ELYSSA

SOMEWHERE IN THE DESERT OF NEVADA

To serve is to find peace.

To obey is to find happiness.

To listen is to find truth.

The words repeat in my head like a dirge. How many times have I said them? Too many to count. Every dawn, noon, and dusk for the last nineteen years. Every day of my life.

Fumbling shapes flit through my subconsciousness. My head hurts. So do my legs.

I can smell the strong accents of incense and fire. Patchouli oil. Desert sand.

And something else beneath all that, something sharp and wet and metallic.

My eyelids remain stubbornly closed as if I'm not in control of my own body. It's easier to remain blind sometimes. It keeps you from seeing the monsters.

Heat suffuses the dry air around me and seeps into my body. That's what finally forces me to open my eyes-the heat. Why on earth is it so hot?

My vision blurs as I push myself into an upright position. More questions bubble to the surface. Why am I on the ground? Why do I feel the indents of the floorboards on the side of my cheek?

I blink a few more times, temporarily distracted by the layers of tuille draped in front of my face. I'm so used to simple cottons and softened white linen-the uniform I've worn all my life, the same one my parents wear, and my friends, and everyone I've ever known-that the tuille over my head feels invasive, strange, unwelcome.

I swat at the fabric, but it follows my every movement. My head spins and the room tilts for a moment, forcing me to take stock of where I am.

This... isn't my room.

Fear pierces through my body as the thought settles. My room has roughened adobe walls that I'd painted an ugly yellow when I was too young to know better. It has a thin mattress lying bare on the floor and a loose board in the corner where I stash all the books I don't want Mama and Papa seeing.

This is not my room.

In here-wherever "here" is-the walls are polished wood. The floor doesn't creak. The bed frame is iron and ornate, far fancier than anything I've ever seen, and the sheets are twisted and half-ripped off the bed like someone has thrashed them to the floor in the throes of a nightmare.

Everything is tilted and leery and wrong. But what is wrong? I can't remember anything about how I got here. Like today is the first day of my life.

I wait for the unsettling disorientation to fade, but my memory is still patchy. Gauzy flashes wisp across my mind, but they don't linger long enough for me to decipher them.

I decide to focus instead on what I see right in front of me. But it's so hard to see, to make sense of things. The world keeps spinning, colors bleeding together.

It reminds me of the time when Father Josiah made all the women and girls gather in the main hall of the Sanctuary to drink the purity water. He said it would cleanse us. But all it did was make a lot of us sick.

Mama couldn't eat for two days. Carrie Wilson vomited her guts out after just one sip. Old Mother Hobbs had taken right to her bed.

Father Josiah insisted that the purity water had worked exactly how it was meant to. "You're cleansed!" he'd boomed in that gravelly voice of his. "All your sins swept away like desert sand after a rainstorm."

To make sure, he had met with all the women individually after the fact. I'd been exempt because I was only six. Mother Hobbs was exempt, too.

Not that it mattered much. She died three days later.

We held a prayer circle after the burial to thank Father Josiah for purifying Mrs. Hobbs's soul before she was taken by the powers that be. He stood in the middle and soaked up our prayers and told us to say them louder. "I've been sent to guide you to salvation," he said again and again. "Let me guide you. Let me guide you."

My finger slips in something sticky and warm. I look down at my hand and as I do, my confusion intensifies.

I didn't even realize I was holding something until now. Something heavy and solid. I hold it up in front of my whirring eyes. The first thing I notice is the graceful curve of dark wings carved into the metal. They rise up a swooping swan's neck to the point of a beak.

It's a paperweight, cast iron and expensive by the looks of it.

And the whole thing is drenched in blood.

Panic starts to pulse through my frozen body, but it hasn't yet crested. I have to avoid hysteria. Hysteria is just another outlet for sin, Father Josiah always says.

I struggle to my feet. I fall a couple of times, still so dizzy that it feels like I'm on a ship at sea, but I keep trying until I'm upright.

The room spins again. I refuse to fall back to the ground, though I do think about how easy it would be to succumb to the disorientation and simply fade away.

Because the alternate is remembering how I got here.

And I'm not sure I want to do that.

I finger the folds of my tuille dress. Another realization hits me like a slap in the face. It's not just any dress: it's a wedding dress.

The confirmation is on my head.

Filmy material tickles the side of my neck and when I go to bat it away, I realize that it's attached to my head.

A veil. I'm wearing a veil.

Oh God... If this is my wedding night, then something has definitely gone very, very wrong.

The panic surfaces again, but I push it down. Hysteria is the enemy. I cannot react. I should not react.

I drop the paperweight. It clunks to the floor. My fingers come away from it, sticky with dried blood clinging to me like a second skin. Without thinking, I brush my hand against the folds of my dress. Of course, it leaves a dark crimson smear.

Don't panic, Elyssa. Don't panic. Do not panic.

Shivering, I take a step forward and stop short when I notice something sticking out from around the edge of the bed.

A naked foot.

My shivering worsens. I hear the howl of a coyote from somewhere in the distance and my gaze flits instantly to the bedroom window. I can see only darkness beyond the glass, but I've grown up on this land. I don't have to see the rolling acres of desert to know what's out there.

My eyes slide from the window to the mirror propped against the adjacent wall. Beneath it-and beside it and lining every available surface in the room-are hundreds and hundreds of candles, all lit and flickering. The flames look almost blue in the moonlight.

That's why it's so hot in here. That's why I'm sweating.

My reflection swims in the mirror. Confirmation of what I suspected when I first came to-it is a wedding dress I'm wearing, and it is a veil on my head. The smear of blood on the skirts does not belong to me.

Scariest of all is my face. It's not even the expression, which is both terrified and confused. It's the makeup caked onto my skin.

Rogue on my cheeks, a dark red lipstick on my lips, a pale foundation applied with a heavy hand. I look so white I'm nearly lifeless. A corpse made of clay.

I've never worn makeup once in my life. I wouldn't even know where to start with it.

Which means... I've done none of this.

Automatically, my gaze falls back to the foot peeking out from behind the bed. I can't ignore it anymore. I take a shaky step forward, my stomach roiling uncomfortably as the man takes shape before me.

He's tall. He's wearing dark pants and no shirt. He's fallen facedown, but his head is turned to the side.

"No," I whisper to the empty room. "No!"

The candles seem to flicker manically, spurred by the burgeoning panic that's turning my chest into a block of ice.

I lurch forward, my hand reaching out to touch him, but I stop at the last moment. Instead, I fall to my knees next to him. I want to touch him, but fear has taken my hands captive.

"Father Josiah," I whisper.

I can't tell if he's breathing or not. But I can see the nasty crater on one side of his face. It looks like paint. It looks like syrup. It looks like...

I forget about the sin of hysteria in that moment. I gasp as the shocking realization scorches through me like a lightning bolt. I collapse and scurry backward on my hands and knees, as far away from Father Josiah's body as I can get.

"Oh God, please, no..." I beg to no one in particular.

I stare desperately at the flickering candles as tears start to run down my cheeks. Each drop carves a track in the thick makeup.

"Stop," I plead helplessly to my reflection in the silver mirror. "Stop staring at me."

The simple facts click together ruthlessly. I woke up with a bloodied metal swan in my hand. There's a dead man in the bed with a hole in the side of his head. One plus one equals two.

I killed him.

I killed him.

I killed him.

The candles flicker brighter, as if they know what's going on inside my mind. I rip the veil off my head and hurl it at a cluster of candles in the corner. It catches fire immediately and starts to crackle.

The shivering comes back. As do the memories-some of them, at least.

Tonight was supposed to be my wedding night. We'd spent weeks in preparation. The event of the decade: Father Josiah had finally decided to take a wife. And he had blessed my family with the highest of honors.

He had chosen me.

But even though the past few weeks start coming back to me, the last twenty-four hours are a complete blur. A black hole that hides the secret to what happened in this bedroom.

I shake my head, unable to look at Father Josiah's body. I'd agreed to marry him. Of course I had. He was the leader of our commune, the Sanctuary. He was strong and brave and kind and honest. He was the savior of so many families, including my own.

I'd been chosen.

And then I'd... killed him?

I look down at the paperweight where I dropped it, waiting for the last piece of the puzzle. But nothing comes. All I have are black shapes, wavy images, and fleeting emotions that I don't recognize.

But the facts are the facts. I killed Father Josiah. I killed my husband.

I don't quite understand what comes over me in the moment that follows. All I know is that my eyes drift to the burning wedding veil in the corner. I stand and rush over to it, though it feels like I'm not even in control of my actions. An out-of-body experience, I think they call it.

I snatch up the biggest candle. Hot, molten wax sears my skin, but I barely feel it.

It's not a conscious decision. But I am distantly aware of the hysteria twisting into something else. Something that feels like... survival.

I push the open flame against the filmy material of the curtain tied up on to side of the window. It catches fire immediately and the roar grows quickly. The fire spreads fast.

Then I throw the candle at the bed. I don't look to see where it lands. I just turn and run.

Down the stairs.

Out the door.

My high heels sink into sand as I cross from the patchy yards of the commune out into the wild desert. Gasping, I kick them off and keep running.

I don't look back. My eyes are on the glow of lights in the far distance. I know those lights. I've watched them my whole life.

Las Vegas.

I've never been myself, despite it being right at our doorstep. The Sanctuary is all I've ever known. To want more was to accept sin into your life. To venture beyond was to turn your back on the commune.

But I've murdered the heart of our community. The shepherd to our flock. I've handed my soul over to the devil. There's nowhere else for me to go now.

So I go toward the lights.

I keep running, even when the heels of my feet start tearing and bleeding. I pant through the pain in my side and the pain in my heart. My eyes never leave the lights ahead.

And little by little, they get brighter. More blinding. The Sanctuary disappears into the vast blackness behind me.

But it doesn't seem to matter how much distance I put between myself and my family, myself and my community, myself and the only home I've ever known.

No matter how far or how fast I run...

I can still smell the lingering hints of patchouli following me through the shadowy desert.

PHOENIX

LAS VEGAS, NEVADA

Wild Night Blossom. A haven for the depraved. A hellhole of debauchery.

On the surface, it's all class. But that's a cold-blooded lie.

I know better.

So does the man I've come here to meet.

It's a meeting that's been three years in the making. My making. And tonight, all this shit finally comes to an end.

I circle the room I've just been shown into. The walls are black, but you can barely tell, thanks to the dozens of framed, mismatched mirrors hung at every height. Some are small and square with thin iron frames. Others are massive splays of rectangular glass with thick, gilded edges.

Five uniform chandeliers hang from the high ceiling. Made of crystal and flickering with candlelight, they're barely bright enough to beat back the shadows crowding in every corner.

There are no windows, of course. Not one. Privacy is of utmost importance to a man like Viktor Ozol.

The master of this whole circus of sin. The motherfucker who has plagued my peace of mind for three years.

Ever since Aurora...

Ever since Yuri...

I'm pacing hard, but the sounds of my footsteps are swallowed whole by the burgundy carpet. The music pulsing beyond these walls is felt more than it's heard. The whole point of this room is to shut out the unsavory nature of what this club was built for: sex in all its forms.

I'd come to the club alone, as per the agreement between Ozol and myself. And as expected, it was a fucking orgy of flesh from the second I stepped foot in the door. In every booth, beneath every table, on every possible surface, there were people fucking. Groans and moans filled the air.

They say the sex is an expression of freedom. Strip yourself of inhibition, reads the ornate sign over the door. They think it's a cute little double entendre.

Sex is power. Sex is confidence.

What a fucking farce.

I'd surveyed the faces of the men and women in each booth I'd passed. Some hid their pain behind robotic moans. Others made a show of enjoyment, despite their vacant expressions.

They were all young.

They were all beautiful.

They were all breathing fucking corpses.

My hand twitches automatically towards the waistband of my pants, but I remember I don't have my gun anymore. My weapons were confiscated at the door.

I made a lot of concessions to gain this meeting. I'm still convinced it's worth it.

Or rather it will be... once I have the fucker within my grasp.

Ozol agreed to meet me in this room at precisely ten-thirty. The silver clock on the wall tells me that it's ten forty-three now. The bastard is late.

I doubt it's an accident. Nothing Viktor Ozol does is ever an accident. I'm sure he thinks this deliberate power move will assert his dominance over me.

He's wrong if he believes I'll be intimidated. He's wrong if he thinks I earned all the things I have-the money, the power-from sheer fucking nepotism.

The blood that runs in my veins is pure mob royalty. I am Phoenix Kovalyov, son of Artem and Esme Kovalyov, the reigning king and queen of the Los Angeles-based Kovalyov Bratva. Nephew to Cillian and Kian O'Sullivan, dons of Ireland's O'Sullivan mafia clan.

But the blood I've spilled to earn my place at the table was done with my own two hands. I carved this empire in Las Vegas myself. Made my own way. Built my own legacy. And I made sure that my reputation would stand on its own two feet, far removed from the dynasties that my mentors built.

Ten years ago, I left my Uncle Kian's tutelage in New York City and came here to erect something from scratch. I did exactly that. I am a don in my own right. Nothing can touch me. No man can hurt me.

Or at least, that's what I used to believe.

Until three years ago.

When I was foolish enough to let an enemy take advantage of the one vulnerability that I'd allowed myself in the last decade.

I glance at the time. Ten forty-nine. This asshole is really fucking with the wrong man. But I force myself to be patient. I've waited three years for this meeting. I can stand to wait a few more minutes.

My muscles ping with adrenaline, preparing for a fight that I've imagined in my head a thousand times over.

Uncle Cillian always says that revenge is the wrong reason to fight. But I disagree. It's the strongest motivator I have left. It's the reason I've made it my life's mission to expose and destroy Astra Tyrannis, the organization that Viktor runs.

Three fucking years... and I can finally feel the end coming.

For one of us.

I hear a sound from just outside the door. I wait, ears piqued, but the door remains closed.

Frustrated and growing increasingly impatient, I stalk over to the gigantic bar that covers the entire end wall of the room. The shelves are set against polished glass, weighed down with endless bottles of liquor.

All rare. All expensive. All bought with blood money.

I don't kid myself that I'm some kind of crusader. I'm no saint. And I'm definitely no hero.

I've killed without reason. I've stolen without compulsion. I've lied without guilt. But even among thieves and murderers, there's a fucking code.

You don't fuck with women or children. And Viktor Ozol has done both.

There's no evidence to pin to him. No proof to nail him with. Just a fuck ton of rumors and the stink of corruption that pervades through every single establishment he owns, through every nasty place his fingers have ever soiled.

He's been avoiding me, though. I'd scored this meeting only because I'd lied about the reason for it. A temporary truce is what I told him. An attempt to broker a mutually beneficial deal between the two biggest players in Las Vegas. It was too tempting an offer for Ozol to pass up, so I'd secured my meeting.

But I'm starting to smell a rat. Because there's no excuse for this kind of delay.

Ten more minutes and his absence will go from rude to insulting. And the only answer to insults in the underworld... is violence.

I'm about to reach for the shiny new bottle of Isabella's Islay -when the door bursts open. I whip around, abandoning the whiskey to face Viktor Ozol.

Except it's not Ozol at all.

The person standing in the doorway is a frail blonde who looks like she's been plucked off the poster of some Gothic horror movie. She's wearing a ripped wedding dress, torn in several places, dusty and bloodstained at the hem.

She stares at me without seeing as she stumbles blearily into the room. I walk towards her cautiously, wondering what kind of game Ozol is playing with me.

My hand strays towards the tiny knife I managed to conceal from security, but I resist pulling it out. No sense in showing my cards before I have to.

The girl-I suppose she's a woman, but she looks so young and innocent that "girl" seems more appropriate-looks up at me. She has huge amber eyes fanned with thick black eyelashes and ringed with smudged mascara. Her blonde hair has lost its sheen to sweat, and her breaths burst from her in small, pain-filled gasps.

She looks like every other girl I've seen here tonight: beautiful. Young. Broken.

The only difference is that, on her... it shows.

"Who the fuck are you?" I snarl.

She blanches, her eyebrows furrowing as though she's trying to shake off the voices in her head.

I look around the room, but it doesn't appear that we're being watched. Of course, that means fuck-all. There are a million places to hide a camera in here if someone with bad intentions wanted to observe.

I turn back to her, unmoved by the tear tracks leaving streaks down her hollow cheeks. She still hasn't answered my question.

"I asked you a question," I repeat. "Who the fuck are you?"

"Please," she whispers, as though terrified to speak out loud, "don't curse."

I raise my eyebrows. Did she just tell me to watch my language? I almost laugh. I'm thirty-two years old, and it's been more than two decades since someone has told me to watch what I say.

Her eyes dart from side to side and her hands twitch at her sides. I look down and notice that her fingernails are bloody. She seems to be shivering, too.

"I... I... The lights were so bright," she stammers. Her words slur. "I was just trying... trying to get away from everything... A door was open... I went... I came in here... and there were... I saw... I saw..."

The trembling is more pronounced now. Her eyes are unfocused. I've seen this before, more times than I care to relive.

She's drugged.

"Listen to me," I order, raising my hands palms up. I don't touch her, but I take a step closer. "Calm down. Breathe."