Yesterday was the best day of my life and this day, this whatever it is, might be the worst.
At least in the top three.
The door opens suddenly. Rinaldo stands backlit with something slumped over his arms and for one terrible moment I think it’s a body, another girl he stole and dragged along into this hell, until he turns on the light.
It’s not a body. It’s a dress.
He slams the door, grinning from ear to ear, and walks over. The dress is long, conservative, old-fashioned in cut and style, gossamer, a bit stained here and there, and gray where it was once bright white from age and storage. I realize with a jolt that it’s a wedding dress, and he throws it down on the foot of the bed an arm’s length away from my knees.
“Put it on,” he instructs and I only stare at him.
I have a leash around my neck and my hands are bound behind my back.
It takes him a few seconds of frowning to realize he needs to set me free if I’m going to change my clothes. He comes around to my side, removes the belt first, and unties the noose from my throat. When it’s free, I rub at the skin on my neck with a feverish insistence thinking about Nico and Papa and Momma.
Rinaldo stands me up and drags me into the middle of the room.
“Put it on,” he says again, pointing.
I reach up and rip off the duct tape. I spit out the sock and it hits the floor with a wet plop. I breathe hard and spit once to try to clear the disgusting taste from my mouth. Rinaldo only watches impassively.
“Fuck you,” I finally say.
He hits me hard. His fist connects with my jaw and I fall flat on my ass with a dizzy head-spinning ringing in my ears and my vision fractures into twos, threes, fours, until it sucks back together again, blurry and tilted. He looms above me.
“Put it on or I’ll hurt you.” He’s smiling. He looks so normal, and how can anyone look so normal in a situation like this?
But I have no other choice. I sob once, twice, as I take off my nightdress, toss it aside, and feel the cold chill of the motel air roll over my breasts. My nipples are hard and my flesh is stippled with goosebumps and I’m wearing only a pair of white lace panties—the same pair Nico had so delightfully and lovingly peeled off my body hours earlier before he choked my father to death—and I cover my chest with my arms.
Rinaldo stares, but he doesn’t seem to see me. Or at least he doesn’t seem to care that my breasts are bare.
I wanted him to look at me once—the thought is disgusting, but it’s the truth. I remember being in the pool with Rinaldo and his eyes moving along my flesh and wanting him to kiss me or at least needing him to stare at my body with a kind of possessiveness. I didn’t know that I was offering myself up to a crocodile.
He nods at the dress and I awkwardly put it on, shuffling into it and zipping up the back as best I can.
It barely fits. It’s small, pinched at the top and hips, but I can leave it on if I don’t breathe too much. The sleeves are puffy and there’s too much ugly lace all over like it’s twenty years out of date—which it probably is.
“Perfect,” Rinaldo says.
“Why are you making me wear this?” I don’t want the answer, but I need to know anyway. I need to hear his plan so I can come up with a way to get myself out of this.
“Here’s the thing.” He walks to the dresser and takes out an old, ratty black suit. He strips without a second thought and I turn my back, unable to look at him as he gets dressed. I stare out the far window at the sun rising higher. “I need leverage. You’re a good hostage, but hostages are always short-term. I can’t keep you as a hostage forever—eventually hostages are traded away for something better or they’re set free or they’re killed. Though a dead hostage isn’t much good. That’s sort of the thing about a hostage, they’re only worth something so long as there’s someone willing to trade. I could kill you, but where would that get me? I was thinking how I could keep you around and ensure that nobody comes for me.”
“You want to get married?”
“Exactly!” He sounds delighted with himself, which is crazy. He has to see how utterly insane all of this is, and yet he doesn’t and that’s what scares me the most. “See, I was thinking. You were supposed to marry me anyway, right? Your father needs a husband for you. Yes, he’ll be angry that I took you, and yes, he’ll be even angrier that I forced you to be my wife, but he’ll come around. I think I can make him see reason sooner or later. Your brothers hate me, and Nico will be so mad, but what can they do if I convince your father? Nothing at all. So you see, Karah, you will be my hostage for life. It’s the perfect plan.”