He laces his fingers through mine and lifts our joined hands to press a kiss to my knuckles. “Relax, baby. It will work out.”

Maybe. Maybe not. But hope is hard to argue with. And so is . . . love.

Damn it.

After we land, we go back to the apartment to change and shower off the evidence of travel. With each minute that ticks us closer to telling my parents the truth, my stress grows. I’m practically vibrating by the time we head down to the car Casimir called.

I sent my parents a text, so they know we’re coming. The fact that I didn’t respond to the dozens of texts from them over the past couple of days isn’t going to earn me any points. I’ve made a fucking mess of this.

“Breathe.” Casimir takes my hand as we walk toward the front door. “You got this.”

“They’re going to shoot you.”

“Maybe.”

I swing around to look at him. “What the fuck do you mean maybe? You can’t seriously be so calm about this.”

“We live in a world of blood and violence, Ruby. But they love you, and I love you, so no one is going to die tonight.”

“That leaves a lot of space for pain and getting shot,” I mutter. I dig my key out and unlock the front door.

“Da.” He opens the door and tugs me inside.

If I hadn’t already known my parents were worried and furious, them meeting us in the foyer would have clued me in. Mother is wringing her hands, but Dad and Da are both locked down.

Da’s expression goes soft when he sees me but hardens immediately as he takes in my hands, linked with Casimir’s. “I think it’s time you explained yourself, Ruby.”

All the words clog my throat, and I have to swallow a few times to get them in order. There are a thousand explanations and excuses lining up in my head, but it’s best to rip off this bandage immediately. “Mom, Da, Dad . . . I’m getting married.” I keep talking over their sharp questions. “To him. Casimir Romanov.”

“Casimir Romanov,” Dad repeats slowly. “You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.”

“Casimir Lukov Romanov, to be most accurate,” Casimir says. He’s so fucking calm in the face of their growing anger.

Da is the one who moves first. He stalks to us, and there’s no warning, no tensing to indicate his intentions. He punches Casimir in the face.

The force of it knocks Casimir back a few steps. I start forward, fully intending to get between them before Casimir strikes back, but he . . . doesn’t. Not even when Da punches him again, this time in the stomach. It bends him in half, and as soon as he rises, Da hits him again.

“Stop!”

Mom starts forward, but Dad gets there first, wrapping his arms around Da and hauling him back. “He’s not fighting you.”

“He’s a fucking Romanov.” Da lunges forward, but Dad holds him back. Barely. “He came into our house and lied to our faces. He defiled our⁠—”

“I’m going to need you to stop right there,” I snap. “Casimir wasn’t completely honest, and that’s something he and I will deal with. You don’t get to start pretending like I’m some virgin princess locked away in a tower and he stole me. I made my choices, and damn it, I’m not an innocent.”

Mom looks a bit like she wants to throttle me. “You went to the Black Rose Auction. You lied to us.”

“Yes.” It’s hard to meet her gaze. “I’m sorry I lied. I’ve been dealing with some stuff, and I had to do it on my own.”

“You mean him.” She turns her attention to where Casimir has finally straightened again. He’s bleeding from his mouth, and one of his eyes is already starting to swell shut. Mom walks past my fathers to stand before him. “You’re the Mad Wolf. We’ve heard of you. Killing you might please me in the short term, but since we have no desire to bring your family down on us, tell me why we shouldn’t drive you to the border of the city and turn you loose.”

Casimir wipes the back of his hand against his bloody mouth. “I love your daughter. I have from the start. I knew you wouldn’t give me the time of day if you knew who I really was, so I lied. But the truth is out now, and I’m only too happy to get my hands bloody standing between Ruby and the rest of the world.”

“Hmm. We’ll see.” She glances at me. “You haven’t handled this properly from the beginning. Coming in here and dramatically announcing that you’re going to marry a Romanov?” She shakes her head. “Cordelia will denounce you in seconds if she thinks you’re compromised. You want to marry him? Do it right.”

I can barely process her words, Casimir’s words. “What do you mean when you say, ‘Do it right’?”

“You will move back in here for a time.” She flicks her fingers at Casimir. “And you will court her properly. A little distance will do you both some good and allow you to think clearly. If this is true love like you claim, you won’t have an issue proving it.”

Casimir doesn’t look like he likes this plan any more than I do. He glances at me and then refocuses on my mother. “Whatever it takes.”

“Yes, well, we’ll see.” She turns back to me. “After a month or so, you can go before Cordelia and ask permission to marry. She will have final call.”

“Mother!”

“This is the proper way to do things, Ruby. Obviously we’ve been too lax with you if you think you can waltz in here with a Romanov who’s been lying to us for years and proclaim you’re getting married. It’s time to grow up.”

Casimir steps close and presses a quick, bloody kiss to my lips. “This changes nothing, baby. I’ll accomplish the task you put before me and come back for you.”

“You may leave now, Casimir,” my mother says, her polite tone icy enough to cut him to the bone.

With one last long look at me, he turns and walks out the door. The cowardly part of me wants to flee after him, to do anything to avoid the difficult conversation coming for me. But my mother is right. It’s time to stop acting like a spoiled brat.

As the door closes, I turn to face my furious parents. Mom turns to my fathers. “Let’s take this to the kitchen.”

That’s only a slight relief. There are two places in this house for shitty conversations—the kitchen and the study. The study is for more formal ones, for the true fuckups. The kitchen is more informal, an easier place to not feel like you’re put on the spot.

“Sit.”

I sit.

My parents move in a smooth rhythm that almost feels coordinated: Mom starting the kettle, Da easily shifting behind her to grab the sugar and cream, Dad pulling out the tea tins. When I was thirteen, Mom decided that talking in the kitchen over tea was the way to handle most teenage challenges. It works.

I’ve sat in this exact spot and spilled my heart out over crushes and fights with friends and asshole teachers and all the frustrations that arise when every conflict feels like the end of the world.

Several minutes later, we all have steaming cups of tea in front of us. Da leans his forearms onto the counter. “You’ve handled this poorly.”

Guilt, true guilt, threatens to suffocate me. “I know. I’m sorry.”

“Take us through it,” Dad says.

And so I do. At least mostly. My parents don’t need to know the dirty details of the sex, and they don’t need to know that Casimir was playing at being Wolf to my Little Red and stalking me. But I disclose the broad strokes of the cheating, the breakup, the auction, the revelation.

“Ruby.” Mom sighs. “You should have come to us.”

“With all due respect, as much as I love you, I have to start dealing with stuff on my own. I won’t pretend that I dealt with this well, and I am sorry for that, but for the first time in my life, I feel like me instead of a polished doll that only does the right thing all the time.”

Da crosses his arms over his chest. “We never expected perfection from you.”

“I know.” My words get choked, but I press through. “I’m not trying to escape responsibility. I didn’t want to disappoint you, so I carved off big parts of myself to fit the role that I thought you wanted, even while I dodged that role. But I’ve been . . . phoning it in when it comes to most of the stuff in my life. It’s time for that to change.”