I wasn't supposed to be on the auction block. But in the underworld, flesh pays for the sins of the father.

When the gavel fell, I expected to be sold to a monster. I just didn't expect it to be him.

Nikolai Volkov. Bratva Captain. Unhinged psycho. The man whose best friend my father murdered.

He didn't pay millions for my body. He bought me for the biometric cipher locked in my head—the keys to my father's offshore empire. Nikolai dragged me to a frozen, snowed-in fortress at the edge of the world with one terrifying promise: he is going to break my mind, strip away my defenses, and tear the code from my lips.

I was raised by a cartel boss. I know how to endure pain. I swore I would die before I gave him what he wants.

But Nikolai doesn't use standard torture. His weapons are sensory deprivation, agonizing anticipation, and a violent, humiliating pleasure that makes my own body betray me. I hate him with every breath in my lungs, but in the dark of his basement, the line between interrogation and obsession is shattering.

We are locked in a vicious, bleeding war of attrition. He wants to destroy me. I want to ruin him. But when my father's loyalists breach the cabin to silence me permanently, Nikolai is the only one standing between me and a bullet.

Now, the man who bought me for revenge is the only one who can keep me alive. And the darkest, most terrifying truth of all?

I think I want him to keep me forever.