Page 133 of Jewel of the Assassin

He advances to me. I still don’t move. Don’t flinch. It’s simply not in my nature. Rebellious, mad, wild, a force of nature. All descriptions applied to me, in mocking tones by my father and adoring but intimidated tones by Sasha.

The stranger invades my space. My blood thrills. He is a head taller than me, overshadowing me, overthrowing me. And then, he lowers his head, casting his breath through the mask along my face. Oh, God, he smells like sin and leather, sweat and masculine musk. Dominance incarnate. Don’t melt. Don’t melt. Don’t melt.

Planting his hands flat on the wall on each side of me, he drops his voice to a deep, gravelly tone, “The worthy one…only a man who would carve an empire from the earth itself could ever hope to match you. A queen. An unbreakable jewel.”

Too late. I’m a melted hot puddle on the floor.

“A kingdom for a queen?” I ask, leaning closer with a smile. “Then I hope the throne is as hot as the king who built it.”

He lowers his head, so close, I feel his breath on my face, the barest brushing of his lips on mine. I arch my back, chest rising. If I lift my chin by an inch, I’ll kiss him. But I won’t. Because I don’t want to be the first. I want to be ravished, dominated, won.

“I assure you, Valentina Volkov,” he murmurs, touching his lips to my brow in a tender kiss. “It will be.”

My core tightens, liquid heat gathering. But the impossible enigma before me retreats.

The next thing I hear is Sasha calling for me as his shadow appears from the other end of the hallway.

When I look back, the man in the gold skeleton mask is gone. And I’m left with a flood of emotion: dejection, terror, and feminine wrath. He’s left me with nothing but the scorch of his breath on my lips—a brand I will carry forever and a hunger no man will ever fill.

Above all: I swear, even in his absence, I could see it: the empire, the throne, the crown. Mine. My king. Forever.

I tell him of the memory. The one shining memory in the dark void of my past. Roman smiles down on me and tenderly kisses my brow again.

“I spent the next six years?—”

“I know,” I interrupt. “Sasha and I arranged with my father?—”

“No,” he interrupts this time and cups my chin, staring emerald daggers at me. “Me, Valya. The old contract, the original one I brokered with my father—before he chose Anton—I set the age at twenty-five.”

Stunned, I let out a long exhale. “Why?”

“So the kingdom would be ready for its queen. And so she would be ready for it. And you were, Moya Koroleva. From the moment you opened your eyes in my bed, you were our queen.Myqueen. My jewel—brighter than all the stars in the heavens.”

I grip the back of his neck and kiss him again, but it’s far briefer this time. Because I murmur against his lips with an eager grin, “It’s your turn, Moya Korona. Your song. For our fathers.” I gesture to the front row.

“Zina,” he says without breaking his gaze from mine. “Play ‘Sweet Dreams’.”

I groan, tipping my head back. “Why didn’t I think of that one?”

“Come, Moya Samotsvet.” He extends his arm, the black sleeve still wet with blood—just like mine.

We approach the front row, and I nod my gratitude to Sasha. I sway along to the music and observe as my husband approaches his father first. My throat tightens with the reminder of Anton’s sickening punishment of forcing me down on his disgusting dick. I fully intend to give Roman at least ten blow jobs in the next twenty-four hours until all I remember is the taste of his cum and the mold of his beautiful cock.

When Roman slams his father to the ground and puts his boot on the back of his neck, I flinch—in the most beautiful way. I glance at my father, rolling my eyes at how much he’s trembling because he knows his turn is soon. I’m surprised Anton hasn’t made a move, barely a muscle twitch.

My breath catches as Roman proceeds to strip his father, tearing away every piece of fabric until Nikolai is naked as a Russian mole rat.

Roman lowers his head, shadowing his eyes, before letting his voice cut through the noise like a blade. “All of this—every sordid drop of blood I spilled, every empire I razed, every coin of gold minted in your filthy coffers—began with you. With your treachery. For six years, I fought for you. I destroyed small empires. I am the reason you became the greatest force of the underworld. By my hand, you profited. By my hand, you prospered. And how did you repay me? By stabbing that hand. By giving the woman I bled for, the woman I earned through sweat and souls, to your pampered, sniveling, bully-brat weakling of a son.”

Anton stiffens, and I mark him with sharp eyes, the kind that promises a storm.

Fleur takes a step toward me, smiles, and withdraws a length of thick rope from the black bag. Roman nods and accepts it, making quick work of binding his father to the nearest pew. Spread-eagled. Like serving him up on a silver platter.

Roman steps closer, his words like venom. “Valentina is mine. She is my Queen. And since you dared to defile her mouth with your filth, it will be her tongue that passes your sentence tonight.”

He locks eyes with me, and I lean into the wickedness and murmur in his ear with eager cruelty, “Would you do me the honor of teaching me how to perform a castration?”

Nikolai’s eyes widen to the bursting point, and…he loses all his piss.