I’m a prisoner with fancier chains, white gold and diamond instead of the plastic zip ties we started with.
As the driver closes the door, Roman leans down to speak to Alexei through the open window. “Sorry about the delayed honeymoon. But we have that meeting at eleven tomorrow morning at the Banya Club.”
Honeymoon?
The word reverberates in my head like a bad joke. As if we’d ever go on a honeymoon. As if this marriage were real enough to warrant one.
“It’s fine.” Alexei claps him on the arm. “The meeting takes priority.”
A dull ache flares in my chest.
Of course it does.
Everything takes priority over me and whatever he intends this sham of a marriage to represent. The limo pulls away from the curb, the cans rattling like broken promises.
We ride in silence. The space between us on the leather seat might as well be miles wide. Alexei gazes out the window, his profile sharp against the passing city lights.
I focus on anything but him.
The alcohol gradually wears off, leaving behind a headache, unwanted clarity, and the sensation that I’m floating on water covered in pond scum.
When we reach Alexei’s converted warehouse, he helps me from the car with that same impersonal touch. His hand hovers at my elbow, guiding but not connecting. During the elevator ride, the air vibrates with unsaid words.
The loft is colder than I remember. Or maybe that’s the reality of my situation settling like ice in my veins.
Alexei strides to his bedroom without acknowledging me, shedding his jacket and loosening his tie as he goes.
Just like that first night, when he found me in the alley and brought me home. A high-end killer who doesn’t care about me beyond my usefulness.
I linger in the main living space, still in my wedding gown, dressed up in someone else’s life.
Something breaks inside me, not with a crash but a whimper. I gather the heavy skirts and flee to the guest room.
Pixie greets me with a soft meow and rubs against my ankles. The normalcy of her presence, the reminder of the one thing in this new life that’s truly mine, nearly undoes me.
“Well, Pixie,” I reach behind my back for the zipper, “I guess this is it.”
My voice cracks on the last word, and I bite my lip to keep from crying.
The zipper sticks halfway down. I struggle with the tab, growing progressively more panicked with each failure to free myself from the fabric’s smothering weight. From the lies.
“This is my life now. Stuck in a situation I can’t escape from and married to a man who hates me.”
Too much.
This new reality is too much. Too heavy, too tight, too fake. Just like this marriage. Just like?—
“I don’t hate you.”
I freeze with the dress half off my shoulders. Alexei idles in the doorway, his shirt unbuttoned, his blue eyes blazing with heat.
Chapter 38
Alexei
My declaration permeates the air like smoke after gunfire. She’s half in, half out of her wedding dress, trapped in a white satin monstrosity that doesn’t suit her any more than this sham of a wedding suited either of us. But the expression on her face—bewilderment, vulnerability, a flash of brightness that might represent hope—slams into me more viciously than any bullet ever could.
I can’t maintain this barrier between us. Not when she’s gazing at me like I might actually matter.
