Clara
Clara woke with the ghost of Alessio’s touch still on her skin, a physical memory that she recognized with a humiliating familiarity. The routine was working: her nerves were conditioned to his presence, her body a battlefield of fear and involuntary response.
But the morning brought a new kind of dread. Kaelen—ever the silent executor—arrived not with breakfast, but with a sleek, locked tablet displaying the morning headlines.
THE QUIET TEACHER WHO STOLE THE LION: VOLKOV CEMENTS DYNASTY WITH SHOCK MARRIAGE.
Her face, radiant and serene in the midnight blue velvet, was plastered across the digital screen. The smile she had given Dmitri, the smile of practiced, obedient dependence, was now the public face of the Volkov empire.
Clara felt a wave of nausea. Her old life wasn't just
