I had 3 dozen yellow roses sent to her dressing room that night. I ordered them in front of my date, not caring when she took offense and stomped off, pouting like a petulant child. I’ve made sure Emma received yellow roses after every performance since.
“Yes,” I say. “Yellow for devotion.”
“Why not red?” she asks. Another question that surprises me.
“Red doesn’t mean romance to me,” I say simply with a half shrug. “I see that colour every day in my line of work. It means the end. And I knew you were my beginning. Bright and beautiful.” I lift my hand to her face now, allow myself the simple pleasure of stroking the pads of my fingers over her cheek.
“Why didn’t you just ask me out?” she asks, her voice a little breathy.
“It’s just not who I am. I needed to feed my obsession with you, but also make sure I wasn’t making you into something you’re not.”
“What do you mean?”
I drop my hand from her face and pour us both a drink before returning to her. “I mean, it’s easy to look at a beautiful woman, dancing like the universe itself is being woven by her skill and talent alone, and fall in lust. I needed to know that the woman I was obsessed with was real and not just some figment of my fractured imagination.”
“Wanting you, was easy,” I add, watching as she downs her drink in three short gulps, before squeezing her eyes and mouth shut against the burn. “Falling for you was easier still. I looked at you and saw my future, and I was willing to wait. But recent events mean the timeline has had to be moved up.”
“What timeline?” she asks. “Swan Lake was eighteen months ago. I firstfeltyou eighteen months ago. I feel like I’ve beenpulled into something I didn’t know I was already a part of. And now you’re telling me you were waiting until I was ready to be claimed. What does that mean?”
My brothers would tell you I never hesitate. I never question the first option that pops into my head when it comes to day-to-day business. I follow orders. I do my job.I never hesitate. But right now, I do.
She is beautiful in her baggy clothes. Her glossy, brown hair, pulled loose from its severe bun, is falling in waves around her face. Her cheekbones are sharp, but her face is soft. I truly believe hers are the only eyes that have ever looked at me without fear or disgust.
It does something to me.
“My uncle, the Pakhan, our boss—” how do I tell her? Fuck I’ll just say it. “I have to marry you and have a child within twelve months.”
Emma
His words land between us like a gunshot.
I blink a few times, processing what I heard, doubting it, realizing he isn’t making a joke and I definitely didn’t mishear him.
“I’ve been watching you closely,” he says as my chest tightens and my breaths become shallow. “Your injury is career-ending, your boss was planning to kick you from the companyafterraping you. He has been trying to do that for a while, by the way. He was already grooming your replacement.”
“Hannah Harvey…” I say, trailing off.I knew it.
“You danced your last performance last night,” he continues. “You know that. Your director knows it. Your boss knew it first.”
I clench my teeth together hard when my jaw tries to tremble.
“You don’t belong to a stage that discards you after breaking you,” he says quietly. “You belong with me. With a family that doesn’t end when your body changes.”
I slam the glass onto the small table beside the sofa, my hands curling into fists. “You think a child replaces everything I’m losing?”
“No,” he says, shaking his head once. “I think it gives you something that can’t ever be taken away. You’ll be safe here. Protected. Wanted in ways I wish I could describe,” he continues. “You won’t have to earn your place by bleeding andbreaking for it. And your body, your discipline, your strength, will be used to build something real for us, instead of destroying itself for others.”
I laugh once, sharp and disbelieving. “You make it all sound so inevitable.”
“It is,” he says. “Unless you choose to walk away right now.”
He gestures to the door.
“I won’t stop you,” he says. “I’ll make sure you’re never harmed again. But you’ll go back to a world that has already decided you’re done.”
I let my gaze flick to the door, then back to Avros, but I don’t move.
“I’m not asking you to fall in love me tonight. I’m asking you to stay. To rest. To let yourself grieve the life that’s over and begin to consider what a future here with me could be like.”
