14
KALINA
Several nights later, we took our places around the fireplace.
I liked the bigger couch now, because I could put my legs up. Misha preferred to sit closest to the fireplace. And Alexsei suited that big chair. Or it suited him, a leathery, plush piece of furniture that was both big enough for his tall frame and sturdy enough that it didn’t soften him too much.
Instead of playing a game tonight, something I could secretly admit I was quickly getting addicted to, we just enjoyed the fire while Misha read.
It was all a treat. One I didn’t think could last. Fourteen years of seeing no one, having zero entertainment other than looking out windows when I was so privileged to stay in a dump where there were actual windows, made me an easy woman to please.
The thrill of competing in a trivial game hadn’t died out yet.
The intrigue of listening to stories hadn’t gotten boring so far.
Alexsei explained a couple of nights ago that Misha wasn’t only reading out loud for the sake of my entertainment. He’dgone through a spell of really struggling to read when he was younger. It was why he’d found private instructors and tutors at an institution for him instead of enrolling him in a traditional educational setting. It was a superior treatment, and he’d overcome a form of dyslexia by reading aloud and sounding it all out. The habit stuck, and he was a bona fide bookworm now.
I hadn’t asked, but I appreciated that Alexsei wasn’t walking on eggshells to not even try to initiate a conversation with me at all.
Especially after he caught me staring at his chiseled chest.
Just the memory of peeking at him for that half of a second threatened to make me blush again.
Tonight, I sat back and zoned out watching the fire in the massive fireplace. Misha read along, his voice changing as he alternated between lines of dialogue from the prince and princess in his book. It was an adventure, and while the suspense was adding up to a grand climax and finale, it was kind of predictable. No less enjoyable to listen to, but it was easily guessable that the guy would get the girl.
Like Misha, I used to be a bookworm. When I was younger, I devoured books. Since I was twelve, though, Erik had deprived me of that pastime. He determined, alongside Yusef’s training, that letting me read books for fun was a disservice to my future husband. A bride intended for nothing but to be bred shouldn’t have a mind of her own, shaped by ideas penned by authors they couldn’t personally vet. An imagination was a crime. A wandering mind was a grievance.
With that long drought of being trapped with no means to readanythingfor so long, Misha’s preference of books suited me. I was an adult, and yes, I wanted something more my level, butfrom where I’d left off with reading books of my choosing—when I was twelve—his genre and book levels matched.
That was why at night, when Alexsei and Misha were in bed, I snacked to my delight in the kitchen and I plucked books off the bookcase to explore. Always careful to listen for someone waking and telling me to go back to bed, I explored and dared to do something for myself in those midnight hours.
Faster and faster, Misha read aloud, lending more theatrical notes to the end of his book.
Itwasinteresting. And I was invested in the ending, even if it was predictable. But all of them were in this genre. That promised happily-ever-after.
Something I never thoughtIcould look forward to. Something I’d been warned to give up as a stupid, girly dream.
But is that still true?
The longer I didn’t see or hear from Erik or Yusef, I wanted to believe that horrible chapter of my life was over. That I’d been spared meeting a husband I didn’t want. That I had been saved from the fate of being bred.
Raisa was, though. I saw her pregnant.
It seemed too foolish to think that I would be deserving of a happily-ever-after like this book that Misha read aloud.
Is that even possible for someone like me?
Someone who was so broken and scared inside that it was a constant battle to speak up and not fear punishment. Someone who was so sheltered under wicked conditioning that it seemed impossible to function as a normal person in the real world.
Despite the end of the book nearing, Misha slumped sideways. Yawns cut between his words. Lower and lower he slumped until he sagged against me. At last, he dropped the rest of the way, his head on my lap. The weight of his head on my left thigh didn’t intimidate me. It almost grounded me. Feeling him against me was an anchor to prevent me from sucking back into the spiral of gloom and doubts.
That, no, I would never be normal after all I’d endured.
That, no, a happily-ever-after wasn’t just waiting to be presented to me.
No one could bethatnaïve.
I wasn’t.
