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An easy, nonjudgmental conversation with the girls.
Or, more importantly, the few precious words and almost forbidden looks that Gareth had given me every game.
I looked forward to those brief moments in time more than anything else in the world, and maybe it was those treasured seconds that had given me the courage I needed to seek Gareth out the night I found out my father was planning to sell me.
I'd always known my father was a cruel bastard, but I never once assumed that he would be the one negotiating the marriage. Yes, I knew that I’d been born and bred to be a mobster’s wife, but I had thought I could choose which allying family I wanted to give my life to.
Stupid of me, especially given all the other evidence in my life that took my choices away. My food, my clothes, my makeup, the way I wore my hair, the music I listened to, the people I was allowed to speak with. All had been selected for me. And there was such a lack of female companionship on that approved list that I found myself unsure how to interact with the girls at the billionaire’s game for the first few months.
They’d been so kind, though, so understanding and gentle with me and my social awkwardness. They never once made me feel out of place, even though I was well aware I wasn't like them.
I wasn't an independent woman with career dreams and aspirations of my own who happened to fall in love with somebody at that table.
No, I’d been a piece of luggage. A high-value asset dragged to each game to be flaunted and displayed. It was a test, taking me to every billionaire’s game after he won his seat in the match. He wanted to see how I would behave should he marry me off.
I’d obviously lived up to his every expectation since he’d been brokering a deal at the last one.
An icy drop of fear slid down my spine, making me shiver.
If I hadn't gone to Gareth’s room that night, if I didn’t win that favor chip, I’d be married to a seventy-year-old, cruel, emotionless man. One who had no interest in me beyond the heir I would hopefully give him.
I shuddered again, knowing in the very depths of my soul that even if I hadn’t had that favor chip, I would’ve gone to Gareth’s room.
Sure, Asher or Crossland or Ethan or Weston had been more than welcoming and kind to me, but they didn't understand my world like Gareth did.
And besides all that, Gareth had always spoken on my behalf, even when he knew it would cause a deeper rift between him and my father.
The tentative peace between our families hung by a thin string, and all his speaking for me threatened to snap it entirely. But he’d never cared, and when those pale green eyes would cast their gaze over me, a silent look asking me if I was okay, it felt more than natural to go to his room that night.
Of course, I thought I'd been going just for a few minutes. Just to ruin myself as he liked to say, just enough that my father's plans would be prevented. But he’d been right. In the end, he'd been the one thinking clearly as opposed to me, who’d been spiraling.
He’d saved me by marrying me, but I knew our time was limited. I knew my father would work on a plan to take me back and make me pay.
I needed to get Gareth to understand that if my father thought there was a chance of getting his pure princess back, he would.
The only actual way I'd be free was if Gareth took my virginity. He seemed as opposed to that concept as anything else. All under the guise that he would ruin me, that I would only be trading one monster for another.
I didn't believe that.
As cloistered as my family kept me, the one thing they never lacked to show me was the monstrous nature of the men in my family. And while I’d remained untouched, I’d witnessed the sales of my cousins and the aftereffects of such deals.
Some feigned happiness and complacency while others returned to family gatherings looking like a shell of their former self, worn down by the constant demands from their husbands.
Gareth was not the kind of monster I was used to.
And in my heart, I didn't believe he was a monster at all.
He hadn’t demanded one thing of me since I'd become his wife, and according to the laws of the world we lived in, he could have demanded anything. Hell, I'd once heard a story about one of my cousins’ husbands forcing them to wear skimpy lingerie and serve all of his friends at a weekend retreat, like they’d been hired entertainment instead of a spouse.
I couldn't see Gareth doing anything like that, but I also knew that I didn't know him as well as I wanted to. And maybe that's all it was. Maybe if I could get to know him, and he could get to know me, then he’d understand.
I certainly didn't have a chance at seducing him, even though I’d been trying in pathetic little attempts. The art of seduction was conveniently left out of my approved studies, and it wasn't like I ever saw my mother seducing my father, as disgusting as that thought was.
The two people were as cold to each other as floating icebergs who never wanted to cross each other's paths. To the public, she was the perfect wife. Silent, submissive, and supportive. But when it was just us? She was a zombie. She was a shell floating in the wind, listless and unmotivated even to do things with her only daughter, like when I'd asked for a lunch date or a conversation or even simply watching a movie together.
What's the point in watching a movie if we can't even pick what we want to see? She would say to me any time I asked.
We could try, I’d begged.
