Chapter Twenty-Four
Livia
I didn’t sleep well last night. I tossed and turned into the early hours of the morning, eventually giving up on sleep completely to just lie in bed and watch the winter sun make a small appearance in the sky, my mind whirling nonstop about my escape.
I weigh my options over and over again against the state of my life right now. Will I be successful if I escape? And what will I do with my life, away from everyone I love, if I’m successful?
There’s a knock on the door, and I know it’s Veronica—she has a signature knock, and I appreciate knowing it’s her and not someone else, and by someone else, I mean the three of them.
“How are we doing this morning?” Veronica asks, pristinely put together in her skirt suit and kitten heel pumps. She draws the rest of the curtains in the bedroom that I closed last night. The room is so big that it has several windows.
Like I have a hangover without the drinking part. Not that I know what a hangover feels like in the first place. I never had one.
“Fine,” I say instead. She has a tablet in her hand, and I know we’re going to do what we did yesterday. She’ll give me a list of things I could do or should do as the Ursid bride—not as their bride in the capacity of them being crime lords, but as them being billionaires in the corporate world.
Yesterday, before my shift at Jimmy’s, Veronica suggested I join a book club, the one all the other billionaires’ wives are in, or start my own charity project. Money is not a problem, she informed me, and she got that from my husbands, aka, my captors.
“Right. Let’s see if I can cajole you into doing some billionaires’ wife stuff. It might be my lucky day.” Today, Veronica gets into it immediately while directing a servant who followed her in to pour me my first cup of coffee. Being waited on is the weirdest thing ever.
“The House of Alanis and Pippy Chic would love to dress you for the Red Ball event next month.”
I slip into the bathroom and brush my teeth while Veronica, who follows me in, gives me a run down of all the celebrities I’ll see at the charity event if I decide to go.
Surprisingly, I know The House of Alanis, and I know Pippy Chic from social media. They dress only royalty, and not even the most famous actress on the planet can convince them to design a gown for them. I also know about the Red Ball, which is literally a red-carpet event for the rich and famous all over the world.
“Now bear in mind, Deacon, Callen, and Mason don’t do red carpet, ever. They hate things like that,” she says when I emerge from the bathroom and gladly accept the coffee with a gratifying smile to the servant, whose name is Emma.
“Then why—”
“Because the Ursid heads informed me that if you wanted to go, they would happily attend the event with you.”
Veronica raises her eyebrow as if I should be flattered by what they’re willing to do for me.
“No thank you, to both the designers and the event.”
By my second sip of coffee, Veronica, after sighing rather theatrically, wants to know if I want to start my own cosmetics line or go into partnership with an already renowned and established luxury brand.
I don’t bother answering her this time since it’s a definitive no and she knows it. She then tells me she received fifteen invitations to breakfast, brunch, lunch, tea, and dinner from the wives of other businessmen. Four less than yesterday, and I curtly decline them all. I will not, under any circumstances, do anything wifely as long as I’m here.
“Then I guess your day today will be spent at that greasy diner you insist on working at. You’re the wife of three billionaires, my darling girl. You have to start acting like it.”
In return, I give her a sweet smile. It was interesting to me how Veronica spun our marriage to the press. Apparently, we decided to elope to one of their private islands for an intimate wedding after our love-at-first-sight proposal. I suppose there was no way she could positively spin kidnapping me and marrying me against my will.
Not to mention everything that happened in the cottage, which now feels like a lifetime ago. I don’t think my mom would ever believe what’s happened to me if she were here. I wish she were here, though, in a lucid state, so she could tell me what to do to get out of this situation.
As for my father, I will continue calling him until he answers, and I won’t lose traction with that vow. I’d already called him three times this morning before Veronica came in. If I thought he would try to help, I’m beginning to see that the Ursid men’s influence is stronger than my father’s love for his daughter.
Who am I kidding?
He sold me out to marry a man who kills women for sport. But I can’t forget that the men I’m married to are more insidious, more quietly vicious, and more sophisticated in their ruthlessness. I haven’t even met Kirill Yenin yet, but I know the Ursid men are far, far, far more dangerous.
Veronica and Celine, whom I promised I would have lunch with one of the days next week, have made it very clear that they would find me within hours, if not minutes, no matter where I went. They own the world. And there will never be a situation where they let me go willingly.
But I can’t give up.
“Darling girl, you must get those thoughts out of your mind and just enjoy this life of utter luxury that is right there on your lap. You are the most protected woman in the universe, with limitless funds at your disposal and three husbands who will kill for you—”
“But why?” I ask earnestly. “They made their point to Kirill Yenin by intercepting his marriage to me.” How naive was I to think that my father was marrying me off to just another lawyer who was going to be a partner in his firm so he would keep the business in the family? How stupid do I look?
“If that was their act of revenge, it’s over now,” I say, getting riled up again. There’s nothing more to it. They could just let me go.”
“I don’t think this is about getting one in on Kirill Yenin.”
“Then what is it about? I don’t understand. What do they want from me? They’re not even forcing me into their...” I stall, trying to find words and fail.
“I think I know what you’re saying. Why aren’t you in their bed every night? I can answer that for you. You might be married, but there’s still an Ursid tradition that Deacon, Callen, and Mason intend to follow before you are considered fully an Ursid bride. It’s a very important Ursid tradition.”
“What tradition?”
“As ancestors of the Ursid men, their… for want of a better word… their members are considered sacred, as is their sperm. Where they place themselves and into whom they empty themselves is of crucial importance to their lives. I’ve said too much,” Veronica says, waving her hand about. “It’s up to them to decide when it happens, but it’s a ritual. An age-old Ursid ritual. And I won’t say any more about it until they decide it’s time.”
A ritual? How much more bizarre can my situation become?
But my frustration reaches new levels as more things go unanswered. True to her word, Veronica says nothing more on the subject, and I can”t, for the life of me, begin to even imagine what this ritual holds.
After she leaves, I pass away my morning by staying in the room assigned to me while I call Faith and try my father again. Kyla sends me a message to say everything is almost ready. I ignore the part where they could actually be tracking everything on this phone despite telling me they won’t. I’m already risking everything anyway.
Breakfast is brought up to me, so I don’t have to venture out of these four walls. I don’t want to bump into any of them any more than I need to.
After taking a shower and changing into a fresh, clean waitress outfit, I’m forced to accept the trembling in my limbs and the butterflies in my stomach that are making me go crazy.
I try not to be fixated on the fact that while I’m married to them, duped into the marriage rather, I’m not truly an Ursid bride, according to Veronica, since there hasn’t been a ritual yet. Does this mean they have plans to return me? Is that why they haven’t come inside me yet? Maybe there’s hope for me after all. But I’m not leaving it to chance.
I refuse to accept that there is no way out of this for me right now. And I have to escape. Asap. What happened with Callen in his bedroom, can’t be repeated with Mason and Deacon.
There’s only so much my body can take, and now my mind might be compromised, too.