Page 14 of Ruthless Vow
“Do these hurt?” I ask.
“No,” she lies again.
She has a very simple tell when she lies. Her voice goes up ever so slightly. A man who isn’t an expert in reading people may not notice, but it’s so obvious to me.
“So, what exactly was the escape plan? Where did you think you’d go?”
I rub the ointment delicately on the angry welts and she sighs heavily.
“There was no plan.”
Lie.
I hold her wrist just a little tighter than necessary, forcing her to look up at me.
“You’re a terrible liar,” I tell her.
She glares at me.
“You’re a terrible person,” she quips back. “And a terrible host. Who could blame me for wanting to get the hell away from here?”
“Are the accommodations not to your satisfaction?” I ask, smirking.
“In general, I don’t appreciate being held against my will anywhere,” she seethes, yanking her hand roughly out of mine. She tries to cover up her wince as she holds her injured wrist, but I see it. She would hate to know that I saw.
“Would you run back to Mikhail?” I ask. “His plans for you are no better than a prison sentence, I imagine.”
She looks up at me in surprise, her anger still on the surface.
“I wasn’t going back to him,” she snaps.
Finally, some truth. At least, she believes it’s the truth. What she doesn’t know is that there’s no way for her to reappear anywhere in Brooklyn without Mikail’s men descending on her. This is the safest place for her now.
“So, you would have disappeared?” I ask curiously. “Escaped into the abyss without anyone noticing?”
I don’t mean to sound mocking, but it’s amazing that she could be caught up in such a delusion. She knows this world as well as I do. There’s no escape.
“I had options,” she answers vaguely.
“You had fantasies,” I correct.
Her eyes flare at this, but we both know I’m right. I set the antiseptic down and lean back slightly on the bed, giving hersome space. She keeps her arms crossed, guarding the scrape on her elbow like I’m going to somehow make it worse.
“Anya, I’m not your enemy,” I say as gently as I can. “Even if it feels that way, I’m not going to hurt you.”
“Then let me go,” she hisses back, her eyes dark and narrowed at me. “You have no reason to keep me here other than a misplaced sense of pride. If I’m in danger from Mikhail, so are you. You let me go, that danger goes away. It seems like a win for both of us.”
“It’s not,” I huff, shaking my head. “You’re being naïve. You think Mikhail isn’t going to tear the city apart looking for you? You think you’re getting out of this state—hell, out of this city—without him dragging you right back to his compound? Grow up.”
She stands then, shaking.
“Get out of my room,” she demands, her voice cracks. “And don’t you ever speak that way to me again.”
“Someone needs to,” I say patiently, staying in my spot. “You’ve grown up in a castle, so you’ve only seen the world a certain way. Your father, Mikhail, and I work in the shadows. There’s no mercy. There’s no forgiveness. There are no happy endings.”
“I’m not a fucking princess!” she shouts. “I’m not as naïve as you think, Viktor. And I’m not some damsel who needs to be rescued. I can take care of myself.”
“And how was that going for you?” I ask, standing up now and purposely stepping into her space. “Because it seemed like you weren’t handling the situation very well when I found you the other night.”
