CHAPTER EIGHT #2
This woman was beyond redemption. My father was worried about me losing all rational thought in Alaric’s bed, when his mistress had long since lost hers in his.
“You—you love him?”
"I do. You're being married off soon and when you are, you'll understand how these things just happen."
"My marriage has nothing to do with love, and if you believe my father's capable of it, you're only ensuring your own misery,” I replied.
"Why are you so bitter? If you weren’t so stubborn, maybe he wouldn’t be so hard on you."
She thought I was stubborn? I caved and bent every day just to keep myself safe, smiling when my face ached from the effort, speaking when silence was all I craved.
I moved through my own life like a marionette with fraying strings, my limbs jerking in a grotesque dance my father orchestrated from above.
I wasn't fucking stubborn—I was selfish in my solitude, hoarding tiny moments of peace like precious jewels, doing whatever necessary to create a sliver of space where no one's eyes followed me and no one's hands reached to hurt me.
I stared at her, my face a mask of indifference that had taken years to perfect. "I'm not bitter, Coraline. I'm observant and honest. It's not my fault you're too deluded to see that. You should run along now. I'm sure he's waiting for you somewhere in this mausoleum we call home."
I left her there without another glance, fuming inside as I went to my room, needing to get the taste of fish out of my mouth. Once in my private bathroom, I cranked the tap handle until water gushed hot and furious. I brushed and rinsed, scrubbing until my gums ached, and then gargled mouthwash.
The mirror reflected back a perfect version of myself—smooth hair, careful makeup, the portrait of composed femininity my father demanded that looked tragically like my mother. My eyes were hers too, dark and haunted.
I wiped my mouth, and after retrieving my phone from the dresser returned to the bathroom again, checking the time.
Fifteen minutes until Amara's call, the only conversation that didn't require performance. Shockingly our father hadn’t said anything about the phone Alaric had given me.
He had to know it existed. My father had abandoned all pretense about his surveillance and told me right to my face there were cameras hidden throughout the house.
I turned the water on again, letting the sound fill the space, a perfect cover for whatever I didn’t want overheard. Then I stepped away from the door, back against the cool tile, phone clutched tight. Steam began to rise, soft and curling, misting the mirror.
Five more minutes.
I could survive anything for five more minutes. Each one of them dragged by until Amara’s name lit up the screen. Her voice cut through before I could speak. "Selene, the news is everywhere. Kostas's PR team has to be working overtime. The Dominion announced it this morning."
"So, the world knows," I replied.
"Is it true?" The question trembled between accusation and disbelief. "Are you actually going through with this? Last time we talked you’d just been going to dinner with him. Why are you moving so fast?"
It wasn’t really moving much faster than any other Dominion adjacent union; it only seemed that way because it was happening to me.
I pressed my fingertips against my closed eyelids, drawing in a slow breath that filled my lungs to capacity before releasing it.
Amara should understand better than anyone—my choices were never truly mine.
This arranged marriage was my only ticket away from our father's ironclad control.
"What would you have me do instead, Amara? Run? Hide? Take the same exit our mother chose?"
Her silence crackled through the phone like static electricity.
"That wasn't fair," she finally said, voice barely audible.
"Neither is the life I'm living."
"There must be something else—"
"Like what exactly? Father's men watch every doorway. His cameras record my every move. He's bartered me away like a commodity. The closest thing I have to choice is the illusion of having one."
"I could help," she stated almost urgently. "Let me look into Kostas, find out who you're really marrying."
"Don't you dare. He'd notice, and then you'd be in his crosshairs too," I objected, my voice hardening with protective fear.
“At least tell me what he’s like in person,” she pled.
What could I tell her about him? That he was intense? That he was dangerous, something she already knew. That I feared him and yet wanted to run to him all at once?
"He's...not like our father," I settled on saying. "He's straightforward and for some reason, he seems to actually see me."
"See you how?" Amara's voice sharpened with suspicion.
I leaned against the bathroom counter, considering how to explain. "The way Dad looks at me—it's like I'm a thing. A possession. Alaric looks at me like I'm a puzzle he wants to solve."
"That doesn't sound comforting."
"It's not meant to be comforting. It's different, and better than what I have right now."
“This isn’t right. I should be the one forced into marrying him, not you,” she murmured softly.
"It’s because of him I might finally be able to see you again.”
"Selene—."
"Don't worry. No matter what happens, I’ll survive. It's what I do."
Her breath hitched, wrapped in resignation. "I love you, little sister.”
"I know."
We lingered in shared silence, neither willing to sever the connection before her final whisper came, too faint to grasp, before the line went dead, not with finality, but with acceptance.
I stood frozen, the sudden silence deafening as the faucet's stream died away. My sister lived in a world where escape seemed possible. I'd learned long ago that hope was the cruelest prison of all.
I hadn’t searched for any news yet, hadn’t allowed myself to because I didn’t want to see what any sources said about me. None of that would change a thing. I hadn’t heard from Alaric since he’d handed me the phone, and I’d never go out of my way to reach out first.
I wondered what he was doing at this exact moment. Was he thinking about me? Or was he simply going about his business, secure in the knowledge that I was now an inevitability in his life?
The thought should have chilled me. Instead, it kindled something warm and dangerous in my chest.