Page 70 of Daddy's Reluctant Queen

The sun is settingand there still hasn’t been any word. Titus has assembled a virtual army of his men in the living room. There’s a din of sound that surrounds me that’s coming from downstairs… and I can’t sleep.

Titus tried to call Ignat hours ago and he’s yet to get an answer back. After the second hour of radio silence, he started moving, making calls to his men to find him and even sending some of them who were here out to look for any sign of Ignat. Suddenly, the issue of Luka being a secret is secondary. He just wants them to be found.

And there’s nothing I can do. I’ve kept my distance. I don’t want to get in his way and distract him from what he needs to do. I wish I could help him somehow. I just don’t know how.

I’ve been lying on my bed watching the light in my room change and I don’t think I can take it any longer. I need to do something to get my mind off the worry swirling around in my head.

My first thought goes to the pool. I usually like to go late at night when I can’t sleep. The fence around the pool is high enough so that Titus’s guards can’t accidentally walk up on me, which isnice when I want to swim without my clothes on, but the house is crawling with his men right now. I’m not even sure if I feel comfortable swimming in a bathing suit right now.

Fuck it. Titus is around and despite it all, I doubt he’d allow anyone to lay a hand on me. I get up from my bed and rummage through my drawers, looking for my bathing suit. It’s a simple one, nothing too small or with too much flair. Just a plain blue suit that looks like the generic ones they used to give out in school when I was on the swimming team as a teen.

I grab it and put it on, then wrap myself up in a robe and leave my room.

The din of conversation gets more intense as I walk toward the landing. The living room is packed with Titus’s men. A couple of them are on the couch, cleaning their guns while drinking bottles of beer. Some of them are walking through with ARs strapped to their backs, bantering back and forth in Russian. Some are just standing around with glasses of liquor in hand, in deep conversation.

I don’t see Titus. I wish I did. I’d feel a little better about having to walk through this thong of men who would shoot me in the head the moment they were given the order to do so. I take a short breath and stick my chest out and hold up my chin. I’m here and everyone knows it. I might as well settle into my momentary title as the untouchable fuck toy.

I start walking down the steps. My bare feet feel chilled with every step I take down into the living room. Slowly, the din changes, quiets, as heads lift and eyes fall on me.

I ignore them all and walk around the stairs and down the hall toward the pool entrance. I can feel a dozen eyes on me as I walkaway, probably trained on my ass, trying to see my hips move under the terry cloth robe I’m wearing.

It occurs to me as I step out into the humid air that this is what Helen of Troy must have felt like, walking through the streets of Troy as every eye watched and judged her. The reason they were at war and the reason the entire city would eventually be conquered.

Only difference is that Paris loved her. And I’m much more disposable than she ever was.

I take off the robe and drape it over one of the pool chairs nearby and take a moment to look up at the dying light in the sky above me. Any second, it’s going to be night proper and the only thing separating me from total darkness will be the lights around the pool. It’s almost symbolic in a way, I guess. The light keeping me from darkness seeking to claim me. The only question is what part of my life is the light and which part is darkness?

I dive headfirst into the pool, letting the cool water envelope me and wash over my head, through my hair, over my body, between my legs and my toes and fingers. I’m weightless as the water holds me, slows me down from hitting the bottom, and pushes me back toward the surface. I change direction to swim up to get some air.

My head emerges and I tread water, breathing in the warm air around me. Then I lean back and float.

There isn’t a cloud in the sky. The reds and oranges are fading out around the edges of the world while little pinpoints of light start to shine through. The world is so much bigger than just this, bigger than me, bigger than…

A sound gets my attention. A quick, scraping noise like a shoe skidding across cement. I right myself and look around the pool area. The door inside the house is closed. The pool chairs are right where they’ve always been. The tiny shed behind me is still in the darkness.

Yet, I feel like I’m being watched. It’s… unsettling.

It’s probably just my anxiety. Still…

Maybe I should go back inside, just as a precaution. I am out here alone, and who the hell knows where Titus is?

I swim to the edge and pull myself out of the pool. All things considered, this was probably a terrible idea, anyway. That’s what I get for being restless.

I grab the robe and wrap it around myself, glancing around one last time before looking down to tie it closed.

I never get the chance to finish tying the belt. Arms grab me from behind and yank me up off the ground. I scream instinctively and a hand covers my mouth.

No!My mind screams. I grab at the hand around my mouth, pulling the wrist away just enough for me to bite down on the palm.

My attacker yells out in pain and the arm around my waist loosens. I drive my elbow back hard, catching him in the stomach, and he drops me. I scramble to my feet and run.

“Fucking bitch!” I hear behind me as hard footsteps pursue me. The door is only a few steps and it feels like it’s a million miles away.

“Titus!” I scream as I get to the door. I’m yanked back again. This time, I swing a fist back and catch my attacker on the side of the face.

“You little cunt?—”

An elbow to the side of his head and he’s let me loose again. I stumble back this time, falling on my back. It’s then that I hear gunshots somewhere else on the property… and I see my attacker’s face. It’s one of Titus’s men. Or ex-men. The one with the same face of the other one I’ve beaten up.