into something new that needs to be managed, dealt with, or annihilated.

“I’ll make copies and bring the real thing to you. It’s actually a relic. The Bible used to be your mother’s, Bianca Randazzo’s. From when she lived in Italy as a girl.”

“Trust those fuckers to take something holy and wipe their asses with it. Hope you’re not a religious man, Petrov. If so, there’s no hope for us.”

I smirk. “Not religious at all, although I love watching your sister on her knees, praying.”

“Fuck me. Make those dirty jokes about my sister to my face, asshole, and see how it ends,” Matteo says, but there is a hint of a smile in his voice.

We ring off, and with a shit-eating grin, I reach for the Bible. I feel it. There’s hope for this connection with the Scaleras. One brother at a time. I flip to the first page with a groan. This is going to be a fucking dull job, but I don’t trust anybody else to do it.

As I head over to my printer to start copying, there’s a knock on the office door. “Yes?”

Kostya peeks his head in. “I’ve put everything in the kitchen, Pakhan. Here’s the card you requested.”

“Good.” I reach for it. “Wait two minutes.”

It’s not the most romantic of gestures, and it’s one I planned before this morning’s cock-up, but it will appease my conscience and make my wife happy. Show her I see her beyond being a nanny to my kids, now turned into my semen’s fertile soil. Fuck. Would be handy if we both had a breeding kink.

I sign the card, seal it, and hand it back to Kostya. “Just leave it on the kitchen island. She’ll find it there.”

“Yes, Pakhan.”

I position the Bible’s first page to copy it, then make a call to the maintenance team while the printer does its thing.

It’s time to move the gate.

64

GABI

When I walk out of my room an hour later, sore and a bit tired in a new way, there are two men I’ve never seen before working on the gate.

“Mrs. Petrova,” they greet in unison and avert they gazes.

“What are you doing?” I ask.

“Moving the gate to include this room in this section of the suite. Can we start drilling now?”

I just nod, with some relief, but also knowing I’m on a production schedule here. Two boys, and then I’ll never have to be locked up again. I’d be free to go and put the past behind me.

But my future…

How does Ivan expect me to leave my own children behind? It seems he compares everything I am and do to what he experienced with Darya, who was basically so far gone, she could have accidentally killed her own kids. She maybe never wanted to be a mother and hated being one. How long is it going to take for him to realize I’m not her?

When I arrive in the kitchen, it’s empty of humans. There’s a good mess, though, proof the girls had breakfast and Yurididn’t have time to clean up. On the counter, there are several paper totes waiting to be unpacked, and no sign of poor Kostya. He’s probably on another errand already.

I clean the breakfast mess, sensing Yuri is outside with the girls at the playground. This is our routine, and my life might have changed completely—I’m now a married woman and a breeding cow—but it doesn’t affect what the girls need.

With a sigh and already thinking what to make for dinner, I reach for the closest paper tote and peek inside, expecting another fruit and veggie haul from the farmers’ market.

My heart stills as I find beautiful watercolor paper of the highest quality, paints, pencils, brushes, three book-binding kits with gold embossing for the covers, and everything I’ve always wanted and needed to illustrate more stories, but never had the money to afford.

I sink onto a barstool with one butt cheek and bite my lip to stop the tears as I reach for the card.

Moya Ptichka,

My little bird. Here’s to many more dragon stories I can’t wait for you to create, and of course for you to find your own inner dragon.