(Flashback – Three months before the kidnapping. Darya is 17. Mikhail is 19.)
BLACKWELL MANSION – SPRING, 13 YEARS AGO (FROM THE PRESENT)
The basement breathes in the dimness, as if the entire house is holding its breath.
My fathers are away—another "business trip" that lasts days, maybe weeks. My brothers have scattered: Aleksei and Sergei in late-night meetings downtown, Nikolai locked in his room with his monitors, Yakov and Vasily training in the backyard until sunrise, Dimitri lighting "accidental" bonfires just to annoy the neighbors.
My mother is upstairs, tending to the newest quintuplets—the babies who arrived recently and still don't know their world is made of bullets and secrets.
The house is empty.
Or almost.
I hear his footsteps before the door even creaks.
Light, deliberate, as if he knows exactly which floorboards squeak and avoids them all.
When the door opens, the faint light from the swaying bulb casts long shadows across the mat.
Mikhail enters without hurry.
Black t-shirt fitted to his body, dark pants, hair damp as if he just stepped out of the shower.
Nineteen now.
The skinny boy who arrived with a beat-up backpack is gone.
In his place, a man who moves like danger is just an accessory.
— Finally alone — he says, voice low, heavy with the intimacy only the two of us understand.
I stand motionless in the center of the mat, training knife in my right hand, sweating despite the cold air seeping through the ventilation grates.
Pretending this is just another training session is useless.
He always sees right through me.
— They could come back any minute — I say, voice steady, but the tremor in my hands betrays me.
He smiles—that crooked smile that starts on one side and ends in his eyes.
— Lie. You know as well as I do that we have until dawn. Your mother is busy with the babies. Your brothers… well, they have their own problems.
Three steps and he's in front of me.
His scent envelops me before the touch: light tobacco, leather, something warm and masculine that belongs only to him.
He doesn't touch me yet.
He just looks.
As if memorizing every inch of my face.
— Show me what you've learned — he orders, but his amber eyes tell another story.
Desire. Patience. Possession.
I hesitate.
The knife feels heavy in my hand.
He notices.
His hands wrap around my wrists—no force, just firmness—lifting my arms slowly until the blade becomes irrelevant between us.
— You're shaking — he observes, and there's genuine pleasure in his voice.
— I'm not — I lie, feeling heat rise to my cheeks.
He laughs low, the sound echoing in the empty basement.
His fingers slide down my arms in a slow, familiar path.
— Lying to me again, solnishko.
The Russian nickname hits me like always: a secret whispered just for me.
My body reacts before my mind.
I lean toward him without meaning to.
— Don't call me that — I protest, without conviction.
— Why not? — His lips find my ear in a light kiss. — You are my sun even on the darkest nights.
He pulls me against his chest.
Reverence in the gesture.
Possession in the arms.
His lips find mine—not in a rush, but with certainty.
As if three years of waiting had only been preparation for this moment.
— You're mine — he murmurs between kisses, voice hoarse with devotion. — Three years waiting for you. Three years learning every detail of you.
No warning.
His fingers slip under the waistband of my leggings, gripping my skin hard enough to leave marks.
My breath catches in my throat—shock mixed with something dirtier, deeper.
His touch is deliberately rough, as if he wants me to feel every callus, every scar on the hand that has already killed, betrayed, survived.
And I… let him.
Because I want to feel it.
I want him to mark me.
— I know you better than you know yourself, Darya — he whispers, eyes reflecting fire. — Your body is already mine. It's only your mind that still resists.
It's true.
Somewhere between training sessions that became excuses, stolen glances in the hallway, nights when he slipped into my room and stayed until the sky lightened… I belong to him.
Not by force.
By choice.
By something that terrifies me precisely because it's mutual.
When we finally separate, the world seems to have stopped.
My swollen lips hold his taste.
My skin carries the heat of his hands.
He brushes my hair back with a gentleness that contrasts with everything he just did.
— Tomorrow… — he begins.
— Tomorrow we pretend again — I finish, voice low.
He nods.
Kisses my forehead.
— But one day we won't have to pretend anymore.
He leaves first.
The door closes behind him with a soft click.
I'm alone in the basement again, breathing still ragged, body marked, heart pounding too hard.
I am his.
He is mine.
And for the first time, that thought doesn't bring fear.
Only certainty.
Tomorrow there will be suspicious looks from my brothers.
Questions I won't answer.
Lies I'll tell with a smile.
But tonight, in this stolen and perfect moment…
I allow myself to dream of the impossible:
That one day we won't have to hide anymore.
That the five fathers, the seven brothers, the entire mafia…
Will accept that we are inevitable.
And, for the first time, that dream doesn't feel so far away.