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“What? What’s wrong?”
“There’s nothing wrong,” he says. “You look…beautiful.”
“Mikhail! You can’t look at her right now! I know, I know, you don't trust anybody else to protect her. Guess what, we have an entire army of men ready to kill anybody that threatens her. Okay?”
I needed protection. Holy shit, Igotprotection.
It feels like forever that I've lived day by day for survival, letting go of anything and everything that had meaning for me. Here, I have a chance to start over. I can go into this kicking and screaming. Or I can put a smile on my face and make the best of it.
I'm safe for now. For the first time in my life, I actually feel like I can breathe.
“After the ceremony, I’ll touch up your makeup for the pictures.”
“Pictures?” I feel myself blanche. What will happen when my face is shown far and wide as the bride of Mikhail Romanov?
Polina goes on. “Mikhail is going to have to prove that he's married. The pictures will go literally everywhere. We haven’t had a marriage in our family since my parents’."
“Polina,” he says in a warning voice.
How strange. Don’t they have siblings or cousins or something?
“And if I don’t want my picture published?”
Maybe I do? Do I?
“Don’t worry, little hacker,” Mikhail says in a low voice. “I’ve got it under control.”
Does he even know what worries me, though?
The last time I was outside of this room was before I was carried into the house, drugged and nearly naked and completely passed out. So I definitely don't remember the sweeping staircases, the elegant flower arrangements on every table, or the lingering scent of vanilla in the air.
We're on the second floor of what appears to be a huge house. I want to explore this house and see it with my own eyes. When I was a little girl, my mom had an extended family that was rich. We used to have holidays at their house, until there was some kind of falling out about money or something.
Oh, I loved that house. I'd never seen anything like it before. A sweeping garden out front, a three-season porch, a formal dining room, and an eat-in kitchen where the fridge made ice cubes and their stove had six burners. There was a large pantry filled with all sorts of snacks that I was allowed to eat, as much as I wanted, a study near the living room, and a finished basement downstairs.
Some of my fondest memories are of exploring that house, pretending that I was a princess and I lived in a mansion.
The touch of nostalgia hits me now. This house is much more modern than the one that I remember from my childhood, but there are nooks and crannies, carpeted rooms and hardwood floors, ceilings that reach to the heavens, and so much warm, bright light.
I walk down the stairs, and even though I'm not here of my own accord, even though I know this is part of a political act, a move that will advance Mikhail or whatever it is they do in their world…I kind of like feeling like a princess.
At the foot of the stairs, there's a sprawling living room with a large, wraparound sofa in navy and a modern fireplace.
There's a priest and only a small handful of people here. Polina sits beside an older, regal woman with silvery hair. Is that her mother?
Music plays, but the tension in the room is palpable. So tense, I feel the tension in my own body, and I find I’m practically holding my breath.
Outside this window, I catch a glimpse of the Manhattan skyline. Yes, we're still in The Cove, nestled between Coney Island and Manhattan. His eyes follow mine, and he drags me across the room, planting us in front of the priest. No one speaks.
"Begin the fucking ceremony," he growls to the priest.
Wow. So he just went there. No respect for the cloth?
I hear the sound of a thump and a cry. I stifle a gasp, but no one moves. Another thump and another, followed by a muffled scream.
Someone…someone’s getting beaten out there. Maybe even killed. I glance out the window and see not one but three men on the ground outside the window, about twenty feet from where we stand in the living room. Blood pools on the concrete. I stare, stricken.
Oh my God.
