Prologue
Nikolai
I woke up to heat.
Not the kind that warns, the kind that claims.
Thighs locked around my hips. Her weight pressing down. Fabric rough against skin. A knife at my throat. A gaze so fucking steady it made my cock twitch before my heart could.
She straddled me like it was hers already. Lean. Controlled. Straddling me with the confidence of someone who knew I wouldn’t kill her before I heard what she had to say.
Or maybe she was just tired of waiting for me to wake up.
“You sleep like a corpse,” she muttered.
My fingers twitched beneath the pillow, brushing the hilt of the blade I kept there. I could’ve had her on the floor in three seconds. Could’ve slashed her open, dumped the body, and had the sheets changed before the sun came up.
But I didn’t move.
Because then she smiled.
Not soft. Not sweet. Predatory. Like the knife wasn’t a threat—it was foreplay.
And then?
She kissed me.
Hard. Fast. Zero hesitation.
Her mouth crashed onto mine like we were already mid-fight.
No hesitation. No warning.
Just full-throttle contact—lips colliding, teeth scraping, tongue forcing mine to respond.
And fuck, I did.
I kissed her back. Harder. Rougher.
Grabbed the back of her neck and hauled her closer like I was the one doing the invading.
The knife didn’t twitch. Neither did she.
Her heat ground against me, confident and deliberate, like her body already knew the threat wasn’t the knife-it was me.
I bit her bottom lip. She moaned—low, wrecked, defiant.
The sound hit me harder than the blade. Straight to the cock. Fuck.
I swallowed it. Dragged her tongue into my mouth and fucked it with mine.
Her breasts brushed my chest, nipples tight under black fabric, teasing friction that made my spine snap straight.
Every instinct screamed to throw her down, pin her, rip her apart.
Instead, I groaned against her mouth. “Jesus Christ.”
Filthy. Animal. Possessive in a way that made me teeth ache and my grip turn brutal.
Her hips rolled against mine and I felt the press of her heat—bare, aggressive, deliberate.
My cock throbbed like it had just caught a death sentence it was happy to take.
Her eyes didn’t close. Even as I kissed her like I planned to own every fucking breath she took.
She stared straight into mine-like she dared me to blink first.
I gripped her hip, fingers digging in hard. Hard enough to bruise. Hard enough to warn.
She didn’t flinch.
Didn’t soften.
Just pulled back an inch, eyes still locked on mine, breath brushing my lips like she knew id let her live. And was already judging what that meant.
“Hello, Nikolai.”
I blinked once. “Who the fuck are you?”
She leaned back far enough to let me see her properly—tight black clothes, harnesses strapped to lean thighs, hair in a braid, eyes like frostbite.
“Talia,” she said. “Consider this a courtesy call.”
I didn’t move. Didn’t smile.
She tapped the tip of the blade gently against my neck, just enough pressure to remind me she hadn’t moved it.
“You’ve inherited me.”
What the fuck.
My grip flexed. “You want to run that by me again?”
“There’s a blood oath. You don’t need the details. Just the bottom line—you’re responsible for me now.”
I stared at her.
She’d straddled me, knife to my throat, lips swollen from the kiss she’d started—and now she was dropping family politics?
“I don’t do babysitting. And I sure as fuck don’t let armed strangers climb into my bed and talk legacy.”
“Good,” she said, smile sharp. “Because I’m not here to be protected.”
The blade vanished—just like that. Slid back into the sheath at her thigh. One fluid motion.
“But I thought you should know,” she added. “You’re off the hook. The blood oaths fulfilled. I can handle myself.”
“And yet, here you are. In my bed.”
“I was curious,” she said.
“About what?”
Her grin went wide and dark. “You.”
Talia
He didn’t try to throw me off.
Didn’t panic. Didn’t shout.
Didn’t even look surprised.
Which was either terrifying—or impressive as hell.
I climbed off him slowly, not because I was done, but because I’d made my point.
Nikolai Markov. Syndicate heir. Mafia king. Stupidly attractive and dangerous in the way frostbite is dangerous—quiet, cold, and guaranteed to cost you something if you don’t move fast enough.
He watched me move like I was a bomb with a timer still ticking.
“You broke into my compound,” he said.
“Evidently.”
“Slipped past the guards. Neutralised my bedroom security.”
I spun one of his knives between my fingers. “Your guard on the east corner is too reliant on his line of sight. He never heard me coming.”
Nikolai’s eyes narrowed. “He will.”
I shrugged.
Not my problem.
“You know I should kill you for this,” he said.
“Probably.”
“Why didn’t you go through official channels?”
“Because I don’t trust anyone else,” I said simply. “And neither do you.”
That made him pause.
I slid the knife into the wood of his nightstand—handle up. “I needed to see the man you turned into. Decide if you were the type to honour an oath, or just bury the people who tried to collect on it.”
“And?”
“You let me live.” I smiled. “So either I impress you… or you’re still deciding where to bury me.”
He stood, grabbing a pair of black sweatpants and tugging them on like he hadn’t just been kissed awake with a blade to the jugular.
Every inch of ink across his chest was a scar in disguise – silent proof that no one walked away from him without bleeding.
Fuck, he was hot. Too hot to be trusted. Especially with a memory like that kiss still dragging heat down my spine.
I turned away before he caught the look.
“So,” I said. “Now that the dramatic entrance is over, you gonna offer me coffee? Or do I have to keep impressing you?”
He didn’t move. “I don’t make coffee for intruders.”
“Then I’ll take your bed as a consolation prize.”
Finally, his mouth twitched. A flicker of dark amusement.
“Why now?” he asked. “Why track me down?”
“Because I have a message. A warning. And because something bigger is coming. Something tied to the old bloodlines. The ones people like us were born from.”
His jaw shifted. Just slightly.
He knew.
He didn’t know what, not yet—but his instincts had clocked the storm on the horizon.
“Tell me everything,” he said.
I looked at the knife still embedded in his nightstand.
Then at him.
And smiled.
“I will. But put a shirt on, Nikolai. Because if you don’t I’m going to fuck you instead of finish my sentence.”
END OF PROLOGUE
