Red Alpha: A BWWM Russian Alpha Billionaire Romance Read Online Free Page A

peoples’ gazes, as he got older he came to realize that it was because his identity preceded him. He was Demyan Boykov, pet to Minister Danshov, sister to the blood-thirsty Elisaveta Boykov, and inheritor of his deceased parents’ estate.
    Said estate had been worth millions at the time of his parents death, and after years of careful investments steered and protected by the Russian government, it was now easily worth billions. Demyan lacked for no physical comfort. He supposed it was a small boon granted to him considering what his sham of a childhood had been like.
    Rather than being born with a so-called silver spoon in his mouth, he’d had one shoved down his throat in adolescence.
    And it had nearly choked him.
    “Boykov. Good of you to come.” He’d barely taken a handful of steps away from the door before he was greeted by Osip’s most loyal watchdog:
    “Evening, Lichakov.” It wasn’t so much the diminutive woman’s presence that intimidated – and it never had been. In fact, looking upon her without the slightest idea of who she was or what she was attached to, many men had been lured to their untimely deaths. No one would ever deny that Roksana Lichakov was one of Moscow’s most prominent beauties. Despite being in her mid-thirties, she didn’t look a day over twenty five. Lush blonde hair tumbled over her shoulders in waves, her face was unmarred by a single scar, and her mouth was full and inviting – always painted a brilliant crimson.
    She had a body most Russian women envied – slender and curvaceous all at once – a tiny waist complimented by ample breasts and a slight flaring of her hips; and Lichakov never failed to flaunt her beauty. It was one of the things that so endeared her to Osip. That, and her penchant for cruelty.
    Though Osip had long been married to a woman of his father’s choosing, everyone close to him knew that it was to Roksana he went at the end of the day – and his wife kept completely mum on the subject. Demyan had always thought it very wise of her, as Roksana had ripped out more than a few errant wagging tongues in her day. Her gorgeous face and cold blue eyes were the last thing that many political prisoners saw before they met brutal deaths at her hands.
    Often while Osip watched.
    No…Demyan didn’t relish being alone with Lichakov. There had been a time when she demonstrated attraction to him, but he knew better than to take that bait. Even now, he made sure to steer well clear of any situation that might be misinterpreted as compromising.
    Lichakov accompanied him through the vast halls of the Kremlin, the enticing sway of her hips drawing many a man’s gaze. Together, she and he were one fourth of all the current power in Russia, and people hurried to move out of their way as they passed.
    “Look at them,” Lichakov sneered under her breath, her lovely mouth pulling down into a grimace of distaste. “Like blind little mice, they scurry about…doing what they’re told.”
    Demyan smirked wryly as they reached the door that led to Osip’s office. “Better a blind mouse, Roksana, than one caught in your claws. Lovely as they might be.” To punctuate his point, he took her hand, brushing his lips over the back of it as he noted her long scarlet fingernails.
    The blonde’s eyes narrowed icily a moment before she snatched her hand from his grip, whirling to march away without a word.
    And for the second time that day – oddly – Demyan was left alone. He took a few moments to relish the stillness of the empty corridor before knocking briskly at the door before him. Almost immediately, a low, growling voice commanded that he enter, and Demyan did as he was bid.
    To one who had never before met Osip Danshov, the sight of him, Demyan knew, was a frightening one. While the Prime Minister himself was short, squat, and had been balding from a young age, he never went anywhere without an entourage of thugs to protect him. For a long while, Demyan had been one