Olivia Sparks

Konstantin scoffed. "Humor me, please, Olivia," he said. The absurdity of the couple's request exponentially grew the longer he stayed in the same sphere as the two. He couldn't wait to leave and pop a bottle of aged whiskey.

If not for Chanel Greene's insistence to meet Olivia that morning, he would be snoring in his pad that very second.

It's not a joke running an underground bank. There would be nights he had to be up to watch the operations, especially last night, when some delegates of the conference got invited to the underground poker game. 

Olivia saw it as her chance to demand something else on top of the list which Maxen was asking for. Scrunching her nose, she wiggled and peeled away from Maxen's caging side embrace. "And I want Natalia. You will deliver her to me tomorrow night in this same room."

"My sister is off-limits, Olivia," Konstantin disagreed although he knew he was left with no choice but agree, yet again, to Olivia's demand. He cracked his neck to relieve the tension that stifled it. He thought, when would his siblings stop creating troubles for him to fix? Breaking him from his stupor was Olivia's jazzy voice.

"Too late. You should have told her not to start a fire she can't quench when she turned Xandra's painting into ashes."

Seeing that Olivia wouldn't budge until she got what she wanted, Konstantin made himself clear. "The last thing that I will ever do is send my one and only sister to a lion's den."

"Okay then. I'm giving you the chance to surrender your sister in our hands peacefully, but it seems I have to use a little force and drag her out of The Ritz."

"You don't have to use force, baby," Maxen said. He c.a.r.e.s.sed Olivia's cheek with the back of his index finger. "We can invite her for dinner, which she will gladly accept, and then accidentally drop a sleeping pill in her drink. After that, you can do whatever you like to her when she wakes up. How does that sound, Kostya?" Maxen jutted his chin towards Konstantin's way.

"Just let it go. What's thirty million to you, Maxen? All you wanted was revenge. And once you got yours, Natalia will retaliate. It will be a never-ending cycle." Konstantin tried to sound as convincing as possible, even when he knew in his gut that the pair was hell-bent on getting payback on his sister.

"No, it won't. Everything between your sister and I would end after she gets a tickle of my anger. So, either we treat her like a princess: you let her walk the red carpet and drop her off properly. Or… I will drag her here, draining her energy even before she faces her nightmare, which is me, by the way."

"Olivia." Konstantin shook his head. He couldn't believe what he was hearing from her mouth. "When have you become so violent? You weren't like this before."

Olivia took a sharp inhale, exhaling through pursed lips. Her gaze locked on Konstantin as she spoke, "I didn't want to offend people before, so they took advantage of me, used me and my silence to mooch off. At one point, I got tired. Why… Why do I let myself be passed around for others' personal gains? What you hear and what you see now is the real me—the one who embraced her flaws. I will get angry. I will get sad. I won't hold back my emotions just because I don't want to be seen as someone you can control."

Maxen rubbed the pad of his thumb on Olivia's arm, and it soothed her from her trembling. While she was speaking, she saw past incidents flash before her, and a healed wound that she buried deep had sliced open. Those memories of betrayal and deceit brought back pain, but it felt good. It made her feel alive and human.

Glancing to her side, she mouthed, "Thank you," to Maxen.

"Your sister burned something important from us. If Maxen hadn't been intellectual enough, we wouldn't have figured out a way to find who we're searching for."

"But you found that person. So there's no need to wage a vendetta against Natalia."

"Kostya, you know your sister. She won't stop until she gets what she wanted and in this case, she wanted Maxen for herself."

"I'll keep her on a leash."

"And she will just bite your hand, running as far away as she could when you let go of it."

Sparing a glance at Maxen, Konstantin wondered why the prince was quiet all along, letting his wife do all the talking. "You agree on this, Maxen?"

"I never spared your sister a glance. All our encounters were purely for business. If you think me speaking to her would change her mind and stop harassing us, well, I'm sorry to break it to you, but you're wrong. There is only one way to end this madness, and that is Olivia showing Natalia that she can't mess with my wife."

"Plus...we know what she begged you to do, and that's the reason why you're trapped in this room. Unfortunately, we both know you were unsuccessful in stealing it. She ruined a thirty-four million art. I just want to have a night with her and I won't charge her for the damages. Not a dime out of her pocket," Olivia reassured him.

Konstantin took a sharp breath. If Olivia wouldn't take a cent from his sister, it meant she would be taking something greater this time. Whatever that was, he was sure as hell it's not an eyebrow.

Konstantin shook his head in disbelief. "What a lovely pair you two are." A corner of his mouth then tugged up in a smirk. His eyes darted from Maxen to Olivia, regarding the royal couple, and his heart squeezed so painfully at how beautiful Olivia was. 

She should be his, but he lost his chance. He should have spoken up sooner, made his feelings known to her, then maybe, just maybe, he would be the one sitting beside her. He stole one last peek at the woman who owned his heart for years and came up to a conclusion.

"You…can meet her later tonight. Let's get this over with." Konstantin let out a loud exhale. He didn't want to do it, but sometimes, one had to be the bad guy to save a sibling from utter ruin.

Nodding his head, Konstantin appreciated the sight across from him. For the first time in a long time, he saw Olivia beaming with happiness. He would love to lie to himself that he was the reason behind that smile, but he knew better. 

That smile so beautiful it could launch a thousand sh.i.p.s wasn't for him. It was a smile celebrating Olivia's victory. But not just her victory. It was also a smile for Natalia and whatever his sister would lose tonight.