BLOOD RELIC
The Blood Legends Mafia Series | Book 2 "You think I'm just a bargaining chip? Some pretty Greek girl to parade at your arm while you fuck your lover in secret apartments? I am not your decoration, Nikandr Zaitsev. And I am not your prisoner."She reached out slowly, deliberately ran her finger along his taut jawline. "You want this alliance?" she whispered. "Then treat me like an equal. Or I will burn everything you've built. Starting with your secrets."Nikandr caught her wrist. Not hard. Just enough to hold her still. His voice was low, almost intimate. "You think I want this marriage any more than you do?"Irenya searched his eyes for weakness, for the lie.She found only the same heat she felt in her bones. "Then why do it?" she asked, sly and careful."Because the alternative is worse." He released her wrist but didn't step back. "Solntsevskaya doesn't ask twice. And neither does my father's ghost."Irenya tilted her head. "So we're both caged.""For now," he answered evenly.Then she smiled. Slow, dangerous, beautiful."Good," she said. "Because I'm very good at breaking cages."Nikandr exhaled a sound that might have been a laugh, might have been a surrender. He stepped back, opened the door, and gestured for her to follow."Come," he said. "We have a wedding to pretend at. And after that... we'll see who breaks first."Irenya walked past him head high, hips swaying with deliberate challenge. As she passed, her fingers brushed his- once, fleeting, electric.The door closed behind them.Neither looked back.But both knew: the game had only just begun.Ⓜ️…



















