“Let us begin,” he continues, placing his hand around my waist, almost sliding me across the polished floor, my feet reluctant to move.
At the far end of the room is a small table covered in a white cloth with an official looking form on top next to a Mont Blanc pen. Behind the table a harassed looking priest. “He looks like he wants to be here as much as me,” I say to Alexsei as we approach him.
“Gerry took some persuading to agree to this. He has, shall we say, reduced some of the legal fripperies to this. You simply say I do and put the ring on your finger.”
“How romantic. Just what every little girl always dreamed of, reducing legal fripperies.”
Gerry nods my way, swallowing hard. “I’m sorry,” he says. “It has to be done.”
“I know,” I reply. “Just get on with it.” I glance around me, wishing someone would save me. There is no one. Not even myfather is here, although I doubt he would do anything if he was.
I have helped him pay off his gambling debts but he can run them up again. I’m trapped by circumstance, by fate, like him, and there’s nothing I can do about it. He is destined to burn through money. I am fated to be unhappy.
Alexsei prods me in the ribs. “Answer him.”
“Huh?”
The priest says it again. “Do you, Mila Belucci, take Alexsei Volkov to be your lawfully wedded husband?”
The same words as in my dream. At least I’m dressed, I guess. I don’t want to answer but Alexsei is glaring at me. “Say it or I’ll rip that dress off you and spank you,” he whispers in my ear.
“I do,” I say, wanting to cry.
Alexsei slips the ring onto my finger. It sparkles in the light, the diamonds looking beautiful but wearing heavily on my soul.
A mark of his possession of me, the end of my life.
The priest nods, turning to Alexsei. “Will that do?”
“Is it legal?”
“As soon as you kiss.”
Alexsei leans toward me, taking hold of the back of my head. He plunges his tongue straight into my mouth and my body melts in response. I hate myself for it but I kiss him back, my lips still tingling when he pulls away from me.
“Time for the first dance,” Alexsei says, hitting a button on the wall. Waltz music fills the air as he takes me in his arms.
We dance together, his feet showing surprising skill, light in their movements as he spins me around until we’re at the far end of the ballroom.
The door is opened by unseen hands and he leads me out into the corridor, the music dying away. “Consider your debt repaid,” he shouts to the priest. “Stay off the marching powder if you can’t afford it, padre.”
The door closes and Alexsei grins hungrily at me. “You are my wife now,” he says, kicking open another door that leads into a lounge filled with easels and canvases.
He sets me on my feet by the roaring fire. “This will be your art studio,” he continues, pointing at a selection of acrylic paints neatly organized in an open drawer by the window. “While you are here, you may access this room whenever you wish.” He holds up a finger. “But if you misbehave, that privilege will be removed. Is that clear?”
He glances at his watch. “You may paint for as long as you like. I doubt I will be available again until tomorrow.” He kisses my forehead, stroking my cheek with a thick finger a moment later. “When I return, we will begin the process of creating a family.”
“That will never happen. I’ll claw your eyes out first.”
“You’re mine.” He smirks. “You’ll change your mind soon enough.”
He walks out of the room but the word family hangs in the air, moving over me and falling, crushing the air from my lungs. I can’t breathe. I start to hyperventilate, gripping the nearest chair. I try to slow my breath. In and out, in and out.
The ringing in my ears dies away.
I cannot have a family with that man. What kind of father would he be? Like my own, I have no doubt. Cruel, cold, violent. I will not let a child be raised by that beast. I will never let it happen.
The need to escape once again rises up in me. I cannot stay here. Not with his kiss still making my lips tingle, making my pussy wonder if I’m protesting too much about all this.