Page 1 of Unrequited

Prologue

Present day

ZOYA

It all feels like a dream.

A strange, hot, fevered dream I can’t wake up from.

“I’m ready.”

Any second now, I’ll open my eyes and realize none of this happened. That my brother never offered me up in marriage. That I’m not marrying someone who despises me.

No.

Any second now, I’ll wake up and just be little Zoya. Homemaker. The girl who makes meals for her family, who takes care of her nieces and nephews, who lives month to month, year to year, without even questioning her own needs. Zoya. Just… little Zoya.

But now, it’s time.

My brothers’ wives are all here. Every one of them is so beautiful. So poised. So infuriatingly supportive. So kind.

Ember wears emerald green, and her eyes glint like gems under the overhead lighting. Hard, fierce… alive. Anya offers me a soft, solemn smile, a touch of sorrow just behind it. And Polina, Rafail’s wife, the only one who dares to touch me, squeezes my hand gently.

“Come, Zoya,” she says with a smile that doesn’t reach her eyes. “We’re ready for you downstairs.”

I’d asked for no procession. No standard fanfare.

I wanted it quiet. Small. Nothing traditional or ceremonial.

Because this isn’t a marriage I ever dreamed of. It isn’t a love story but a sentence. So why dress it up?

When the massive double doors open into our living room, something immediately feels wrong.

I can’t place it. Not at first. It’s in the air. Something about the stillness. A pallor. A hush.

Rafail smiles at me, and even Semyon, cold, removed, practically carved from stone, seems alert, aware, and alive.

Rodion comes straight to me and presses a kiss to my cheek. “If he ever treats you bad, sister,” he murmurs low, “you know who to call.”

And I know he means it, every word, but it seems like too little, too late. Shouldn’t his protection come before we made it this far?

And where are the Morozovs? Weren’t they supposed tobring witnesses? I’m marrying into their family, and they’re not here.

It’s strange. Wrong.

“Where are they?” I ask Rafail, my voice small, trembling in the space between us.

“He’s here,” Rafail says, frowning. “I saw him ten minutes ago. He’s all we need.”

I nod. “Okay.”

Music plays. It echoes off the walls and into the hollow of my chest.

Even now, a part of me still expects Seamus to come and rescue me.

From what? From this? He’s not the knight in shining armor. He’sThe Undertaker.

And now I understand why.