15
Everything comes crashing down on me at once. Broken glass. Strong whiskey. Ruined shirts. The dim lights of a bar, and unwanted hands travelling up my thighs.Don’t look.
Across me, the floor of the bedroom is spotless in the aftermath, with no evidence of all the shirts I destroyed. I sink back into the pillow, drifting back to sleep when a voice cuts through my conscious.
“Miss Freya.”
I groan an inaudible response. It takes a few seconds for me to recognise that the voice belongs to Giulia, and I pry my eyes open to find her concerned face staring down at me. “You must not drink so much, Miss Freya.”
She places a giant glass of bright green juice on the nightstand. “This will help.”
Really, all I want to do is go back to sleep, but between the splitting pain in my head and the cramping in my stomach, I figure I really do need to take something. Grudgingly, I pick up the glass of juice, the cold surface numbing the pricks of pain in my palms.
I bring the glass to my lips, take a hesitant sip and then resist the urge to hurl. It tastes like grass. I twist my face as I look up at her. “Whatisthis?”
“Good for you,” she says, giving me a pointed look. “Drink it all at once.”
Grimacing, I tilt my head back and gulp down as much of the vile green liquid down. It slips down my throat as my stomach churns. When all that’s left is the bits of pulp sliding down the sides on the glass, I hand it back to Giulia.
She starts receding towards the door but abruptly stops. “I have cooked,” she says. “Please eat.”
Right now, the thought of eating makes me want to throw up. “Maybe later.”
Her brows knit slightly, gaze lighting with suspicion. I’m too tired to analyse it or ask why, and she doesn’t elaborate. leaving me in silence once again. I stare down at my bandaged hands, and my stomach turns for an entirely different reason.
He wrapped my hands up.
I don’t know why. And I hate not knowing.
Slowly, I unwrap the bandages to find the cuts on my palms freshly scabbed over. The shiny diamond ring sits on my finger, glistening and perfect despite the damaged skin of my palms. Mocking me, almost.
Reminding me that even though he was the one who wrapped the bandage on my hand, he’s still the monster who shoved his ring on my finger and caged me.
I pull off the white dress shirt, wincing when the material presses too harshly on my hands and step into the shower. When I get out, I feel a hundred times better.
Giulia seems to have taken out an outfit for me from my closet and tried to pick the most decent one she could find. There’s an oversized black tee and my nicest sweatpants. I pull on the shirt and ditch the pants.
Just then, my gaze latches on something small and shiny in the corner of the room. Narrowing my eyes, I step up to it and bend to take a closer look, realizing what it is.
The bullet.
It must have not caught Giulia’s eye when she was cleaning up. I lean down and pick it up, rolling the cold metal between my fingers before dropping it in the tiny badge pocket on my shirt.
I wish I could remember the look on his face when I pulled the trigger, but my memories are blurry and altered by the alcohol. All I remember was that there was blood. So much blood.
And he didn’t seem even the least bit phased by it.
For some reason, I find myself relieved that the bullet didn’t pierce somewhere fatal. I don’t know what I would have done with myself if I really killed him. The image would have haunted me for life.
You kill me, and your entire family is dead.
He didn’t even say it like it was a threat. He said it like it was a fact. And that pisses me off more than anything, because threats could be empty, but a fact is a fact.
I can’t kill him. Fine. But there are other ways I can push him over the edge. I’m going to continue my petty little plan of disgruntling him so much that he chooses to call off the wedding and stay the hell away from my family. Until I find a better plan, at least.
But not today.
I’m tired. Mellowed out. Trying so hard to defy him with my every breath is zapping my energy, and I don’t want to do it anymore.
With my mind made, I saunter around the second level of the penthouse, slipping into the library. It’s next to his office, and filled with mostly non-fiction books on history, politics, and war.
Venturing towards the back and working my way through the maze of shelves, I stumble on a little section of books with the pastel blue, pink, green and yellow spines gilded in gold patterns.
They’re collectables, and they’re fiction.
This little section is a stark contrast to the rest of the library.
Almost like it was… preserved. For someone else.
I slot outPride and Prejudice, blowing away the thin layer of dust on its spine, and take a seat on one of the plush leather couches, curling into myself as I start reading.
I flick through the first few pages to get to the beginning of the story, but something catches my eye.
Black ink and perfect cursive handwriting.
Flipping back to the dedication page, I spot it.
Sof,
Happy birthday.
Love, T
Clearly, it was for some woman he cared about.Loved, apparently. I scoff to myself.
I didn’t think he was even capable of any positive emotion.
It can’t be his mother. I know her name was Catarina. And as far as I know, he has no sister. So that leaves…a lover, of some sort. There’s an itchy ache in my throat, and my heart seems to solidify and sink in my chest. I blame it on the hangover, shaking my head as I flip to the first chapter.
From the pink pen annotations and little hearts drawn around Mr. Darcy’s name the first time it’s mentioned, it’s clear that the girl was young.
I can’t help but fall in love with the girl’s writing.
Her annotations make the book better, somehow.
I’m not sure how much time passes before I hear a whining at the door.
A dark shadow is pacing at the entrance of the library, and a smile splits my lips. “Rhaegar?”
He whines again, trotting around but not crossing the entrance of the library, like he was trained against it. I roll my eyes and lift a hand, beckoning him inside. “Come here.”
Rhaegar lifts his paw over the imaginary boundary line, then rescinds it, whining low as he stares at me with unblinking eyes.
“Come on, big boy.”
Apparently, that’s all the convincing he needs, because he finally trots to me. I lean down, and pet him gently, even though the skin of my palms sting. “Where have you been? I missed you.”
He lays at the foot of the couch, wagging his tail happily, almost as if to sayme too.
I tap the seat next to me on the couch, tilting my head. “Over here.”
A laugh escapes me as Rhaegar leaps up and playfully attacks me.
He calms down after a while, and I angle myself so that I can pet him with one hand while reading.
But he peers over me, fascinated with the pink annotations as much as I am.
So instead, I tilt the book, sharing it with him and place a hand over his fur, reading out aloud.
Turns out Rhaegar’s a fan of Jane Austen. He stays quiet the entire time, his big body contracting and expanding as he breathes next to me.
“His character was decided,” I read out, “He was the proudest, most disagreeable man in the world, and everybody hoped that he would never come there again.”
I turn to Rhaegar. “Sounds familiar, doesn’t it?”
My lips lift when I get a bark in response. We manage to get through a few chapters before I feel a dark gaze on me. I recognize the searing heat burning the left side of my face all too well. Rhaegar leaps away, bolting out the library.
At the entrance, Torren is leaning against the doorframe, in dark slacks and a black dress shirt with the sleeves rolled up his thick forearms, wet hair falling over his forehead. His arms are crossed over his chest, his gaze empty as it washes over me.
“He’s not allowed in here,” he says, finally, his deep voice cutting through the hollow silence and spreading over my chest. “Let alone on the couch.”
I glare up at him. “And neither am I?”
His expression is blank.“I never said that.”
But I’m already standing to leave, looking around to find something I can use as a bookmark. There’s nothing except the bullet in my shirt pocket, so I fish it out and tuck it into the book to keep my place.
I walk straight towards the doorway, about to stride past him when he steps forward, blocking me. Clamping down on my jaw, I move around him, but he side steps me, blocking me off once again.
Not wanting any part of his little game, I bite down harder and take a step back. But that only invites him more space to take a step closer to me, pushing my back to the bookshelf and caging me in. I tuck the book behind me and hope he doesn’t notice.
His fingers graze the hem of my oversized shirt and his gaze clouds over as he looks down at me. “I like you better in my shirt.”
“Like me better?” I ask, “Or hate me less?”
He bunches the fabric in his fist, exposing my thigh. “Both.”
I’m not meant to be doing this. Today was meant to be a day away from him, away from trying to get on his nerves. But I guess defying him comes as second nature to me, because I say, “Too bad I destroyed all of them, then.”
He tugs on my shirt. Hard. “I should repay the favor, don’t you think?”
My grip on the book tightens and I swallow, saying nothing as cool air hits the exposed skin of my thigh.
“Were you never taught—” His right arm wraps around me as his fingers clasp around the book behind me. “— not to touch things that don’t belong to you?”
I inhale sharply when the rough pad of his thumb meets the skin on my thigh. “That man, yesterday,” I say, “Did you kill him?”
Torren pauses, tilting his head to consider me with his dark eyes. “Yes.”
I resist the urge to suck in a sharp breath, flashes of blood-stained carpets in my mind. “Why?”
He gives me a hard look. “He touched something that belonged to me.”
My brows furrow as I realize what he’s implying. “I’m not yours.”
The corner of his mouth lifts, and his grip — on both the book and my thigh —tightens. “Every inch of you belongs to me, little Morozov. You just don’t know it yet.”
And with a flick of his wrist, the book is gone from my hands. He releases his hold on my shirt. The warmth of his body heat is harshly retracted as he pulls away, and I’m forced to watch as he turns and strides out the library.