Chapter 1

When I was twelve, I picked out a mad dog at an underground fighting pit.

The skinny boy had been beaten until blood soaked every inch of him, yet he still dragged himself to my feet.

"Miss Harrington. Pick me."

"My life belongs to you from this day on. I'll make myself useful."

I thought he was interesting, so I brought him back to the family and branded him with our exclusive crest.

In ten short years, Damien rose from nameless slave to the second-in-command of the Harrington house.

He guarded me for a decade. Took three bullets for me. Left paralyzed five times.

He was the most loyal, most unhinged dog at my side.

I thought the two of us were bound together for life.

Until the night I was ready to make our relationship public. A soft, innocent-looking girl showed up at my door, her belly round with pregnancy.

"Every time you went to the chapel to pray for a child, Damien was with me at my prenatal appointments."

"Every time he touched you, it made him so sick he had to dose himself with pills just to keep from throwing up. You didn't know, did you? That night you knelt on the chapel steps for three days praying for his safe return—he was right next door, taking my virginity."

Then the girl tossed down two passports with smug triumph.

"He already agreed to leave with me after his last job. A filthy piece of trash like you was never good enough for him."

I laughed.

I took the knife my man handed me and rammed it clean through her belly.

"Wrap this little bastard up and send it to the Blackwood house. Congratulate him on becoming a father."

. . .

Three cigarettes burned down to the filter before Damien finally arrived.

He was lethal on his feet. All those years of risking his life for me had trained him to move without sound.

But now, the steady footsteps I knew so well were uncharacteristically ragged.

"Adeline, let Vivienne go. She isn't part of this world. She shouldn't be dragged into any of this."

Damien came to a halt in front of me.

He had rushed here so fast he hadn't even wiped the blood off himself.

I raised my eyes and fixed my gaze on the blood-soaked shirt clinging to his chest.

"You got my present, then."

Damien's breathing quickened. The rims of his eyes turned red, inch by inch.

A wordless standoff stretched between us for a few seconds.

Then, without warning, he dropped to his knees. "Adeline. I'm begging you. Let Vivienne go."

For ten years, Damien had clawed his way to where he was on nothing but an iron spine.

Whether it was being tortured by enemies or taking wounds meant for me, he had never begged for mercy. Never once cried out in pain.

And now, here he was. On his knees. For another woman.

"Ha."

Looking down at his bowed head, I let out a short laugh.

I lifted my hand and traced the deep scar at the corner of his eye—the scar he had taken at eighteen, catching an arrow meant for me. An inch to the left and it would have gone through his eye.

"Adeline..."

"Shh."

My hand glided across the sharp ridge of his brow, down along the side of his face.

The moment he looked up, I backhanded him across the cheek as hard as I could.

Without a flicker of expression, I ground my cigarette out against his heaving chest.

I didn't stop until the smell of burning flesh reached me. Only then did I take the handkerchief from my butler and wipe my hand, again and again.

"You're nothing but a dog my family keeps. Remember your place."

Damien turned his face back to mine, eyes bloodshot.

His voice was hoarse, but he repeated the words with deliberate precision: "Miss Harrington. I am begging you. Let Vivienne go."

Watching him refuse to yield an inch, the last trace of warmth in my eyes froze over.

"Damien!"

A series of shrill screams burst from the inner chamber.

Vivienne crawled out with agonizing slowness, a long ribbon of blood trailing behind her.

"Don't beg her. Even if I die, I'll never kneel to her."

Damien's pupils contracted. He crossed the distance in two strides.

When he saw the vicious wound across her stomach, his eyes flooded red. His hands clenched so tightly his knuckles trembled.

"Miss, if we let that woman live she'll be nothing but trouble. Let me have it finished now."

Arthur had barely finished speaking when Damien's gaze cut across the room like a blade.

He scooped Vivienne up and started toward the door.

The aura rolling off him was enough that even my men hesitated to close in.

Until a gunshot cracked through the hall.

Damien grunted, and his right leg buckled. He dropped onto one knee.

I held my pistol steady, staring him down with frozen eyes.

"Tonight is the family memorial. Grandfather and the others will be here within the hour. Are you really going to defy the entire Harrington house for one woman?"

Damien pushed himself back up.

He held Vivienne against him. A long moment passed. Then, very quietly, he gave a short, bitter scoff.

The rage in my chest shot straight to the top of my skull.

Something inside me was slipping out of my grip.

"Miss—don't do anything rash!"

Arthur was quick. He caught my arm before I could move.

Damien's right leg had been shot clean through. Blood was pooling at his feet. But he moved like he couldn't feel it at all, walking against the tide of men, step by slow step, until he was out the door.

It was the first time he had ever defied me.

Watching his back disappear, I laughed. The kind of laugh that comes from the edge of something breaking.

"Vivienne Ashford. How very clever."

"I want every detail on that woman. Bring it to me within the hour."