Chapter 42 BETH
BETH
Come sit on daddy’s lap
Everything felt like a nightmare, a cruel unending slumber.
I had scrubbed a hand continuously over my face and pinched my skin hard enough to bruise, but nothing changed. Nothing felt real. Except that it was real, and the reality belonged to me.
It had been an hour since we were driven from the church to the guesthouse, but an hour wasn’t nearly enough to process the wreckage of my life.
Fear coiled around my ribs, suffocating, and bitterness soured my tongue.
But more than anything. I was terrified.
And I missed Kenzo.
My gaze lifted from where I was sitting on the edge of bed the moment the door opened and Zaghan walked in. My lips parted to ask him questions about Kenzo, but I snapped them shut seeing a phone pressed against his ear. And he looked pretty angry at whoever was on the other end.
“What’s going going on, Seb?” he demanded, his steps lithe and impatient as he crossed the room to the table where a bottle of his infamous American whiskey sat, pouring himself a glass.
“It’s been over a week.” My eyes followed him as he walked over to the window, looking into the dark night.
“?Dónde cono está mi vinedo?” The latter was said in Spanish, and for a moment, I couldn’t help thinking about how utterly super attractive…
and smart he looked, sounded whenever he spoke a foreign language.
So far, I had learned he spoke roughly about nine languages, Scottish, of course, then Arabic, French, Russian, Swahili, Chinese, Spanish, and others.
The aforementioned were the ones I had overheard him or walked in on him speaking.
And the strange thing about this discovery was the part where he would automatically adapt the local accent of each language whenever he spoke them.
Every dialect swiftly turned into his mother’s tongue the moment he got into character.
Commendably, Zaghan…or Callan was an intelligent man, not so far from a genius.
But he was evil and that ruled out anything else.
“Arréglalo ahora,” he said, still in Spanish, as he veered away from the window, heading to the couch at the corner of the room and sinking into it.
“O lo arreglo yo mismo. Y sabes lo que pasa cuando arreglo las cosas yo mismo.” He took a sip of his wine, a dark look crossing his eyes.
“Estoy seguro de que estás intentando evitar tener demasiada sangre en las manos.”
I couldn’t help but wonder what he was talking about.
It didn’t matter who he was speaking with.
I hoped it wasn’t about me. But he hadn’t, for once, spared me a glance since he walked in, so I doubted it was about me.
And I hoped the topic didn’t involve him having to kill another person in Braemont again.
I wasn’t sure the people would be able to handle another loss.
“Come here.” His husky and commanding voice broke into my thoughts, shutting off the voices in my head.
My gaze flickered across to him. He was no longer on a call, and the wine glass was empty now, placed on the glass stool beside him.
“Come on now,” he urged, voice lazy as he patted his lap, a ghostly smirk tucked under the curve of his full lips. “Come sit on daddy’s lap.”
Say what now?
I stared in defiance at him across the room, my brows pinched in irritation, fingers clenching around the polished wooden edge of the bed.
He exhaled tiredly. “Don’t make this difficult, Mrs. Raskov.”
I hated the new name. And he had been teasing me with it ever since he slid the stupid ring into my finger.
Ring.
I glanced down at my left hand and my chest tightened at the sight of the silver that weighed on my finger, the diamond encrusted in it catching the light.
I might not have been paying attention. I might have acted like I didn’t care when he asked me to pick the one I wanted and I randomly pointed. But I heard the price. The money was enough to sustain me and maybe ten generations after me.
The ring felt like a weight. It wasn’t a promise. It was an entrapment for me.
“Elizabeth.” His voice rumbled, my name rolling off his tongue like steel against silk.
With an uneager sigh, I lifted myself off the bed, the muscles in my calf snapping as I dragged my feet across the room to him.
Barely an arm’s length away from him, and he pulled me by my wrist to his lap, one hand immediately snaking around my waist, holding me in place.
And even though I had so much anger and resentment trapped inside me, I couldn’t help it when yet again, my body defied my resolve. Being so close to him had a way of shattering my defense. One whiff of his intoxicating cologne and I was a mess again, lightheaded, on fire.
“My darling wife,” he teased, and heat spread across my exposed thigh where his free hand rested, tingles shooting up my spine when he ran the tip of his nose along the curve of my neck.
“Kenzo,” I whispered, my eyes burning, heart aching not for anything else, but for the fact that no matter how I fought this today, I would still bend to his desire, give him anything he asked because I was so foolish, I could never make my body cooperate with my heart.
“You’re my wife now. Mine,” he murmured, his tone growing raspy as he pressed his lips to a sensitive spot below my ear, his palm squeezing my thigh sensually. “So keep another man’s name off your lips.”
My eyes squeezed shut to stop the embarrassing sound sitting in my throat, hands clenched tightly on the hem of my skirt as he assaulted my neck with hot, open-mouthed kisses.
I could feel the heat pooling between my thighs. And if his exploring palm dove further under my skirt, he would feel just how much amidst the chaos, I wanted him.
How was I supposed to maintain the rage inside me, prove to him that this wasn’t the end when I fell apart at the mere touch of his hand? Of what use if I fought and rebelled so hard but couldn’t stop moaning his name and begging for more of him?
Really, what sort of cruel fate was this? How could my body still be responding to the man who murdered multiple people, forced a human heart down my throat, and pressed a gun to my best friend’s head?
Was I even human myself at this point?
“I need…” I violently bit down a moan by sinking my canine into my lower lip, almost drawing blood. “I need to know if he’s okay.”
Hissing, he pulled his head away, a disapproving look blending into the darkening ember of his eyes.
“He is fine,” he bit out. “Back at his home, fucking fine, Elizabeth!”
“Okay.” I nodded, my palms laid flat on my thighs, my chest heaving. I knew he wasn’t lying. That information relieved me a little. I couldn’t have possibly slept well today, not knowing how he was doing, if he was alive or dead.
I scanned the room, looking anywhere else but his face. My body still carried the residue of the fire he had lit with his touch.
“What about my phone?” I asked. He had snatched it from me earlier, on our way to the church.
“I will get you another one when we arrive at Glenfallow,” he stated, leaving no room for further questions.
He wanted to erase anything that connected me to this place or anywhere else. I knew he was going to make me a prisoner, cutting me off from the world because he didn’t want to risk anything that would snatch me away from him.
He wanted me to leave everything behind, adopt a new life.
He wanted me to forget everything.
I didn’t mind. I would cope. But what about Kenzo? It had been him and I for years now. We weren’t just friends anymore. We were like the two sides of a coin. How could I move on to live another life without Kenzo in it?
“Why are you acting so miserable?” he suddenly asked, and it wasn’t out of spite, but curiosity.
Did he really not understand why I was the saddest girl in the world right now?
“Forgive me for not leaping in joy.” I didn’t mean to sound snarky, but I just couldn’t bite down the anger.
“afterall, it has always been my dream to marry a man who threatens me with my friend’s life, subdues me into cannibalism and oh, who also killed two of my teachers and a bunch of innocent boys just because I had a thing with them. ”
I couldn’t believe the nonchalant way he was taking this situation? Was this his own kind of normal?
To my outburst, he scoffed, his finger trailing mindless, phantom lines on my thigh. “Am I really that bad? Do you think I’ll be such a terrible husband?”
I looked away instead, blinking as the tears dropped. Then I suddenly felt his finger curling under my chin, forcing me to look at him.
“We are never going to be hold hands and run into the sunset.” His hand dropped from my chin and returned to my thigh. “You will definitely not be happy with me, at least, not very soon.” He took in a sharp, deep breath. “But one thing is for sure, I will give you everything else but freedom.”
He didn’t blink, didn’t waver. His storm-dark gaze locked onto mine, dragging me under, pulling me into the relentless abyss of him. I felt myself spiraling, caught in the violent whirlpool of his sanity, unable to fight the current.
“For as long as you are mine, I’m going make you so powerful, Beth Raskov.” His voice was thick with promise, dark with conviction. More than a vow, more than an oath. It felt like blood seeping into stone, irreversible. “So fucking powerful that no one will ever dare to stand against you.”
Each word struck like thunderclaps, sending shivers cascading down my back, rippling through my bones. My heart slammed against my ribs, each beat an echo of something both terrifying and exhilarating.
“You pretend to be simple, to want simple things.” His gaze flickered with something wild.
Something knowing, as his hand lifted, slow and deliberate, to press a fingertip against a spot just above my left breast. “But I see through you.” My breath stuttered.
“Deep down, you crave it just like I do.” His voice dipped lower, coiling around me like smoke. “Power.”
His touch lingered. It was a silent claim, a branding against my skin.
“Together, we’ll be unstoppable.” His smirk widened, dark amusement dancing in his eyes. “Indomitable.”
I wasn’t sure how accurate his words were.
He always spoke as if he knew me more than I knew myself.
I was sure I would have loved a little cottage in Castle Combe with the right amount of books and healthy storage of coffee beans.
Maybe a simple husband who did a simple job and returned home at 5pm to help me make dinner.
And maybe have a child or two to run around the field in summer.
Wasn’t that enough? Wasn’t that satisfying and perfect? Had I always wanted more?
“We leave for Glenfallow in two hours.” His voice snapped me out of my thoughts. “You can see your friend one more time.”
Was that supposed to make me throw a series of thank-yous? How was he about to take me away from the place I basically grew up in, away from my best friend, and all I got as a compensation was to see Kenzo only one more time?
“C-can I just stay behind for maybe a week–”
“No.”
“If you are taking me away, the least you could do is let me say my goodbyes properly,” I bit out.
“I said, no.”
My fingers clenched on my thigh, but I shouldn’t trigger him.
“What about Mother?” I asked. “It’s been over ten days. Let me just make sure she’s not dead somewhere and actually went for an outreach.”
It didn’t matter that Mother played the role of a monster in my life too. It didn’t matter that our relationship wasn’t healthy. But still, she provided food, catered to shelter, and was still a family. Leaving without making sure she was okay felt like leaving loose ends.
“I don’t care.”
“Please,” I insisted. “Let me just go to her office and make a confirmation.”
“You are not spending another week here, Elizabeth,” he grounded out, his expression hardening. “Don’t even bother pushing it.”
“Okay two days,” I bargained.
He exhaled, pinching the bridge between his eyebrows. “What exactly do you want, Beth?”
“Closure.”
“On?”
“The whereabouts of Mother.”
I saw a gentle tick in his jaw, a beat passed, and something settled in his eyes, something dark, but I couldn’t place a finger on it. Then slowly, the corner of his lips curled, a grotesque grin crawling out.
“You know what,” he suddenly said, lifting me gently from his lap, his hand resting on my waist to steady me on my feet. “I just figured out something we can do to make our wedding night a bit memorable.”
“Wedding night?” I asked. “I thought we were going to find Mother?”
He didn’t answer me.