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Baring my teeth, I whisper, “Maybe if you weren’t so unbearably prissy, I would have the patience to speak to you.”
She grimaces, offense circling her parted lips as she rips her arm away from my clutch and pushes me out of her face with her fist to my chest. The second she slams her bedroom door, I walk over to my mother's dress, pick it up off the floor and hang it back in the closet. It takes every ounce of strength I have not to fly off the hinge again as I walk out of the room and close the door, leaving me in the dark once again.
Anger is still swelling within me, like an infected wound it’s poisoning my insides, and I no longer have any desire to ever be trapped in an awful marriage with a brat like her.
I take every positive thing back that I’ve ever thought about her. She’s insufferable. A completely loathsome princess, with an aggravating propensity for always following the rules, and waving her supremacy over everyone she comes into contact with. Well, I can follow the rules too, and I know of one that if broken, will result in our little deal ending…
By any means necessary, I will successfully seduce Espie San Giovanni, and she will never be married to me or any other mafia heir for that matter.
9
ESPIE
It’s been two days since the power outages have been rolling in and out in two hour increments. But ever since 6 am this morning, it has remained on consecutively. That will be about four hours of power— longer than we’ve been able to have it our entire stay.
Barth told us at breakfast that the snow is so high, it will take five years to melt. He was definitely lying about that. He likes joking with Olive and me. I’m just glad he wasn’t joking when he told us the snow finally stopped falling.
It’s not so bad here, but ever since a few nights ago when Adrik yelled at us, we’ve been avoiding each other. A fate I don’t mind, to be honest.
Olive and I have mostly watched old movies on her laptop, charging it in the hours we have power. It’s been a strange sort of vacation that feels far too similar to being trapped at home. With the added bonus of Adrik Mikhailov, who I deeply regret referring to as a bonus; His name and that word should not be in the same sentence.
Now I’m alone in the library, almost finished with the book I started upon coming here. It’s the first in a series, I believe. Truly gripping. It’s wonderful to finish a book like this, in a beautiful old library with towering ceilings and a cozy fireplace. Just as I’m reading the last page, captivated by every word, I’m pulled out of the story by Adrik. He sits down in the chair next to me, placing a mug on the table between us.
“I brought you tea. Olive said you liked Earl Grey.” I look up at him, then down at the mug.
“I like London Fog. Not Earl Grey by itself.”
He tenses his brows, pouting his plump lips to the side. “I don’t know how to make that.”
I look back down at the pages of my book. “No. I wouldn’t suppose you would.”
He cocks his head, and I’m certain that comment will make him leave or get pissed and say something shitty, then leave. But he doesn’t. He just looks at me, blinking his thick lash line, until I look over at him.
“What?” I ask with annoyance.
He shrugs, moistening his lips. “Nothing.”
“Then why are you staring at me?”
“Because you’re beautiful,” he says, completely serious, and so different from his normal way of speaking to me that it’s startling. I laugh in disbelief and his eyes light up like it’s the best thing he’s ever heard.
“What do you want?” I close my book.
“To make you dinner.”
“Tonight?”
“Yes.”
“Isn’t that a little weird for us? You and I, sharing a meal?”
“If you think that’s weird, then I guess we won’t get to go out on other dates when the snow clears.”
“Dates?”
“Yes…”
“You didn’t say tonight was a date.”
