Page 101 of Desperate Crimes
“Then he won’t be mad, Princess. He’s gonna be proud. Because your father knows exactly who I am. And he’ll know—no one will ever love his little girl like the man who’s loved her forever.”
And standing there, wrapped in shadows and silk and a summer sunset that feels like it’s bleeding just for us—he says it. In a roundabout way. But still, he says it.
And I believe him.
Even if it terrifies me.
Chapter Twenty-Six-Nico Jr
The week blurs.
A dream stitched together by silk sheets, stolen kisses, and the sound of Leanna’s laugh echoing off the walls of our home.
I work from the mansion—our mansion now—not because I can’t go in, but because I can’t stand to be away from her for too long.
Between coordinating her move without raising red flags and spending every waking—and sinfully sleepless—moment proving to her that I’m not just obsessed, but fucking devoted, it’s been a week of pure, uncut heaven.
But I know we can’t live in isolation forever.
Sooner or later, the world will come knocking.
Leanna hasn’t settled on a career yet.
She's newly graduated with a master's in business, though her passions live in the wild places of her mind—French existentialist literature and art history, her two minors.
She reads Camus and Foucault like some people read cookbooks, and she’s the only woman I know who can quote Sartre while stripping out of thousand-dollar lingerie with a smirk.
And now? She’s in the garden I built for her, cataloguing the flowers in a small leather-bound notebook with careful, curious attention.
I watch her on the monitor, entranced.
A soft summer breeze flutters her long dress around her legs, the hem dancing across her thighs like it’s in love with her too.
The fabric clings to her curves, and her long, tousled hair gleams like burnished gold in the dying light of day.
She looks like a storybook fairy, half-wild and half-divine, with ink on her fingers and petals stuck to her skin.
Goddamn.
This woman is everything.
She doesn’t flinch at the presence of the guards. Doesn’t question the extra locks, the perimeter alerts, or the biometric safes.
And why would she? She grew up Volkov, a princess of another empire.
Her father's enemies weren’t petty criminals—they were international threats.
So maybe, just maybe, she understands.
Still, I know her parents are going to lose their fucking minds.
The cousins already know. They’ve kept their mouths shut, though I’ve already fielded one call from her righteous sister, Michaela. And her husband, Liam O'Doyle, Leanna’s brother-in-law. I don’t underestimate either of them.
But here’s the thing—they don’t get a vote.
Leanna isn’t up for negotiation.
She loves me.
