Good Novel
39
“We’re going to my restaurant. My family will be there, so dress appropriate and be on time.” As I turn for the door, I notice the bed hasn’t been slept in. The covers are all neatly in place, not so much as a wrinkle.
“I slept on the chaise,” she tells me, catching my line of sight.
“Why?” Like everything else in my home, the bed is luxury. Sleeping on a cloud would be less comfortable than the bedding in this room.
“I fell asleep.” She shrugs.
Niko’s waiting for me; I don’t have time for word games.
“Why didn’t you fall asleep on the bed?” I slide my hands into my pockets and take a small step away from her, giving her some space to herself.
She glances away. I don’t think she wants to talk about it, which makes me even more interested.
“I was just sitting there for a few minutes thinking, the next thing I knew it was morning.” She blushes. As confessions go, this was about as incriminating as Mother Teresa snagging a biscuit for herself at the food line.
“What were you thinking about?”
She raises her eyes to mine and for the first time, I see the slight puffiness around them. The woman hasn’t slept well in days, and I’m positive she’s been crying recently. Why wouldn’t she be, she’d been kidnapped and now is being forced to marry into the family that stole her from the street.
“Nothing important.” She runs her hands up and down her arms.
“Nothing exciting either, I guess since it put you to sleep.”
She rolls her eyes. A gesture that normally pisses me off, but she’s reacting to my lame attempt at levity, so I let it go. She’s going to have a hard enough day ahead of her.
“Did my father’s men hurt you when they took you?” I ask her, sensing a dark cloud lurking off in the shadows.
She blinks then shakes her head. “No, not really. I mean the drug they used made me sick, but other than that, I wasn’t hurt.”
I know what drug she means. A cocktail my brother, Igor, concocted years ago. It eventually renders the victim unconscious, but first it messes with their mind, makes them dizzy, gives them a headache as strong as a migraine. Some people become nauseated. The effects sometimes take days to fade.
“Are you still feeling ill?” I should have asked her these questions yesterday.
“No. The headache was gone when I woke up, I just had a little upset stomach. But I’m fine now.” She pads over to the chaise, her bare feet making no sound against the plush gray carpeting. When she sits down, the hem of the dress rises, exposing a dark purple bruise on the outside of her knee.
“What’s this?” I move to her and point to the bruise. If those assholes touched her while she was unconscious, if my father gave the go-ahead to use her while she was in that holding cell in the stable, I’m not sure I’ll be able to stop myself from bringing it to him.
She bends to see what I’m pointing at, then brushes my hand away. “It’s nothing. I hit my knee on the bed frame back at the…” She lifts her eyes to mine. “The stable.”
The weight of her disgust presses down on me. It’s not a proud feature of my family. But it is my family. I won’t speak out against them, not even to her.
My phone buzzes. I’m late.
I text Niko then stash the phone back in my pocket. “I have to get moving. There’s breakfast in the kitchen, eat it. If you’d rather, I can have one of my men take you to your father’s house and you can pack your things this afternoon.”
The corner of her mouth twitches upward and for a second I think she’s going to smile. But she recovers quickly, stashing her joy before it can fully form.
“That would be good, yes.” She looks at the bed. “Thank you.”
“Dimitri will be here at one o’clock to bring you to your father’s. I want you to rest this morning. Pick out something from the closet just for today.”
Her gaze hardens.
“You would rather show up at your father’s house in the same dress you were wearing yesterday?” I point to the skirt. “It’s all wrinkled.”
Her jaw clenches tighter. I’m not making a case, and I don’t need to. If I tell her to pick something, she should just fucking pick it.
“I won’t have you giving your father any reason to think I’m mistreating you. There’s peace today between our families, Lena. Do you really want to do anything that will mess that up?”
“Maybe you could have thought of that before your family kidnapped me and forced me here,” she snaps.
“It’s not that simple, and you know it.” My phone dings again. “I’m not arguing with you, I’m telling you. Don’t wear that to your father’s this afternoon. Pick something else; you can burn it later if you want.” I’m not sure what makes me offer that suggestion, but it seems to do the trick.
“You should go. You’re late,” she says and walks to the en-suite bathroom, closing the door gently. I wait for a soft click to signal she’s locked the door, but nothing comes. Satisfied that she will at least be able to behave herself while I’m gone, I grab my phone and shoot off a message that I’m on my way.
Once in the elevator, I send off orders to my men. We all have our duties for the day. Dimitri is the lucky bastard picked to babysit my fiancee for the afternoon.Property © NôvelDrama.Org.
Lucky bastard, indeed.