Chapter 8
Tigran
The presidential suite at the Palmer House feels like a gilded cage designed for two prisoners.
I close the door behind us and engage the security locks while Zita stands in the center of the opulent room, still wearing her wedding dress but looking like she’s preparing for battle rather than a wedding night.
The cathedral train spreads around her feet like spilled silk, and the elaborate beadwork catches light from the crystal chandelier overhead.
She looks beautiful, furious, and completely untouchable.
The reception ended an hour ago after five hours of political theater disguised as celebration as we traded handshakes with judges, heard toasts from city council members, and took photographs with business associates who needed to be seen supporting our alliance.
Every conversation served multiple purposes, and every moment reinforced the message that the Belsky organization had successfully expanded its influence through marriage.
Now it’s just the two of us, and the performance we’ve been maintaining all day can finally end.
“Your security team is very thorough,” Zita says, walking toward the panoramic windows that overlook downtown Chicago. “I counted at least twelve guards disguised as hotel staff between the lobby and this floor.”
She noticed. Of course, she did. Zita Lo Duca—Zita Belsky now—is too intelligent to miss the precautions that kept today’s ceremony from becoming the bloodbath Avgar Federoff might have been planning.
“The world we live in requires careful management of potential threats.” I remove my tuxedo jacket and drape it over the back of an antique chair that probably belongs in a museum. “Today’s event attracted attention from people who don’t necessarily wish our families well.”
“People like the Federoffs?” Zita turns from the window to face me directly. “Is that why your men looked like they were expecting a war instead of a wedding?”
The question catches me by surprise. I hadn’t realized she knew enough about our organizational conflicts to identify specific rival families, let alone understand why they might pose threats during important ceremonies.
“You know about the Federoffs?” I loosen my tie while studying her expression for signs of how much she actually understands about our current situation.
“I know enough.” She reaches behind her neck to unfasten the intricate clasp holding her elaborate necklace.
“I know they’ve been challenging your authority since your father died, and they see our marriage as either opportunity or threat.
I know today could have ended very differently if they’d decided to make their move. ”
She’s remarkably well-informed for someone who claims to want nothing to do with my family’s business operations. Either Claude has been sharing more strategic intelligence with his daughter than I realized, or Zita has been conducting her own research into the circumstances affecting her future.
“How do you feel about marrying someone whose enemies might have turned your wedding into a crime scene?” I remove my cufflinks and set them on the marble-topped dresser, noting how she watches my movements with the wariness of someone who’s not sure what to expect next.
“I feel like I married someone whose life is as dangerous and complicated as I thought it would be.” Zita struggles with the hidden fasteners on her dress, the elaborate construction making it impossible to remove without assistance.
“I feel like my father sold me to a man whose world will never be safe or normal or anything close to what I wanted for my future.”
The bitterness in her voice is so sharp it could cut glass.
She’s not just angry about today’s security measures or the political implications of our marriage.
She’s mourning the life she thought she was going to have, the choices she believed she would get to make, and the future she’s been forced to abandon.
“Do you want help with that?” I gesture toward her dress, noting the frustration building in her posture as she continues to struggle with fastenings designed to be managed by multiple assistants.
“I want a lot of things I’m not going to get.” Zita gives up on the dress and turns to face me fully. “But yes, I need help getting out of this costume so I can stop pretending to be someone I’m not.”
I approach her slowly, giving her time to change her mind or step away if my proximity makes her uncomfortable, but she stands her ground with the defiant courage that’s been impressing and frustrating me since our first meeting.
The dress fastens with dozens of tiny buttons and hidden hooks that require the utmost patience to manage properly.
I work from the top down, starting at the high collar that frames her elegant neck.
My fingers brush against her skin as I navigate the intricate closures, and she shivers slightly at the contact.
“Are you cold?” I pause in my work to meet her gaze in the antique mirror positioned across from us.
“I’m angry.” Zita’s reflection looks back at me with raw honesty that’s both refreshing and dangerous. “I’m furious about today, about this marriage, and having my entire future decided by men who see me as an asset rather than a person.”
“Yet you performed beautifully during the ceremony.” I continue working on the dress fastenings, noting how the formal structure begins to loosen as I progress. “You played the role of grateful bride with remarkable conviction.”
“I played the role because I didn’t have a choice.” Zita’s voice carries the strain of holding back explosive emotions all day. “Just like I don’t have a choice about anything else in my life anymore.”
The dress finally gives way and slides down her shoulders, revealing the delicate lace undergarments beneath. Zita steps out of the silk puddle and kicks aside the expensive gown with unnecessary force, as if attacking the symbol of everything she resents about today.
“Better?” I hang the dress carefully on the provided garment rack, treating it with more respect than its wearer currently feels it deserves.
“Better.” Zita walks back toward the window, now wearing only the ivory silk camisole and matching panties that were chosen specifically for tonight. The lingerie is beautiful and expensive and clearly selected by someone other than the woman wearing it. “But not good.”
I remove my shirt and tie, noting how she watches my reflection in the window glass. There’s curiosity in her observation, but also calculation, as if she’s trying to determine what kind of threat or ally she’s been chained to through marriage.
“What would make it good?” I ask, genuinely curious about her answer.
“Freedom to make my own choices about my life, my career, and my relationships.” Her response comes without hesitation. “The ability to build something meaningful based on my own values instead of adapting to circumstances created by other people’s moral compromises.”
“Those things aren’t possible. The circumstances we’re dealing with don’t allow for individual preferences to take priority over family obligations.”
“I’ll find ways to create them anyway.” She turns away from the window to face me directly. “I’ll find ways to maintain my integrity even if I can’t maintain my independence.”
The fierce determination in her voice reminds me why she’s been so difficult to manage throughout our engagement period.
Zita isn’t someone who adapts gracefully to situations she didn’t choose.
She’s someone who fights back against circumstances she can’t control, even when resistance seems pointless.
“You realize fighting me will make both our lives significantly more difficult than they need to be.” I approach her slowly, noting how she doesn’t retreat despite the obvious tension in her posture.
“You realize that expecting me to submit gracefully will guarantee a marriage based on resentment and hostility rather than anything approaching partnership?” Zita lifts her chin to maintain eye contact as I stop just close enough to touch her.
“Trying to control me will fail spectacularly and probably create the problems you’re hoping to avoid. ”
“I don’t want to control you.” The admission surprises me as much as it seems to surprise her. “I want to find ways for us to work together instead of against each other.”
“Working together requires mutual respect and shared decision-making.” Zita’s response is delivered briskly “It requires treating me like an equal partner instead of a political acquisition.”
“What will you do if I’m willing to treat this marriage as something… more than business? Friendly, perhaps? Equal?”
Skepticism and possibly hope flicker in Zita’s expression. “I might be willing to work with you instead of spending our entire marriage finding ways to make you regret forcing me into it. Make my life easy, and your life might be a little easier too.”
The honesty of her response is both encouraging and troubling.
She’s offering cooperation in exchange for respect, which seems reasonable until I consider what partnership with someone like Zita might actually require.
She’s intelligent, strong-willed, and completely opposed to many aspects of how my family conducts business.
Treating her as an equal partner could mean accepting challenges to methods and decisions I’ve never had to justify before, but the alternative is a marriage based on resentment and hostility that could undermine everything I’m trying to build.
“A pleasant partnership,” I say, testing the concept. “Shared responsibility. Shared bed.”
She laughs. “Don’t get ahead of yourself.”
I shrug. It was worth suggesting, especially after that wedding kiss. I won’t forget the way she did it, with passion rather than trepidation.
“We can do a partnership,” I say. “And then we’ll see where it goes.”