Chapter 4

Ten hours until I was officially handed over to the Volkovs.

I sat in my dark room, biting down on a towel, using tweezers to pull shards of glass from my palms and knees. No anesthetic. No doctor.

The entire De Luca medical team was busy fussing over Isla’s fake heart attack.

When I poured alcohol over the wounds, my whole body seized in pain. Cold sweat drenched my back.

The wounds were getting infected. A fever was setting in.

At 8 p.m., a soft knock on the door.

A maid entered, trembling, holding a huge designer box. She untied the ribbon. Inside lay a stunning wedding dress, covered in diamonds.

“Miss…” The maid kept her head down, too scared to look at me. Her voice shook. “Mr. Julian said… ten o’clock tonight. In the glass conservatory. The priest is already waiting. He promised you a secret wedding, and he will keep his word. He said… he was just worried about Miss Isla yesterday. He said his heart was breaking for you… Please, wear this dress and go to him…”

I stared at the dress, glittering with fake promises in the dim light. It was the sickest joke I’d ever heard.

He left me bleeding on a floor of broken glass. Didn’t even give me a second look.

And now he thought a secret wedding could buy off his guilt?

He wanted Isla’s weakness to feed his hero complex. And he wanted to brand me as his before shipping me off to a monster.

Disgusting.

I ripped the IV from the back of my hand, grabbed the dress box, and my small suitcase with its few old clothes, and walked out.

At the top of the grand staircase, I ran right into Isla, fresh from her “near-death” act, sipping a cup of herbal tea.

She saw the dress box. Jealousy poured out of her eyes.

She blocked my way, a smirk on her face. “Going to marry Julian in the conservatory? Don’t get too excited, Aurora. He just feels sorry for you. It’s charity. A final kindness for a dying dog.”

“Is that so?”

I stopped. I looked at her greedy, spiteful face.

The next second, I threw the priceless wedding dress, box and all, right at her head.

“Ah!” she screamed as the box hit her. The dress tumbled out onto the floor.

“You want it so bad? It’s yours.” I looked at her, feeling nothing. “You can have him, too. The coward. And this whole rotten family. Take it all. Just looking at it makes me feel dirty.”

Isla’s mouth opened, but for once, she had nothing to say.

I didn’t waste another glance on her. I walked down the stairs, suitcase in hand, and straight out the main doors.

I wasn't spending another minute in this hell. I called for a black armored car to take me to the private airport. I’d wait for the Russians there.

But as I opened the car door, Isla came running out in her slippers.

She pushed past the guards and forced her way into the car with me.

Her eyes were wide with a vicious, manic energy. “Stop acting so high and mighty! I’m going to watch you get on that plane myself. I’m going to make sure you’re gone for good!”

I closed my eyes and leaned back, treating her like thin air. She was a dead woman walking anyway.

The car pulled out of the estate and onto a dark, deserted coastal highway.

Suddenly, two heavy, blacked-out SUVs with no plates tore out of a side road, ramming us from the front and back.

The impact sent our car spinning on the wet asphalt. Isla let out a blood-curdling scream as her head slammed against the window.

A street war.

Men in black ski masks, holding rifles, jumped out of the SUVs.

The Irish. The De Luca family’s old enemies. Professional killers.

BANG! BANG!

Two shots. Our driver and guard were dead.

“AHH! Help me! Julian, save me!” Isla lost control of her bladder, shrinking into a sobbing ball in her seat.

I looked at the black barrels of the guns outside my window. I didn’t scream. I didn’t fight.

The window shattered. A rough, calloused hand reached in, grabbed a fistful of Isla’s hair, and dragged her out.

Then, the barrel of another gun was pressed against my temple.

“Well, look at our luck. Both of the De Luca princesses,” the lead Irishman sneered, yanking me violently from the car.

I didn’t resist. I let them pull a black hood over my head.

The last thing I heard before the world went dark was Isla’s desperate, piercing cry.