Pretty Sinner (The Oligarchs)

But people noticed. There were fewer pedestrians outside of my window, and in the distance, black smoke billowed over the buildings.

New guards took over my care. They ignored me, like always, except for one: a crooked little fellow with a sharp nose and big teeth. He looked more like a math teacher than a soldier, but the others treated him like one of their own.

I didn’t think anything of it until he approached me that afternoon.

I was sitting near the window drawing. I wasn’t good at buildings—too many straight lines. They were too geometrical, too perfect. I liked flaws, curves, flows. People were perfect—none of them were symmetrical, but they always followed the same basic logic. I didn’t notice when the new guard lingered over my shoulder, looking at my sketchbook.

“That’s not bad.”

I jumped in shock. He was the first person aside from Kaspar to speak to me in days. I looked back with wide eyes and flinched away. His smile was probably meant to be disarming, but came off creepy and wolfish.

“Uh, thank you, but can you not look over my shoulder?”

He seemed bashful. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to intrude.”

“No, it’s fine, I’m just surprised. Don’t you have orders to ignore me?”

“I’m not one of Kaspar’s men.”

I got a strange, twisting feeling. “Who are you then?”

His eyes sparkled. “Want to hear a little secret?”

I didn’t. Not even a little bit. This man made all the little hairs on my neck stand up, like a dog with raised hackles. Something was wrong here—he shouldn’t be talking to me, not if he valued his life, and yet he wasn’t even trying to hide his approach. The other guards glared, but none of them moved to interrupt.

“I guess so.”

“Your brother sent me.”

I nearly screamed in his face.

“Is this some kind of joke?”

He held a finger to his lips, shaking his head, eyes smiling. My tone was hysterical and I was hyperventilating.

“If you can’t calm down, the other guards are going to come over. So please, get it together.”

“They’re already watching. You said Darren sent you?”

“Hired me for this mission specifically. Please, you need to get yourself together.”

I sucked in big, slow breaths to try to get level again but I couldn’t manage to stop my hands from shaking.

“What mission?” I asked at a whisper.

“I’m going to bring you home.”

He was fucking with me. He had to be. I went through this once already and it ended with my utter humiliation followed by one of the best orgasms of my life. I was willing to come like that again—but wasn’t interested in getting embarrassed in front of Kaspar’s guards.

“How?” I croaked like a frog. A pathetic little toad.

“Tonight. Leave your window open. I’ll do the rest.”

“My window?”

“You’re monitored. Your door, the whole apartment. Except your room. Except your windows.”

“We’re fifty stories up.”

“Leave it open. Trust me. I’ll handle the rest.”

I shivered, afraid, but he turned and walked away. He didn’t give me time to think, time to answer.

I had a decision to make.

All day, I sat, sketched, and thought.

This had to be a trap.

But to what purpose?

The thing with Cards was supposed to show me that escape was futile. But I wasn’t trying to escape anymore. He had me, broken and obedient.

There was no reason to dangle another fake escape attempt in front of me.

Which meant this was real.

Darren wanted me back. He attacked once in an attempt to save my life and steal me away, but he’d been quiet ever since. I thought he gave up.

Maybe he was playing a longer game.

Kaspar didn’t come home. I waited as long as I could, until I was too tired to think. I thought maybe, maybe, he might convince me to stay—give me some reason to ignore this insane offer from that strange guard.

I couldn’t do it.

Staying would be the height of insanity. It would only show that Kaspar owned me.

And yet I worried that if I left, nobody would be able to rein him in. Kaspar would rampage around Chicago, burning, killing, maiming, until he finished off Maeve—then he’d come for me.

There’d be a war, and nothing would stop it.

I could stay and avert the worst.

In my room, with the lights off, I tried to imagine being with him.

Married to Kaspar.

It was a strange image. Coming home to him smiling at me, kissing my neck, whispering all the filthy things he wanted to do to me.

We’d never be normal.

Though I didn’t want what all the other regular people had.

I was an Oligarch. I was meant for more.

So why stay? Why not return home and try to do something with myself?

In the darkness, I opened the window, and I waited.

Part of me wanted the guard to stay away.

If he never came then I didn’t have to make a choice.

But as I lay there staring at the ceiling, trying to imagine forgiving Kaspar enough to be his wife, I heard thumping from outside.