Anya carries in a tray around one o'clock—a salad with grilled chicken and balsamic dressing, a fresh roll that’s still warm from the oven, and a glass of sparkling water with lemon. It’s perfectly prepared and beautifully plated. It’s the kind of meal you’d pay good money for at a nice restaurant.
And it’s utterly tasteless.
Or maybe everything is tasteless now. Maybe my ability to enjoy anything died with Alexei. Maybe grief has stolen my sense of taste along with everything else—my freedom, my future, my hope.
I pick at it, managing to eat about half before the nausea threatens to return. The smell of the balsamic is too strong, making my stomach turn. I push the plate away and curl up in the chair again, staring out at the too-perfect grounds.
The afternoon drags on with the weight of centuries.
I try reading one of the books from the library, a leather-bound copy ofPride and Prejudicethat’s probably a first edition worth thousands of dollars. But I can’t focus. The words blur together, meaningless. I read the same paragraph three times and still have no idea what it says. My mind won’t settle or stop spinning through scenarios and possibilities and fears.
What if Dimitri finds out about the baby? What if someone notices the morning sickness? What if I start showing before I can figure out a plan? What if, what if, what if...
I attempt to nap on the plush couch in my room, but sleep won’t come. I’m too wired, too anxious, too aware of the life growing inside me and the danger I’m in. Every time I close my eyes, I see Dimitri’s face—those cold gray eyes, that harsh expression. I hear his voice. “Welcome to hell, Mrs. Volkov.”
Hell. That’s what this is. A beautiful, expensive hell.
The shadows grow longer as afternoon turns to evening. I watch the sun move across the sky, golden light turning orange then pink then purple. It’s beautiful, in an abstract way. The kind of sunset people take photographs of, that they watch from beaches or mountaintops while feeling grateful to be alive.
I feel nothing. Just numb. Empty. Alone.
Around five o’clock, Anya appears in the doorway of the morning room where I’ve spent most of the day.
“Mrs. Volkov? Dinner will be served at seven in the formal dining room.”
Seven o’clock. Still two hours away. Two more hours to wait, to sit with my thoughts, to spiral further into anxiety and fear.
“Will Mr. Volkov be joining me?” I ask, even though I already know the answer and I’m not sure if I want him to be there or not.
She shakes her head, her expression sympathetic. “Mrs. Kozlov says he called. He won’t be home until very late. He has... business to attend to.” She says the last part carefully, like she’s repeating what she was told to say. “You’ll be dining alone.”
Right. Of course. Of course he won’t be here. He got what he needed from me last night—the consummation to make the marriage official in the eyes of the community. The proof that he’d claimed his revenge. Now he can go back to pretending I don’t exist. Go back to his business, his life, his world that has nothing to do with the unwanted wife he’s locked in his house.
“Thank you, Anya,” I manage to say.
The formal dining room is exactly that, formal and utterly impersonal.
A polished mahogany table that could seat twenty, maybe thirty people, stretches the length of the room. The chandelier overhead is massive—crystal and gold, dripping with prisms that catch the light and throw rainbows across the walls. More expensive art. More everything.
But there’s only one place setting. Mine. At the end of this enormous table, looking small and ridiculous and so fucking lonely I want to cry.
The meal is excellent. Perfectly cooked salmon with a lemon butter sauce that probably took someone hours to prepare.Roasted asparagus and baby potatoes and carrots seasoned to perfection. Risotto that’s creamy and rich, the kind you pay forty or fifty dollars for at an Italian restaurant. A dessert of panna cotta with berry compote that’s so beautiful it looks like art.
All of it served by Anya, who quietly sets each course down. Each time she enters, she’s silent except for the soft clink of dishes being set down. Each time she leaves, the door closes with a gentle click that somehow sounds like a cell door locking.
I eat alone in that massive room, the chandelier casting shadows that dance across the walls. The silence is so complete I can hear my own breathing, the scrape of my fork against the plate, the whisper of fabric when I shift in my chair.
This is my life now. Expensive meals eaten alone. A beautiful prison. Guards and hostile staff. A husband who hates me and only touched me once to establish ownership, who can’t even bear to be in the same house as me during waking hours.
And a secret growing inside me that could destroy everything.
I manage to eat most of the meal. I guess my appetite is better in the evening than it was this morning, which is something to be grateful for, I suppose. Small mercies. But each bite feels like ashes in my mouth, tasteless and joyless.
When I finally retreat to my bedroom, I’m exhausted but too anxious to sleep.
I pace the room, from the windows overlooking the grounds to the door and back again. Back and forth. Back and forth. My feet wear a path in the plush carpet. The room is dimly lit now, shadows gathering in the corners, and it feels even larger in the darkness. More empty. More lonely.
My hand keeps drifting to my stomach. A gesture I really need to stop making before someone notices. But I can’t help it. It’s the only thing that feels real right now. The only thing connecting me to Alexei, to the life we should have had, to the future that was stolen from us.
