Page 4 of Marrying the Savage

Not in the dramatic, romantic way where hatred secretly means attraction, because God has punished women enough without inventing that nonsense.

I loathe him purely. I loathe his confidence. His assumptions. His perfect cuff links. The way he smiles when he thinks he has won. The fact that he’s probably already imagining me in some black designer dress, standing beside him like a silent, expensive vase.

“Adjust,” I repeat.

“Yes.” He sets down his glass. “Marriage requires maturity.”

“Then you must be terrified.”

His eyes flash. For one second, the charm drops, and I see the man underneath. The one who does not like being laughed at. The one who will not tolerate embarrassment, especially not from the woman everyone has already promised him.

My uncle sees it too.

The waiter returns with dessert, because apparently the universe has a sick sense of humor. He places a perfect little chocolate mousse in front of me, topped with gold leaf so thin it looks like something stolen from a saint’s halo. I pick up my spoon and take a bite, mostly because if my life is going to collapse, I deserve sugar.

The mousse is annoyingly delicious. I close my eyes despite myself.

Dmitri chuckles. “Finally. Something pleases you.”

I open one eye. “The mousse, yes.”

His smile fades.

My uncle mutters something in Russian under his breath. I choose to believe it’s a prayer for patience and not a request for my immediate removal from the bloodline.

Dmitri pushes his chair back slightly, his mood repairing itself as he returns to a subject he enjoys. Himself. “After the wedding, we’ll move into the Sokolov estate. You’ll have staff, of course. Drivers. Security. A stylist, if necessary.”

“If necessary?”

His gaze skims over my pale blue dress, my loose hair, and the little pearl earrings I chose because they belonged to my mother. Not because they match whatever version of me he wants to display.

“You have a tendency toward softness,” he says.

I look down at myself. “How humiliating.”

“It isn’t an insult.”

“It sounded like one, but please continue. I love being reviewed like furniture.”

“You’ll be my wife,” he says. As if that explains everything.

The conversation moves on without me, which is exactly how most conversations about my life seem to go.

Dmitri talks about security for the wedding with the seriousness of a man planning a military coup. My uncle answers in short, controlled sentences, occasionally correcting him when his arrogance starts outrunning common sense. They discuss the church entrance, the reception hall, the placement of armed men, and which families should not be seated anywhere near each other unless we want bloodshed before dessert.

I sit between them, spooning chocolate mousse into my mouth and trying to decide whether I can fake an illness dramatic enough to postpone the wedding but not so dramatic that someone calls a doctor loyal to my uncle.

Food poisoning seems possible. Madness feels imminent.

“The Volkonskys should be kept near the back,” Dmitri says, tapping one finger against the wedding folder. “They’re useful, but they drink too much.”

My uncle gives a dry look. “Half the men attending this wedding drink too much.”

“Yes, but the Volkonskys shoot when they drink.”

“That narrows nothing down.”

I nearly smile into my spoon.