Chapter Eighteen #2
“Remember to be a tulip, Katerina,” she told me when I was only seven. “Bright and beautiful no matter where you are planted.”
There was only one person who brought me tulips the day my mother died. Only one person who understood. My Grandmother. She knew the symbolism it meant to me.
“You danced beautifully,” he says, and I can’t tell if he means it or if it’s just another polite phrase he was trained to say. “I always knew you belonged in the spotlight.”
“Did my father send you?” I ask, cutting straight to the point, turning to drop the roses on the vanity so I don’t have to touch them anymore.
“No.” His smile doesn’t falter, but something flickers in his eyes when I turn back around. “I came because I wanted to. Watching you on that stage tonight… it reminded me why I’ve been patient.” My father mentioned Maxim’s crush, and now I’m wondering if that has truth to it.
“I didn’t realize you were the patient type,” I say calmly.
He chuckles. “For some things, yes. For others, no.”
He steps closer.
“I still want to see a union between our families,” he says. “Your father still wants that, too. But that’s not the only reason I want to marry you. I’ve always had a feeling that you and I would make a good fit, once the time was right.”
I stare at him. “I’m already married.”
“To a hockey player,” he says lightly, as if that explains everything. “A temporary arrangement, from what I’ve heard.”
My heart spikes. Who did he hear that from?
“There’s nothing temporary about my marriage,” I say, lifting my left hand to show Scottie’s ring.
The memory of our wedding day and Scottie saying that the ring was meant to ward off men in the audience who thought they might have a shot with me, comes back to full circle.
He barely glances at the ring and then looks away.
“A simple signature on a divorce decree would solve that problem. We could make a good team, Katerina,” he continues, as though he didn’t just casually slice open my biggest secret.
“You and I. You belong in ballrooms, in mansions, on mega yachts, vacationing all over the world. Not,” his gaze drops briefly to my taped, bloody feet, ”…
destroying yourself to be the entertainment. ”
Entertainment? Anger burns under my skin.
“Being ‘the entertainment,’” I say quietly, “is my choice. Being a wife to someone like you never was.”
He exhales as though I’m being unreasonable.
“If this is about security,” he says, “about what kind of life I can give you… Perhaps this will help.”
He lifts the black box and opens it.
Inside, nestled on velvet, lies a necklace that makes my eyes sting.
A chain of diamonds and platinum, delicate and obscene at the same time, with a single pear-cut blue sapphire at the center. It catches every bit of light in the room, throwing tiny light fragments across the walls.
“My father sent you with this bride to buy me off. It shows how little he knows me.”
“Your father didn’t tell me to ‘buy you off, ’ Maxim says, tone insulted.
“And I came because I’ve always admired you, but I kept my distance because of your age.
I was waiting until you returned from New York, but your father approached me before your visa renewal expired and made the proposal that you and I should marry. ”
“If he didn’t send you here to bribe me, then what is the necklace for?”
“Your father doesn’t have to tell me what you deserve.
The sapphire alone is worth close to half a million, I’d imagine.
” He shrugs like it’s nothing. “It’s just a small taste of the life I can afford for you, if you agree to the arrangement our families have made.
But this isn’t just a marriage of convenience for me.
I’ve also had plans to propose once you lived a life in New York and were ready to take your rightful place beside me.
You’re too beautiful and too smart to waste all of that here. We could be a team.”
My throat closes.
“Well,” I say, carefully measured, “I hate roses. They remind me of my mother’s funeral. And I don’t wear gaudy pieces of jewelry like that. Not now. Not ever. You know nothing about me, Maxim, and I know nothing about you.”
“We can change that. Come home with me… I fly back tonight. I’ll have my lawyers in New York send your hockey player divorce papers.
I can promise you that my family is still more powerful than your father.
I can protect you from him. You’ll have your own life.
I’ll give you anything you ask for if you accept my hand, just try me. ”
“And ballet?” I ask.
He lets out a scoff. “My wife can’t be a ballerina. She has a duty to the people, to bear the next generation. You have responsibilities, as do I… you know that.”
“Then just as I suspected. We are incorrectly matched. You should find a well-trained poodle who sits on your command. I’m not that woman, Maxim, and I never will be.
I’ll only cause you headaches and frustration.
And no matter what you think you can offer me, you could never make me happy, because I’m in love with someone else. ”
His jaw tightens.
“You can take your things,” I finish softly, “…and leave. My husband won't appreciate you being here with the door closed, and neither do I.” I say the word husband with emphasis to remind him that I am, after all, a married woman.
For a moment, we just stare at each other. His eyes are cool, calculating, weighing the best next move… not unlike the way my father evaluates his obstructions to get what he wants.
Then he snaps the box shut and I turn from him to grab the roses off the makeup vanity for him to take too. I hand them over but he doesn’t take them. Instead, his eyes stay fixed on me.
“Your grandmother is coming,” he says.
My blood runs cold, and I whip a glance back to him.
“Is that some kind of threat?” I ask. “It’s not a threat. I just thought you should know that this all might not go down the way you want it to.” “How would you know that she’s coming?” I ask.
“She’ll be here tomorrow, from what I understand.” He sets the black box on my vanity where I had laid the roses, and then he steps back. “I came out ahead of her, hoping to make this easier for you.”
“Easier,” I echo.
“Yes.” He straightens his cufflinks, adjusting something that doesn’t need adjusting. “You and I both know there’s one person you won’t be able to turn away. Not without… consequences.”
My pulse thunders in my ears.
“She loves you,” he says. “She wants what’s best for you. I suggest you think very carefully about what that looks like, Katerina.” He gestures vaguely to the necklace. “Keep that. In case you change your mind.”
“I don’t want it,” I whisper.
“Consider it… collateral,” he says. “Something to remind you of what you’re walking away from.
The luxury you were born and raised for.
This life,” he says, glancing around my changing room.
“Was fun while it lasted. A little rich girl wanting to see how the other half lives. But performing isn’t in your blood…
power is. Being married to me is what you were bred for. ”
And with that, he turns and leaves.
The door clicks shut behind him.
I stare at the roses in my hand that he wouldn’t take. The coffin-red petals swallow the light, and suddenly I can’t breathe.
My hands move before my brain catches up.
I grip the stems of the bouquet harder than I mean to out of anger, thorns biting into my palm, and march out into the hallway. A trash can sits near the stage door. I shove the roses in, stems and all, until all I can see is dark metal and wilted red.
When I walk back to the dressing room, my hand is bleeding in three places.
The necklace box sits on the vanity when I return, glossy and obscene.
I don’t touch it.
Not yet.
I’ll send it back when I figure out how—when I find a way to return it that doesn’t give anyone an excuse to accuse me of theft. That’s the kind of trap my father would love.
For now, I shove the box into the bottom of my dance bag, under a pile of sweaters and spare tights, hoping to suffocate it of oxygen. Just looking at it makes my skin crawl.
My phone buzzes on the table.
For a wild second, I think it might be my father. Or Maxim again.
It’s not.
Scottie: Lost tonight. Refs were trash, and we couldn’t stay out of the box, so that’s on us. But it’s done. I’ve been thinking about you all night instead of the game anyway, so maybe that’s karma.
A shaky laugh catches in my throat.
Scottie: How’d opening night go, KitKat? I’ll be on a flight home after media and dinner, so you can tell me everything. I wish I could’ve been there.
Tears sting my eyes.
How do I tell him?
How do I explain that my grandmother is on her way across the world to inspect our marriage like it’s a crime scene? That Maxim showed up with a half-million-dollar necklace that looked more like my noose, and my father’s expectations on his tongue?
That suddenly I’m less sure than ever that this is going to work…that I won’t get sent back, that our lie will hold, that I won’t be forced into a life where Scottie doesn’t exist?
My fingers hover over the keyboard.
Me: Thank you for the tea.
Scottie: I looked up your schedule and I have it on auto delivery for all of your shows.
Of course he did, because he’s always looking for ways to take care of me.
I could tell him….I should tell him.
Instead, I lock the phone and drop it back on the table like it burned me.
I’m a coward. And even I know it.
But right now, I feel like I’m standing on a tightrope stretched between two skyscrapers and one wrong word will snap the wire.
I just need one night.
One night of pretending this didn’t just happen. He’ll be home soon, and I could use his arms around me.
I change into warm-ups and sneakers, sling my bag over my shoulder, and leave through the stage door, the cool Seattle air hitting my face like a slap.
The city is alive, though I feel as far from alive as a person can feel. Cab drivers honking, cars skidding at the red light, voices of people walking by, and distant sirens, but I feel oddly separate from all of it, like I’m moving underwater.
By the time I reach The Commons, my feet ache in a different way, my blisters screaming in their soft shoes. I ride the elevator up in silence, watching my own reflection in the mirrored wall.
Your grandmother is coming.
Panic claws up my throat.
Inside the penthouse, it’s dark and quiet. Scottie’s not home. Of course he isn’t. He’s in another state, probably preparing for the media, and the team dinner, and then a flight home.
I drop my bag by the door and go straight to Scottie’s room, stripping mechanically, leaving a trail of clothes on the floor. I wash off the stage makeup until my face feels like my own again, pull on one of Scottie’s t-shirts I “borrowed” from the laundry, and crawl into his bed.
The sheets are cold, but they feel like him even though he isn’t here.
I curl into a ball, pressing my face into his pillow. It still smells like him, which gives me just a moment of calm.
I don’t cry.
I just stare into the dark, counting my breaths, trying not to think about sapphire necklaces and red roses and my grandmother’s impending arrival.
At some point, exhaustion drags me under.
I don’t know what time it is when the mattress shifts.
For a second, I think I’m dreaming—that my body is conjuring a fantasy because my brain is too tired to fight it.
Then a familiar weight dips the bed.
The scent hits me next. And my body instantly eases in my half-asleep state.
A big, warm hand slides over my waist.
“Hey,” Scottie whispers, his voice rough like he’d been yelling all night… and he probably was. “It’s just me. Didn’t mean to wake you.”
“Scottie?” I say, but I don't really have to ask; I know it’s him.
“Got in late. I went to your room first, but…you weren’t there. You had me in a panic for a minute.”
His breath warms the back of my neck.
“So I came to find you,” he finishes softly.
Something in me cracks.
I roll over and press my face into his chest, inhaling him like oxygen. His arms wrap around me instantly, strong and sure, pulling me flush against him. His heartbeat thuds steadily under my ear, a comforting drum.
“You okay?” he whispers, fingers slipping into my hair, rubbing slow circles at the base of my skull.
I swallow hard.
I want to tell him everything. About Maxim. About the necklace burning a hole on the top of his dresser. About my grandmother flying toward us like a storm front I can’t outrun.
Instead, I lie.
“I’m just tired,” I say. It’s not entirely untrue.
He hums, like he understands. “Opening night will do that.”
“It went well,” I add quietly, because he deserves that much. “The performance. The audience… They liked me.”
A smile curves against my forehead. “Of course they did,” he says. “They’re not idiots.”
I huff out a laugh that’s half sob.
His arms tighten. “I’m proud of you, KitKat. So damn proud. I wish I could’ve seen it.”
“Me too,” I whisper.
“Next time,” he promises. “I’ll be there.”
The words slice me open.
Because I don’t know what “next time” looks like anymore. I don’t know if he’ll still be here… or even if I will.
But for tonight… for one stolen and fragile night, I let myself believe him.
“Scottie?” I whisper.
“Yeah?”
“Can you just… hold me?” My voice shakes. “Please?”
He doesn’t ask why.
He just pulls me closer, tucking me beneath his chin, his hand splayed across my back like he’s trying to shield me from the entire world.
“I’ve got you,” he whispers into my hair. “I’m not going anywhere.”
I squeeze my eyes shut and breathe him in. Maxim, my grandmother… everything else, can wait until tomorrow.
Just for tonight, I let myself pretend that this is forever. That the woman in this bed belongs to this man in every way that matters. That visas and fathers and grandmothers and green card timelines don’t exist.
Just one more night.
One more night of his heartbeat under my ear.
One more night of his arms around me.
One more night before everything might change.