Not everyone is heartless like him.
So I raise my chin, shooting him the same glare.
"It's not my fault," I say. "You pushed me into this marriage. You didn't mean to help me. If you did, you would have helped me without shoving me into this ridiculous game. You took advantage of my trapped state. How can I make such a vow to someone like you?"
"Cassie, we had a fucking deal." His voice is menacing, deadly.
I scoff in disbelief.
"Right. You're a fucking businessman. I get it. And I'm sick of it." My voice is shaking due to the emotion eating me inside—I'm trying my best not to shed a tear. "I'm tired of everybody always talking about business around me. I'm tired of people using me."
Even my own family, Morgan, is using me for money, for her ambition. She has admitted that she used Dad too, that she never loved him. And I'm about to enter a marriage in which both people are using each other, not because they care about and love each other.
"Cassie." Luke's voice is shaking, but unlike me, who's shaking from holding my tears, he's shaking from holding his anger. "You're talking about people ruining your life. Do you think that getting out of this marriage now would do any good for yourself?"
I'm stunned. Now that he said it like that, my mind is filled withmany thoughts. Say, I walk away from this marriage, what will happen to me?
The embarrassing news will reach the media, and in no time, the whole world will know about that. I'll be the nation's joke once again. They may think that I'm indeed a bitch who doesn’t want to settle down, an ungrateful woman who ditches her future husband who loves her and has stayed by her side during the lowest point of her life—I mean, I've made him sound like an angel to the rest of the world.
I know that many girls would kill to be in my position, to marry Luke.
And Luke won't be there to cover up all those dirty headlines anymore after what I'll have done to him.
Worse, some men who've always wanted to get to me will come back to bother me again, which will be the perfect fuel for the paparazzi.
Worst of all is that Morgan will think that I'm nothing without her, because apparently, my life didn’t get any better after she left me.
In short, it would be a mess. It would be shitty.
I cover my mouth with my hand, pacing around again. My heart thumps so wildly that I feel like it's about to explode out of my chest. Oh, God, am I having a panic attack?
"No, no," I deny, still pacing around in the room, feeling so lost.
"Cassie, look at me," Luke says.
"What should I do?" I rasp. "Oh, God, what am I gonna do?"
"Cassie," he warns.
"I can't walk down the aisle." I find it hard to breathe, my chest heaving up and down.
"Cassandra!" he snaps, making me halt in an instant.
Slowly, I turn toward him, only to find him boiling. I realize now that he tends to call me by my full first name every time he loses his temper—this is the second time that he’s done that.
He approaches me, his piercing hazel eyes boring into mine.
"Listen to me." His voice softens but is filled with implacable authority. "You will walk down the aisle and meet me at the altar. There's no other way. It's the only way out."
The truth behind his words hits me to the core. He's stating a fact, whether I like it or not.
My lips tremble. "But, I don't think that I can walk in this state," I stutter. I've never been this nervous before, not even when I performed in one of the biggest concerts in history. "What if people still think of me as the nation's whore? Maybe—" I choke, thinking about all those VIP guests, celebrities, and most importantly, countless reporters waiting outside. Admitting this to Luke makes me feel so fragile. "Maybe they came here to watch a joke."
Luke shoots me a deep and intense stare. He grits his teeth.
"You are going to be my wife, that makes you nowhere near a joke," he states.
Sometimes, I envy him for being so self-centered and confident, like he doesn't give a damn about what people think.
