21
VIOLET
Fiancée.
The admission makes the air leave my lungs. The room tilts sideways. For three heartbeats, I can’t move.
Fiancée.The word tastes like poison. The courtyard. The restaurant. His mouth between my thighs while I screamed his name. All of it contaminated now.
The rage crashes in.
“You son of a bitch.”
I’m moving before I process the decision. Past him, toward the hallway, toward my room, my prison, my cage, the place he put me in while he had a fiancée waiting somewhere outside these walls. My heels crack against the marble like gunshots.
“Violet—” His footsteps follow. “Let me explain?—”
“Explain?” I whirl on him. We’re in the hallway now, halfway to my room, and I don’t care who hears. “Explain what? That you kidnapped me, kept me prisoner, made me—” My voice cracks. I hate the crack. Hate the weakness it reveals. “Made me feel things while you had afiancée?”
“It’s not what you think.”
“Oh, that’s rich.” A laugh tears from my throat. Ugly and sharp. “That’s what every married man says. Every cheatingpiece of shit with a wife at home and a mistress on the side. ‘It’s not what you think, baby. She doesn’t understand me like you do.’”
His face goes pale. “I’m not?—”
“You’reexactlythat.” I back away from him. Keep backing up until my shoulders hit my bedroom door. “Just a darker, stronger version. You don’t sneak around behind her back. You cage the other woman in your house. Keep her locked up like a dirty secret. Make her want you while you pick outwedding rings.”
“It’s an arrangement.” His jaw is tight. Hands fisted at his sides. “Political. I never wanted?—”
“I don’t care what it is.” The words slice through the air between us. “You lied.”
“I never wanted to marry her.”
“But you were going to!” The words rip from somewhere deep. Somewhere I didn’t know could hurt this much. “Your father’s in there talking about speeches and rings and you’reengaged, Elio. While I’m here thinking?—”
I stop.
Can’t finish that sentence. Can’t admit what I was thinking. What I was starting to feel.
“Thinking what?” His voice is quiet. Careful.
“Nothing.” I fumble for the door handle behind me. “Forget it.”
“Violet—”
The door opens. I stumble inside. Try to slam it in his face.
He catches it. Pushes through. Closes it behind him with a soft click that sounds like a prison cell locking.
“Get out.”
“No.”
“I said getout.”
“And I saidno.” He stands between me and the door. Blocking my escape. As if there’s anywhere to escape to. “You don’t get to walk away without hearing the truth.”
“The truth?” Another bitter laugh. “The truth is, you lied. Every conversation, every meal, every time you touched me—” My voice breaks again. Fuck. “—you were lying. Showing me what ‘our life could be’ while another woman was planning your wedding.”
