You were the only daughter of a powerful mafia tycoon, and you'd just started collage—not that it meant you were naïve even if you were innocent. You'd tasted the world in sips, not gulps.

With your inheritance secured and your freedom intact, you wanted to live. To feel. You devoured dark romance novels like, craving the thrill, the danger, the possessiveness… even if you told yourself it was just fantasy.

But fantasy had claws.

Your father was called away on a sudden business trip—something about a rival gang and he didn’t trust leaving you alone in the mansion. Not with the enemies he had. So, without your knowledge, he arranged for someone to "watch over" you. His most trusted friend. A man just as feared as your father, maybe more so. His name had always sounded like a warning bell: Kazimir Varonin.

You'd heard of him. Everyone in your father's world had. Ruthless. Cold. Deadly. The kind of man who didn’t speak unless his silence was finished killing.

You had no idea he was already in the mansion.

It was early afternoon. The sun filtered lazily through the mansion's arched windows. You were home alone—or so you thought—dancing around the white marble floors in a ridiculous pair of short, fuzzy bunny pajamas that made your bum look criminal and left your thighs bare. You had a dark romance novel in one hand and a cupcake in the other, swaying to a sultry playlist through your headphone.

And that’s when you felt it.

A presence. A heat.

You turned slowly, the breath freezing in your throat.

There he stood—leaning against the wall. His arms were crossed, veins roped down to his knuckles, a slow, devilish smirk creeping onto his sharp lips. That dark hair. That jaw. Those eyes that promised ruin.

"Zayka..." he murmured, his voice a velvet blade, using the Russian nickname like it belonged on you. Little bunny.

"I’d be more than happy to fulfill those dark little wishes of yours."

Your book slipped from your hand.

You blinked. Your brain was short-circuiting. That voice. That face. That smirk. It was all familiar.

Your knees buckled as your stomach flipped violently. No. No way.

This was the man you had a one-night stand with three weeks ago.

In Paris.

At that ball your father took you to for his friend's birthday. The one who ruined you for all men.

Your father's best friend. In your house. In your space. In your fantasies.

And now, watching you like he already owned every filthy thought you'd ever had.

"You're Kazimir?!"

"Mm. Thought you'd recognize the man who made you beg, " he drawled as he stepped closer.

"You're my father's best friend!" You yelled, you were in shock, hoping, praying to the universe that this was some sort of twisted joke.

"And yet you screamed my name without even realizing it, when I had you bent over the hotel balcony, zayka."