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The rest of the table—Diego’s brother and his wife, Lucia—is silent. The little boy isn’t at the table, and I can guess why—it’s not uncommon for family meals in households like these to be restricted to adults. My father never liked the practice, saying that his daughters should take meals with the family and not a nanny, but his preference was the exception to wealthy families’ rules here.
I don’t want to sit next to Diego, but I slide into the seat anyway.Pick your battles, Isabella,I chant in my head over and over, like a mantra. The time will come, I know, when he’ll demand something I won’t be willing to do. He’ll slowly escalate it, bit by bit, until I—like a frog in slowly boiling water—can’t take it anymore. And then I’ll snap and rebel, and he’ll punish me.
When that happens, I at least want it to be worth it. Not for being unable to get out of bed, not over which seat I take at the breakfast table. Something worth feeling the weight of his wrath come down on me.
Breakfast is good, which I suppose shouldn’t be all that surprising, considering the iron fists that Maria and Renata run the house with. Of course they employ a good cook. I eat more than I ever would have allowed myself to at home under my mother’s watchful eye, feeling Renata’s gaze grow darker by the second as she watches me consumeconchas, ham, eggs, fried tomatoes, and a number of other things I scoop onto my plate. I’m actually starving—I’ve barely eaten since well before the gala last night, and I’m enjoying the fact that this is going to piss her off without her really being able to do anything about it. I’m willing to bet that Diego wouldn’t like his mother implying at the table that his bride-to-be is eating too much. And Renata isn’tmymother.
A hand slams down onto the table in front of me, and I jerk back, nearly choking on a slippery bite of egg. I look up, feeling a small tremor go down my spine, and meet Diego’s narrowed eyes.
“Watch yourself, little one,” he says in a low tone. “I bought a princess from Ricardo Santiago, not a pig. Unless you want me to have you locked in your room and your meals brought to you, so you don’t overeat?”
I swallow hard, feeling tears prick at the back of my eyelids, but I keep my mouth shut.Being reckless got me here,I remind myself, even as an acid remark feels like it’s burning my tongue. “I’m sorry,” I force myself to say, ignoring the bile that tries to follow it and set my utensils down. “I didn’t eat much at dinner last night at the gala. I was too nervous.”
I look up at him under my lashes as I say it, hoping he’ll infer that my nervousness was about my engagement, but my coyness doesn’t work. Diego curls his lip, and the hand gripping the knife he used to cut his ham comes up, stabbing so suddenly into the table an inch from my fingers that I jerk backward with a cry.
“Of course you were,” he says, his voice thick and oily. “Lying little slut. The man you cuckolded me with was sitting just down the table from you. You must have been pissing yourself with fear.”
The entire table is still and quiet, as if they’re terrified to move a muscle, lest Diego take notice of them next.
“I’m sorry,” I whisper again. I don’t know what else to say, what combination of words will satisfy him rather than make him stab the knife into my hand next.Places to hurt you where no one will see,he’d said last night, and my hand could certainly be one of those. I wouldn’t be the first bride to wear white lace gloves on her wedding day.A fashion statement.
Diego’s lips part, and he takes a heavy breath, his gaze turning leering. “You should wear prettier clothes to the dining table,” he says finally, leaving his knife wobbling in the tablecloth and the wood beneath as he turns back to his breakfast. “I like a nice view in the morning.”
I canfeelthe sigh that the rest of the table lets out. I sink back into my chair, my hands trembling, fighting back the tears. I refuse to let him see me cry. Not here, not yet.Only for something worth it.
He succeeded in one thing, though—my appetite is entirely gone.
---
The rest of the morning consists of Renata showing me around the huge house, the gardens, and the pool deck in the back. It’s a gorgeously lavish house, with perfectly curated rooms filled with the finest textiles, expensive art, carved and plush furniture, and beautifully woven rugs and drapes. The landscaping of the gardens is exquisite, and the pool is surrounded by what can only be described as a jungle of tropical plants, with a bar to one side, lounge seating, and a stone fireplace, as well as a hot tub to one side. My father’s mansion and grounds is still more beautiful, more tasteful, whereas Diego’s runs to gaudiness at times, as if he has to show off his wealth to feel good about it.
Renata exclaims over the pool, hot tub, and the jungle of brightly colored flora surrounding it, calling it her oasis in the desert. It just makes me feel nauseous, wondering if Diego will want me in there one night. If I’ll have to parade in a bikini for his eyes, maybe those of his friends as well, and service him on demand.
Beautiful as it is, this can never feel like my home. It never will. And if I get a chance to escape—I’m going to take it. No matter the cost if I’m caught.
I can’t bear a life with Diego.
“Come along.” Renata snaps her fingers, shaking me out of my daze. “Someone is coming to fit you for your wedding dress, and we don’t want to be late. The planner is likely already here.”
My wedding.My stomach clenches, nausea roiling over me again, this time too fiercely to be ignored.I’m going to throw up,I think wildly, frantic not to do it where Renata can see or hear. It’s only been two weeks since the first night Niall and I slept together, but I’ve never measured my cycles. I have no idea what it means that my period was a week and a half before that, how much danger of pregnancy I’d put myself in. At the time, I’d clutched the idea of being pregnant from my trysts with Niall close to me, another wicked secret that could be mine alone, another way to punish the man who would eventually force himself on me as my husband. Now the idea is terrifying, because if Iampregnant and Diego discovers it, he won’t let me keep the baby. He already knows he’s a cuckold, and he’ll be waiting for signs that something is going to come of it.
I manage to hold it back until we’re in the house, feeling the hot, bitter press of it against the back of my throat. “I have to pee!” I exclaim wildly the minute we’re in the house, ignoring Renata’s shocked and disgusted look, and run straight for the downstairs bathroom I remember passing this morning on the way to breakfast.
A breakfast that all comes up now, the minute I fling myself in front of the toilet, every bit of it. I cling to the sides of the bowl as I throw up harder than I ever have in my life, choking and coughing as I try to muffle the sounds, tears running down my face.
It’s the stress,I tell myself.Since last night you’ve endured an entire gauntlet of emotions, stress, shock, and abuse, and your whole life has been turned upside down. Anyone would puke over that. It means nothing.
I press my hand to my flat stomach, tears running down my face. I’d wanted Niall’s baby only days ago, but now I’m praying that there’s any other reason for this. Diego will never believe the baby is his, not if we were married and bedded tomorrow, a thought that sends me into a second round of retching over the toilet bowl. He’ll force me into an abortion, or if the pregnancy makes itself known after we’re married, he’ll treat the child like shit its entire life, never fully trusting the paternity.Especially if the baby is a girl—
The hammering of a fist comes at the door, and I nearly jump out of my skin.“Isabella!”Renata’s shrill voice comes through, making my stomach sink. “What are you doing in there? Hurry up!”
“I’m coming!” I flush the toilet, making sure no traces are left and hurry to the marble-topped sink to wash my face and hands, trying to rinse off any evidence that I’ve been crying. My eyes still look pink, and a little swollen, but that in and of itself isn’t proof I vomited.
I think they’re all expecting me to be crying, anyway.
