AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Your family, like ours, values the bond of family. So, if you were to become pregnant, the Furinos would be less of a threat to our family,” Ivan explains. “Your father, no matter how cruel, would never harm you or his grandson, even if that grandson will be a Volkov. It will further cement the peace we have attempted to create with this union.”
“We have peace,” I say, my entire body shaking. “My father won’t do anything to you or Luka or anyone. He wants this marriage to happen.”
“We are no longer sure of that. Plus, who is to say you won’t run away the way you did with the Irish gunrunner? Then, what will become of my family? A child would bond you to Luka and keep you from fleeing,” Ivan says. “Have Luka’s child, or die. Those are the choices.”
I stare down at the empty plates on the table, trying to understand how this conversation exists in the same reality in which I had dinner with Luka’s parents. It was only minutes ago that we were eating, but it feels like years, decades. I’m exhausted and confused and desperate to talk to Luka alone. To sort all of this out. If I can just get him by himself – away from his father – and find out what the hell is going on behind those infuriatingly ambiguous eyes, I’ll be able to figure a way out of this mess. But Ivan isn’t going anywhere until he gets what he wants.
So, I agree.
“I’m his wife,” I say weakly. “I planned to have his children, anyway.”
Ivan raises and eyebrow and Luka shifts slightly in his seat.
“Are you agreeing?” Ivan asks.
I nod. “Yes. I am.”
18
Eve
I lurk outside Luka’s office door, trying to find the courage to go inside. It has been a week since the disastrous family dinner, and I haven’t talked to him once. I’ve tried. Many times. But he is always rushing off somewhere, and he hasn’t even been coming back to the mansion to sleep. I’ve gone back to my guest room, but apparently, being just down the hall is still too close.
I can hear him working, tapping at his keyboard and shuffling things across his desk, and when I knock, everything goes silent.
He doesn’t move or breath or tell me to come in, and I wait for a few seconds before I’ve finally had enough, and I push the door open.
“No one said you could come in.” He doesn’t look up from his computer.
“I need to talk to you,” I say, beginning the speech I’ve been rehearsing for days. “My father arranged my marriage to the gunrunner. I didn’t even know him, and I had no interest in marrying him. Which is why the engagement fell through.”
“You had no interest in marrying me, either,” he says, finally looking up. His green eyes are pale like frost-covered leaves on a foggy morning. “Your father arranged our marriage. Does this mean our relationship will fall through, too?”
I sigh. “That isn’t what I meant. I’m just trying to say that—”
“I don’t much care what you’re trying to say, Eve.”
It goes to show how desperate I am for his attention that my heart stutters at the sound of my name on his lips.
“This marriage is a business arrangement, and since you nullified the terms by not disclosing your past relationships, a new agreement has been drawn.” He closes his laptop and leans back in his chair. His muscular forearms flex, and I wish I could hate him the way I once did. It would make everything so much easier.
“You really want to follow your father’s plan?” I ask, stepping forward and placing my palms on the edge of his desk. We are closer than we’ve been in days, and I can feel my body yearning to be close to him. “I will have a family with you, Luka. I agreed to this marriage. But not like this. As part of a deal? Is that how you want your firstborn to come into this world? Why can’t we wait until we are ready?”
“Because I don’t know that I won’t be murdered in my sleep while we wait,” he says. “I don’t know that your father won’t plan an attack on my family, using you as his mole. We can’t wait until we are ready because I will never be ready to tie myself forever to a woman who is willing and able to manipulate me.”
“Manipulate you?” I ask, throwing my hands up, eyebrows drawn together. “Explain to me how I manipulated you to propose to me in the dining room of the restaurant I worked at? Explain to me how I had never met you, and yet somehow brainwashed you into carrying out my evil plan?”
“Don’t talk to me like that,” he snaps.
But I’m too angry to stop. “The proposal was your idea, and I turned you down first! You are the one who went to my father and told him about the arrangement. You defied your own father to make it happen. I didn’t force you to do any of that, Luka. You did it because you wanted to and no other reason, so don’t—”
Suddenly, he is standing up and leaning across the desk, his face inches from mine and a shade of angry red I’ve never seen before. “Don’t pretend like you didn’t know what you were doing when you sashayed around our table and played hard to get, Eve. You played me and made me trust you, and I’ll never forgive you for that.”
Never.
The word rings in my head like a bell, and I see the truth of it in his eyes. Luka hates me. Maybe, at some point before and briefly after our marriage he didn’t, but he does now. Luka can barely stand the sight of me, and that alone makes me want to curl up and cry. What he says next seals the deal.
“I spoke with the family physician today. You were seen shortly before the wedding and had just ended your cycle, so the six-day window of when you are most likely to conceive begins today.” He pushes his chair under his desk and walks towards me. “So, we have to have sex.”
