When I didn’t react to his remark, he said, “Alright. Alright. But, seriously, you have no idea how things change in the underworld. As you have noticed, he doesn’t talk much. So he’d rather be silent than tell you something untrue.”
“If he didn’t care about what happened to you at all, you’d be dead by now,” he added, his tone devoid of humor.
Does that make all this easier?
Hell, no.
**********
Waking up without a window to gaze at the sky was torture in itself. It was like I’d lost my sense of time, and my body’s internal alarm was the boss.
So, today is the day I get married.
Growing up, I didn’t exactly have the time to dream about what my wedding day would look like. But it wasn’t like I didn’t spend hours imagining what my ideal wedding would be like when I was with Siroc, or even in the first few months of dating Vitya. None of my wedding fantasies or imaginings were particularly detailed. But I would pick even the worst of those over the reality I found myself in.
People married people they didn’t love all the time. But the man I hated the most? It was a recipe for disaster. Even though it was something I had to do, I couldn’t help but wish I were waking up in another reality where I wasn’t in the position to have to marry Konstantin Lobanov.
Up to this point, the clear expectation that Konstantin had of me—that I would take the reality badly and break—had been my incentive to act composed and keep my despair hidden. It had been the reason behind my calm demeanor. That and the fact that I couldn’t possibly change how things were going.
But the truth was that I wasn’t that girl. I wasn’t the girl who randomly got married in the name of strategy. I wasn’t the girl who lived one life one day and a completely different life the next.
But maybe I can try to be her.
Sighing heavily, I went into the bathroom to freshen up.
Ruslan was practically dragging me out of the room an hour later. He had come into the room just after I freshened up and was rolling my hair up in its usual twist. I, for one, was glad to be stepping out of the room after being restricted to its four walls.
“Cheer up!” he persuaded, “you only get married once.”
“Not when you’re marrying the devil himself,” I replied, making him suck in a dramatic breath.
Men moved swiftly up and down the hallway, carrying and organizing things. The interior of the house, which was covered in dust just two days ago, was now super neat. Of course, it was their boss getting married. But I realized something else: these people were used to arrangements like these, snap marriages, cover stories, clean paperwork. They were too efficient and organized to be unaccustomed to all of it. Unlike me.
“It’s definitely not what you would have wanted. But, eventually, it will only be what you make of it. Besides, aren’t you glad you weren’t in a relationship when all this happened? Imagine if you had to break someone’s heart. How messy would it have been?”
“That doesn’t make me feel better,” I declared.
He chuckled as he opened a door along the hallway and we entered a room which was much bigger than the one I had been staying in.
“Hello, miss,” a willowy blonde walked up to me, all smiles. “I’m Mara. Your seamstress. I’ll also be styling your hair and face.”
“I’ll be back to check on you,” Ruslan assured before leaving me.
This is really it.
As I followed Mara’s lead to the soft cream dress held up by a hanger, I felt like a pawn in a chess game I had no understanding of.
A spark of defiance burned in me as she started working on my face, her brush making quick but soft strokes.
I wondered what Konstantin was doing. He was probably ordering his men around in preparation for a marriage that would do more damage than he’d already done in my life. In that moment, my hatred for him surged.
Does he even remember the lives he has taken?
“I hope you like it. He said you preferred simple,” she inquired as she moved to the side, and I gazed at the mirror.
The makeup was, indeed, simple. But, it was also beautiful. The soft pink on my eyebrows and the highlighted contour of my face made me look and even feel younger.
The woman in the mirror wasn’t a victim; she was a woman who could survive inside a lion’s den.
