His Coldest Bargain

The Vasiliev syndicate runs the salt trade along a dead god's spine, and Ilona Vasiliev has been given every knife in the family except the books. When the capo dies and the accounts disappear, the only witness left is the man who buried her mother and walked out fourteen years ago. Aleksei Danilov comes back with a single requirement: the family releases his brother from the salt mines, or he takes his silence to a rival house. Ilona offers him the ledger and a bride price instead. Together they drive the salt road, from a night market to a sunk chapel, and the ledger they recover names a man whose blood Ilona cannot spill without spilling her own. Aleksei wants her alive. She wants the truth. Neither of them plans to be the one who walks away this time.