Page 67 of Betrayal and Vows

Decent. What a joke.

I open the door and her eyes sweep over me with clinical assessment. No horror. No sympathy. Just calculation.

"The tape," she says.

I stand there like a mannequin while she applies strips of clear tape to keep the dress from completely exposing me. The adhesive pulls at my skin, creating lines of irritation across my chest. Each strip feels like another chain binding me to this performance.

"There," she says, stepping back to examine her work. "Perfect."

Perfect for what? A strip club? A brothel?

I catch my reflection in the full-length mirror and barely recognize myself. The woman staring back looks expensive, untouchable, and utterly miserable. My grandmother's bracelet sits delicately on my wrist—the only piece of me that's still mine.

"Your hair needs to be up," Mom says, already reaching for the pins on my vanity. "Show off your neck."

She twists my hair into an elaborate chignon, securing it with a million pins. When she's finished, I look like every other Bratva wife—beautiful, polished, and completely hollow.

"Jewelry," she says, opening a velvet box I've never seen before.

The diamonds inside could fund a small country. A choker-style necklace that looks more like a collar, matching earrings that brush my shoulders, and a gaudy bracelet.

"I already have a bracelet," I say, touching my grandmother's gift.

"Not tonight." Her voice brooks no argument. "Take it off."

"No."

"Lena—"

"No," I repeat, louder this time.

It’s a small thing. Nothing to anyone else but everything to me.

Her eyes take in the bracelet. Of course, she knows where it comes from.

“You’re playing with fire,” she murmurs.

“I don’t care.”

“Come. We’re going to be late.”

Mother opens the door, and Anton is there.

His eyes sweep over me. I watch his expression shift from professional alertness to something darker.Much darker.

And dangerous.

His jaw tightens, a muscle jumping beneath the skin as he takes in every inch of the dress that barely covers me.

The anger in his eyes is immediate and volcanic. His hands clench into fists at his sides.

Mother shakes her head and walks away without a word, leaving us alone in the doorway.

"What the fuck are you wearing?" His voice is low and dangerous. The kind of tone that makes grown men step back.

"Anton—"

"Change. Now." He steps closer, his presence filling the doorway. "Take that off and put on something else. Anything else."