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Our family’s future rested on my ovaries. Ovaries he was going to tie to Bill Murphy.
God help me.
“I’m so pleased you agree,” Father drawled, but his tone was content, cordial, and he picked up his spoon and continued eating.
A good sign. The best, actually.
He’d come prepared for an argument, I registered. But I was smarter than him. An argument would get me locked in my bedroom again.
Like the last time.
Being locked in there wouldn’t do me any good.
If I wanted out of this, I had to save myself.
“I’ll arrange an official meeting between you two,” Father intoned.
That he hadn’t arranged it already was further proof that he’d expected me to put up a fight that would see me caged in my bedroom for days on end.
The back of my neck turned clammy; my palms grew slick too. I wasn’t sure what was going on with my face, but I could only hope that I appeared relatively normal. That I was managing to hide the growing horror at what he was saying, what he was admitting to without words—he was going to force my compliance.
My wishes didn’t matter to him. My safety didn’t either.
God, how I wished I weren’t his daughter.
Or Mother’s.
Before I’d moved in with him, I thought things would be better than with her. I could never have imagined how cruel he could be, would never have believed that he could be even more vicious than her, but he was.
How perfect they were for each other, and they didn’t even know it.
I dropped my hand into my lap and clenched it into a fist so tight that I felt the joints ache as he told me how the next few weeks would go.
First a meeting between my future groom and me, he shared, followed by an engagement announcement and a party that the O’Donnellys would likely attend.
Then, the banns would be read in church, and as soon as Father Doyle was content this marriage wasn’t being rushed along because I was pregnant—God forbid—we’d wed in Saint Patrick’s, where all Five Pointers were wed.
I had six weeks at the most to escape.
Six weeks.
As he talked, my mind whirred because I knew I didn’tactuallyhave six weeks. Six weeks was a luxury that wasn’t going to be afforded to me.
Bill Murphy wouldn’t wait for the wedding night.
He’d seal the deal before then, compromising me, tying me to him even if I didn’t want that, even if…
I sucked in a breath.
No, my consent wasn’t required.
Not where this marriage was concerned, nor where my body was.
I sailed through the rest of the evening like I was high. I wished I were. I wished this were the worst downer ever, but it wasn’t.
Somehow, despite my internalized distress, I managed to fool him into believing that I wanted what was best for the family.
I’d never known I was that good an actress.
