Avrora
My heart has been smashed into so many pieces it's impossible to count them all. It's no different to all the grains of sand in this world.
My mind and body are disconnected, and my soul weeps for losing the love of my life. All that is left of me is an empty shell with nothing but a void inside.
The only thing I can feel is the spark of life created with love in my belly, calling to me to stay alive. But I've already failed as a mother because there's nothing I can do.
In my terror and grief, I'm here sitting on the floor of the bedroom I was taken to after Mira killed Dad, feeling sorry for myself.
I don't know what this place is. It seems like Mira conducts something medical here. Apart from the armed guards, on my way up I saw offices and labs with clinical staff. I also saw other storage rooms and bedrooms like this.
We're on the third floor, so quite high up with no possible way of escape. If I were to even try, I'm sure this shitty tunic Mira forced me to wear would get me the wrong kind of attention. I look like I escaped from a hospital, and I'm sure the rest of me looks that way as well.
Dad's blood was all over me from head to toe. I've been cleaned off, but as far as I'm concerned, I could still be covered in it. My skin remembers the feeling, and that copper scent still assaults my nose. The image of so much red and the man who assumed the role as my father dead will never leave me.
I don't know what the plan is for me once we leave this place, but if Mikhail doesn't keep me, I can't imagine I'll have much more time left on this earth.
He and Mira will wait until everything is official then kill me in the same barbaric fashion they murdered Dad. Then most likely return to Boston to continue their normal lives.
I'll join the dead and become another secret. At least in some ways, I'll be with my husband.
Anatoli... when I woke this morning in his arms, I didn't know it would be the last time. I didn't know I'd be in the breath of day and night staring at the waning sun through this window, and he'd be gone.
Dead.
I physically can't cry anymore. All the tears inside me have dried up like a thousand-year-old well, and the void has swallowed everything else.
The wooden door opens, and Mikhail walks inside with a smug smile on his face.
I can't believe I ever had any kind of feelings for this man, or that I spent weeks in confusion trying to stay true to him when I knew in my soul that I wasn't in love with him.
He moves closer and stops a breath away, glaring down at me.
"Get up."
"Fuck you." I don't care what I say anymore. I have no fight left in me. I've lost everything, and I'm just waiting for him to take my baby.
Mikhail smiles, uncanny and unfazed. In one swift movement, he reaches down, grabs my arm, and yanks me up from the floor.
I shriek from the pain that races up my arm, but he doesn't care. He shoves me into the wall, and that smile of his widens.
"You stupid bitch. You think you can just talk to me like that?" He grabs my face and leans closer. "This was how it was always supposed to be. You and me. You get to determine how long it will beyou and meif you play nice, because my feelings for you are the only thing keeping you alive."
"Feelings? Don't make me vomit. You never had any kind of feelings for me. You were always a fucking cheating bastard."
"All men cheat, Avrora."
"No, they don't. My husband would have never cheated on me." The hollow inside me grows when I think of Anatoli, and my soul continues to weep.
"You're not that special. Eventually, he would have."
"No. He wouldn't have. He wouldn't have needed to because he truly loved me and I was enough for him." I've lost everything but my belief in the true love I shared with Anatoli. And Mikhail doesn't like my answer one bit. "He wasn't you."
"No. He wasn't. He was a parasite, just like the thing you carry in your belly." His poisonous words have the desired effect.
They hurt my heart. But they also ignite the last shred of fire left in me to fight. I ball my hand into a fist and punch him straight in the side of his face, making him shout.
Mikhail never saw my attack coming because of the angle he's holding me.
The shock on his face is classic, and worth the pain I feel when he slaps me back. With a savage growl, Mikhail lifts me by my throat and carries me just like that across the room. He throws me onto the bed and slaps my face again and again and again until I see stars and taste blood.
I scream and cry as the pain shreds me to pieces, and I'm sure death is close. It has to be with such pain burning through my body.
"Fucking bitch." He delivers one last slap to my face. "Fucking whore. The doctors are on their way to remove it and fix you so you will never have children. That way, we won't have to worry about your whoring ways and having any other accidents."
"You evil asshole."
"It doesn't matter what you say. You are mine now." Another slap brings black dots before my eyes, and I scream again.
"I will never be yours." I can hardly talk, but my words are my only attack. "I will never love you. Never!"
"Then you will just be something to fuck until I'm ready to throw you away. Why don't I start now?"
He holds me down and pushes the tunic up my hips. When he tears off my panties, I kick my legs, trying to get him off me.
Nothing works. There's nothing I can do but lie here and allow him to destroy me.
"Stop it." My terror-filled voice fills the room. I'm sure people can hear me if they're nearby, but Mikhail has no plans to stop anything.
He undoes his belt and shoves his pants down his hips, freeing his cock.
Grabbing my hips, he readies himself to shove into me, but just then the door flies open and Mira rushes in.
"What the fuck?" Mikhail pulls his pants back on and sneers at her.
"We have a problem," Mira says.
I manage the strength to lift my head and look at her. She's gone pale, and her eyes are wide with fright.
"What the hell is happening?"
"We have to leave now. Malik is here with Anatoli, and they have the Knights' enforcers with them, along with the Pakhan. It's over. We have to leave."
All I truly hear is Anatoli's name. He's alive.
"How the fuck did Anatoli survive?"
"I don't know. It doesn't matter. Let's go, Mikhail. Take her. We still have the oil company if we have her."
He yanks me off the bed and pulls me along, blood streaming down my face and my body shattered.
The three of us rush through the door. The cold seeps into my bare skin when we step into the hall. We rush down it and get in the elevator.
The moment we go down, gunfire rips through the air. It sounds like a war zone.
Mikhail takes out his gun, getting it ready to shoot the moment we step out of the elevator.
The passage is clear, but when we turn the corner, a host of men are coming our way. I spot Jayce and Zane, and they see me, too, in Mikhail's grasp and Mira running beside me.
Mikhail starts shooting, and when they return fire, Mira gets hit straight in the back of her head and several times in her back. She goes down like a rag doll, and Mikhail doesn't even spare her a glance.
In his greed to get me away, he decides to retreat and hoist me over his shoulder. Now I'm used almost like a shield. The bullets stop because I'm too close to Mikhail and we still have a good distance between us and the men.
We make it outside, and it's war out here, too, but he manages to reach a car. One of his guards is already running toward us to help him.
The guard shoots back at the men rushing our way while Mikhail shoves me in the back seat of the car before he gets in the driver's seat and drives away.