Chapter Forty-five
The lights have been darkened, the tables have moved a little further away from the dance floor and soft music now plays for the room.
There are crowds of people dotted throughout the space, some talking quietly, others laughing, all dressed in their finest as cameras flash and people dance.
I’ve taken meds which have taken the edge off the pain in my hand making me feel a little lighter. No one mentions what happened, they ask me if I’m okay but that’s as far as it goes.
“Dance with me,” Malakai leans in.
“Not many people are dancing right now,” I point out.
“So?”
“Everyone will stare.”
“Please give me another pointless reason,” He deadpans.
I glance at the dance floor and try to tell myself why this is a bad idea but I can’t think of a single reason, so I slide my uninjured hand into his.
His eyes light up as he helps me to my feet and then he’s guiding me to the dance floor.
Hozier, Work song, plays softly over the speakers as Malakai draws me in close. I place my injured hand on his shoulder while my other rests in his, and his hand spreads across my spine, keeping me flush against him. His eyes are on me as he begins to move us to the music, his every step in beat to the song. The lyrics flow through me, slamming into me more and more as his eyes hold mine, never wavering.
We don’t speak as we dance, the attention is purely on the way we move, on the way our bodies talk and join, like they know, like it’s built somewhere deep inside of us to read the other. Nothing else matters right now, I don’t see the hundreds of other people surrounding us or the other bodies dancing. I only feel us as we dance, like the two of us are part of the same puzzle, pieces coming together to form an entire image.
A beautiful, messy painting built upon carnage, deception, and violence.
He holds me like I am precious, like I am the sun in his life and the way he looks at me completely devastates me.
“Olivia,” He rasps my name, the sound almost lost to the music.
“Don’t,” I warn.
I see him swallow and a touch of his hardness shutters over his eyes, “Later, then.”
“Later,” I agree. Or never.
He finishes the song with me, his touch not changing despite the shift in our conversation and the hardness remaining in his eyes. I’m not ready to have such discussions with him. It’s just sex. Just a mutual loathing that manifested in some great fucking, but too much reflection has now ruined that.
This between us, it’s just a contract, that’s all marriage is. I have to ignore what I feel.
But no matter how much I say it in my head, I can’t get myself to agree to it.
Fuck, when did this get hard?
I pull out of his arms, “I need some air.”
He moves to come with me, but I shake my head, “Give me five minutes. I just need five.”
“Olivia,” He whispers.
“Please,” I breathe.
I can see he doesn’t want to, can see he is warring with himself, it’s all over his face but eventually, he dips his chin and lets me go. I flee, my heels eating up the space to the door. I feel him watching me the entire time, right until I slip out the door. There are a few guests mingling in the foyer and beyond the doors I see snow is falling. I don’t have a coat, so I change direction and head for the staff entrance behind the desk, slipping into the empty hall.
I press my back against the wall, close my eyes and let out a breath.
It was all the little things. The crusts on my bread, the need to know I’ve had water, had food. It was the forehead kisses and light touches, the smiles he threw me when I tried to piss him off. It’s the attention and care he provides, the softness I see in him when he’s trying to hide it behind a wall of violence.
It’s him in his entirety, the hard, brutal parts of him, the dominant possessive edges that have been softened by the way he cares for those close to him. It’s his laughter with the boys and his mischievous, playful grins.
Fuck.
I’m falling in love with my husband.
Conflict works through me; how could I love him? He took my choices away, threatened my family. My sister is the only family I have left, and he would have taken her too if I didn’t agree to marry him. It makes everything that happened to her seem small, not important but it almost destroyed her.
It feels disloyal.
I should call her. I pull my cell from my purse and bring up her contact information but before I can press the button, the staff door opens. I’m expecting one of my employees but it’s two men who enter the hall.
“Sorry,” I lock my phone again, “You can’t be back here. This is a staff only area.”
“Olivia Farrow?” The one on the right asks.
“That’s right.”
The two men exchange a look and then they’re coming for me. I stumble back, dropping my purse, along with the phone which they step on, crushing it.
Shit.
I turn and I run, heading straight for the office. If I can get there first, I can lock myself inside.
I’m pulling on the handle when arms come around me, dragging me back from the door.
I let out a scream but a hand slams across my mouth hard enough, my teeth cut into my lip and I instantly taste blood on my tongue. He lifts me off the floor and begins to drag me toward the door that leads back to the offices. There’s a fire exit that way and no one to see them.
I can’t let them get me there. I fight in his arms, kicking out with my legs and landing a blow to his shin with my heel.
“Bitch!” He hollers, dropping me. I land hard on my knees but I’m up a moment later, and sprinting as best I can with the lengths of the dress and my heels. I need to get to where there are people, where someone can see me, but the door is so fucking far away. My mouth is still bleeding and my knees ache, my hand throbbing anew.
Shit. Shit. Shit.
A hand grips my arm tightly, stopping my forward motion. I’m yanked back once more.
“Knock the bitch out!” I hear the other one say.
“Help me!” I scream before he can quieten me. A hand strikes me across the face and bright light bursts behind my eyes, stunning me enough I feel my body go lax in the arms that hold me.
Fuck. No.
But I feel useless, like I can’t fight even though my mind is telling me to. My body doesn’t listen, it does nothing.
“She’s still awake,” I hear them say, the voice like an echo inside my head.
He’ll hit me again. Any second now.
I feel my spine hit the wall, hands holding me up but my head rolls to the side, eyes flicking to the door.
“Pretty little thing,” he says, grabbing my cheeks in his fingers. My lips pucker as my teeth bite against the inside of my cheeks. “Be a good girl and go to sleep.”
He jerks my head forward and then slams it back, knocking my head into the wall.
Fog drifts into my vision but still, I look to the door. To safety that’s just too far out of reach.
But then it opens, and a body fills the frame.
My vision is too dark to make out who it is but there’s something so recognizable in the way they stand and then they speak, in a voice filled with murderous intent, the roar filling the space all around me.
“Get your fucking hands off my wife!”