“She’s the one who cut your lip that first time I saw you.”
“I make her mad.”
“Fuck her.”
Her eyes lift to mine. “Do you mean that?”
“Do I mean fuck her? Yeah. And her fucking goons. I’m going to kill them.”
“You can’t kill Jeffrey.”
“I’ll kill him last.”
“No! Please, Nik, please. He’s my only friend.”
“Your friend knocked me out. Your friend stood there while your mother hit you. That’s not your friend.”
“He’s saved me before. Please. He thought he was protecting me in that room. He’s a good man.”
I’d kill him later.
"You'll need to stay on the estate," I say finally. "The grounds are extensive. There's a pool, gardens, and a small pond. But don't leave the perimeter."
She rolls her eyes. "Trading one prison for another. Fantastic."
That gives me pause. "What?"
She doesn't look at me when she answers. Her gaze flicks once toward the night-dark gardens through the glass. "There wasn't much outside in my life," she says. "The rooftop was my best option, if I was good. The rest was glass and walls. I never had a garden to walk to. No permission to take a run in the park. Just a treadmill. Through and through."
That lands harder than she probably intended.
I say nothing, but suddenly the way she stared at the trees when we arrived, like she was afraid to blink and lose them, makes perfect, devastating sense.
She wasn't being dramatic. She was starving.
No one deserves a life that narrow.
My next words come out softer than I mean them to. "Pasha knows the grounds better than anyone. He can show you the lake. The frog ponds. There's a hidden path to theboathouse." I pause. "And the gate that looks locked, but isn't."
Her eyes snap back to mine, filled with surprise. And then she smiles. Genuinely bright. The kind people don't fake.
"Thank you," she whispers.
“Don’t thank me.I didn’t save you. I don’t trust you. I don’t know you and I don’t care.”
I walk away and ignore the hurt I saw in her eyes.
Not my problem.
8
ELLE
Three days in, and I've officially been demoted from "forced bride" to "house plant." At least plants get watered occasionally.
I get nothing. Not a word, not a glance, not even the barest acknowledgment that I exist from the man who's supposedly going to be my husband.
Oh, yeah. I'm lucky, alright.
