Page 2 of Sweet Deception (Savage Vow #2)

ANNA

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He dropped the smoldering book at my feet. Ash whispered across my lap as the final pages curled inward, devoured by flame. The lighter clinked softly to the floor.

My lungs refused to expand. My fingers clenched the armrests of the chair so tightly my nails dug through the velvet. That book, my last escape, the only place I could still breathe was gone. Burned because I dared to imagine a life beyond this cage.

“You bastard,” I whispered.

His silhouette moved through the haze of smoke. Unflinching. Unapologetic.

I didn’t expect an answer. I didn’t expect anything but the cold weight of his silence pressing down.

Then he moved.

Fast.

A blur of black stormed past me, and before I could scream, his hand closed around Elisabetta’s throat.

“No!”

Her body slammed into the wall with a sickening crack. Her feet skidded, then dangled as he hoisted her upward. She clawed at his wrist, her face going red, then purple.

“Gleb! please!” My voice broke as I lurched forward. My wheels jammed in the rug’s edge. I couldn’t reach her. “Stop! What is she doing? What has she done?”

He didn’t answer.

Didn’t even look at me.

The only sound was the desperate rasp of Elisabetta’s breath—thin, fleeting, wet.

I panicked.

My hand shot out. I grabbed the nearest thing, a plate from the untouched breakfast and hurled it at his shoulder.

It shattered.

He didn’t flinch.

I grabbed a fork.

“Let her go!”

And then, instinct took over. I thrust it deep into his arm.

He grunted, his grip faltering. Elisabetta crumpled to the floor in a heap, gasping and coughing, eyes wild.

Blood dripped from Gleb’s sleeve in a thin, clean line.

He turned toward me, slow and controlled, and pulled the fork from his arm with an awful crunch.

“Why?” he asked, voice quiet. Measured.

My throat tightened. “You were going to kill her.”

Stillness.

The kind that made your skin crawl.

Then, he looked down at Elisabetta, who now knelt on the floor, clutching her throat.

“She’s been poisoning you,” he said.

My breath caught.

“No.” My voice cracked. “That’s not possible. You’re lying.”

His tone remained infuriatingly calm. “Ask her.”

I turned to Elisabetta. “Tell me he’s lying.”

She didn’t speak.

Gleb’s voice hardened. “Confess. Or die.”

Her shoulders trembled. Tears streaked down her face. “I’m sorry, Anna.”

My heart squeezed.

“Elisabetta, no. Tell me the truth.”

She choked out a sob. “I was following your father’s orders. He said... he said you had to stay weak. That you could never walk again. I... I just did what he told me.”

The floor dropped out beneath me.

My father.

The man who kissed my forehead, who told me bedtime stories and called me his princess.

Five years.

Five years of failed therapy, of confusion, of wondering why I couldn’t stand even when doctors said I could.

He did that to me?

He did that to me.

Gleb didn’t look victorious. Or angry. He just watched.

Like this was a lesson. A necessary cruelty.

“You’re lying,” I whispered again, but my voice had no strength.

Then, two deafening shots.

I screamed, too late.

Elisabetta’s body dropped. A single, clean bullet between the eyes. Her mouth still open mid-sob.

Blood splattered across the marble.

I couldn’t move. Couldn’t breathe.

My scream never made it past my throat.

Gleb turned and walked away, his boots trailing blood.

“You promised to spare her,” I whispered, voice trembling. “You said if she confessed...”

“She did,” he said. “Too late.”

I couldn’t stop staring.

Not at her face, that was gone, ruined. but at her hands. The ones that used to braid my hair. The ones that once trembled when they tucked me into bed after my first seizure. The ones that held me every night after Maria ran away.

Now they were still.

Motionless. Lifeless.

And it was my fault.

I stabbed him. I made him angry. I...

No.

He pulled the trigger. Not me.

He murdered her.

I slammed my fist into the armrest. My throat was raw from screaming, though I couldn’t remember when I’d stopped.

Gleb reentered like he hadn’t just shattered my world. His sleeves were rolled up now. Calm. Controlled. Blood dried at the edge of his cuff.

He poured himself a glass of something dark. Sat in the chair across from me, legs spread like a king who’d just claimed a new province.

“This is war, Anna,” he said. “War doesn’t wait for your comfort.”

My laugh came out broken. “You call this war?”

“I call it cleansing.”

He took a sip.

“She was the only one I had,” I hissed. “The only person who ever...”

“Lied to you.”

His interruption was quiet. Almost... gentle.

That made it worse.

“I hope you rot,” I said.

“Already am.” He tilted his glass. “But so are your enemies. Your family included.”

I froze.

“My father...”

“Drugged you.” His gaze pinned me like a knife. “Kept you helpless. Sent you to me as a pawn.”

“You’re worse.”

“I’m honest.”

No.

No, he wasn’t. He was brutal. Cold. Calculating.

But honest? No.

There had to be something more. Some ulterior motive. He was too precise to be just a sadist.

“You didn’t kill her for justice,” I said. “You killed her for power. To prove I belong to you.”

His lips twitched. The ghost of a smirk. “You’re learning.”

I hated him more in that moment than I had yesterday.

And yet, deep beneath the rage and grief, was something uglier.

Relief.

I had answers now.

All the missing pieces, the weakness, the slow decline, the therapy that never worked, finally made sense.

My father had caged me in a broken body.

Gleb had forced me to see it.

Did that make him my savior?

No.

But it made him necessary.

And that was worse.

He leaned forward, elbows on his knees.

“I don’t need your love,” he said. “But I will have your loyalty. One way or another.”

I stared at him, breathing hard.

“I’ll never be loyal to you.”

His eyes gleamed. “You will. When I show you the truth of your blood.”

He stood.

“You have two minutes to say goodbye,” he said, nodding at Elisabetta’s corpse. “Then you will bathe, change, and dine with me. Like the wife you now are.”

He stood, towering over me, and I braced myself.

But he didn’t strike. Instead, he turned to the wall, a massive oil painting of a stern woman in a fur coat, her eyes dark and piercing.

His mother, I realized, the resemblance unmistakable.

He stared at it, silent, then pulled a knife from his belt.

The blade gleamed, still flecked with Elisabetta’s blood.

“What are you...” He slashed the canvas, a vicious diagonal cut from her throat to her waist. The sound, ripping fabric, splintering frame, tore through me. I flinched, hands gripping the wheels. He didn’t stop. Another slash, then another, until her face was ribbons, the painting sagging in ruin.

My breath caught. “Why?” He turned, knife in hand, blood dripping from the tip. “Your mother took her from me.” His voice was ice, each word a shard. “She set the fire that burned her alive.”

I stared, stunned. “That’s impossible.”

He stepped closer, the knife hovering near my face, not touching, but close enough to feel its chill. “Your family destroys. I rebuild. That’s why you’re here.”

He grabbed my wrist, yanking me forward in the chair. The sudden jolt sent pain shooting through my useless legs. His grip was iron, his breath hot against my ear. “You’ll give me a son or I’ll carve every piece of you they’ve touched until there’s nothing left to mourn.”

He released me, shoving me back. I caught myself on the armrests, trembling, as he wiped the blade on his sleeve.

“In five minutes, you’ll sit across from me, wear your grief like a crown, and remember what happens to those who betray you.

Or this...” he gestured to the shredded painting, then to Elisabetta’s corpse. ..“is just the start.”

He walked out, the knife still in hand, leaving me with the wreckage, ashes, blood, and a threat that sank into my bones. I didn’t move. Couldn’t. Not until the echo of his boots faded, and the silence pressed in, heavier than his hands ever could.

Left me with the blood, the silence, and a grief so sharp it carved through my ribs.

And still, I didn’t cry.

I braced myself, muscles trembling, and pushed against the chair.

Stand. Just stand. For once. My legs twitched, a flicker of hope, then buckled.

Pain shot through my hips as I slid forward, my jaw slamming into the table’s edge.

I crumpled to the floor, a gasp tearing from my throat, the bruise throbbing hot and sharp. Useless. Always useless.

I dragged myself back into the chair, every inch a battle, my breath ragged. The silence pressed in, heavier than his threats, as I clutched the wheels, ash-streaked and bruised.

I wheeled away, the wreckage blurring past me, until the bedroom door shut out the blood and silence swallowed me.

Gleb’s voice still echoed in my bones.

My fingers trembled against the wheel rims. The dress clung to me, stiff with dried blood. I gripped the velvet where Elisabetta’s hands had once smoothed it, trying to remember the warmth.

Five minutes. That’s all I had. I’d already wasted two just breathing.

In the next two, I changed.

The dress was silk. Black. Heavy.

It clung to my skin like mourning.

I chose it on purpose.

He hadn’t given me options. The wardrobe was curated, like a dollhouse for a grieving wife but I still made it a weapon. I didn’t brush my hair. Didn’t apply makeup. Didn’t cover the bruise forming at my temple.

Let him look.

I descended the stairs slowly. My leg ached with each step, but I didn’t flinch. I made him wait.

He was already seated, posture straight, cutlery perfectly placed. His suit was charcoal. Tie loose, like the aftermath of a funeral.

There were two plates.

Steak. Roasted potatoes. A red wine that smelled like blood.

“Sit,” he said without looking at me.

I did.

Not because he asked.

Because I wanted him to see what he’d broken and know I wasn’t finished.

The silence stretched.

“I assume you’ve cried,” he said.

I picked up my fork. Cut into the steak. Perfectly rare.

“I don’t cry in front of murderers.”

He looked up.

A glint surfaced in his eyes. Annoyance. Approval. Both.

“Your loyalty is not required tonight,” he said. “Only your attention.”

“Don’t flatter yourself.”

“I don’t need to. You’ve been thinking about me all day.”

My stomach clenched. I swallowed hard and said nothing.

He waited a beat longer, then reached into his jacket and pulled out a phone.

My phone.

Unlocked.

My hands curled around the napkin in my lap.

He placed it beside my plate.

“I had our techs go through it,” he said. “Curious text history. Your sister. Maria contacted you recently, didn’t she?”

I stared at him.

“I don’t know where she is.”

“I didn’t ask that.”

He leaned forward.

“I asked why she told you to run.”

My breath caught.

I said nothing.

Then he picked up his fork. Ate a bite of steak. Chewed. Swallowed.

“You see, Anna,” he said, “you’re not powerless. You’re just undisciplined.”

I flinched.

He continued, voice low. Patient.

“Power isn’t in rage. Or grief. Or loyalty. It’s in control.”

“Control you stole from me.”

“I gave you the truth.”

“You gave me a corpse.”

His smile was thin. “And what will you give me in return?”

I met his eyes. Hold them.

He looked everywhere but the bruise. As if by pretending it didn’t exist, he could erase it. Or maybe he wanted me to squirm under the weight of that silence.

I didn’t.

“My silence.”

He considered that.

Then he nodded.

“Your silence will be useful. For now.”

He stood abruptly and left without a word, his boots echoing through the house like a death march.

***

The knock was soft, hesitant, too polite for this house.

I didn’t answer. My eyes stayed fixed on the bloodstain that had already begun to set into the floorboards. No amount of scrubbing would ever clean that away.

The door creaked open anyway. Light footsteps approached, slow, cautious.

“Mrs. Romanov?”

The voice was unfamiliar. I turned slightly, just enough to see her. Mid-thirties, tall and slim, with cropped dark hair and sharp eyes that scanned the room like a soldier entering enemy terrain. She didn’t flinch at the mess, or the tension hanging in the air like smoke.

“I’m Zoya,” she said quietly. “Mr. Romanov sent me.”

Of course he did. I didn’t reply.

She moved closer, her gaze lingering on my face. “May I help you into bed?”

I wanted to scream at her to leave. But my body felt heavy, like I’d sunk into the floor. My fingers ached from gripping the arms of the wheelchair too tightly.

“Fine,” I muttered.

She moved with brisk efficiency, one hand supporting my back, the other adjusting the brakes on the chair. She was strong, professional but not unkind.

Once I was settled beneath the blankets, she knelt beside the bed and pulled out a first aid kit. “I need to clean that bruise on your jaw.”

My hand instinctively touched my cheek. “I fell.”

Zoya met my eyes, not blinking. “Did you?”

I said nothing.

She gently dabbed the bruise with antiseptic. “You’ll feel sore for a few days. There’s swelling around your eye, too. Did he hit you?”

“No.”

Again, that long, unflinching stare.

“I’m not here to judge,” she said finally. “But I am here to protect you. Whether you want me to or not.”

I flinched at that. “Protect me? You work for him.”

“I don’t work for anyone,” Zoya replied, her voice cool. “I was assigned. There’s a difference.”

That made me pause.

She taped a cold compress to my jaw and stood. “I’ll be outside the room if you need anything. If he comes back, you call me first.”

I didn’t know what to make of her. She wasn’t soft like Elisabetta, but there was something steady in her presence. Something sharp and still, not unlike a blade tucked into velvet.

“Is there a gym here?”

“Yes. Unused.” Her eyes sharpened.

“Show me. Tomorrow.” My jaw throbbed.

My legs, poisoned, mocked me. If my father broke them, Gleb’s truth could wake them.

“Okay.”

When the door shut behind her, I stared at the ceiling and let the silence fold in around me.

Was Zoya my enemy... or was she the first person who might actually protect me in this house of monsters?”