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I haven’t seen Luka since last night when he pinned me against the wall.
He’d done it before in my room, pushing me against the armoire, but the hallway felt different. Something in his eyes had shifted. Honestly, I thought he was going to kiss me. And I didn’t have the urge to vomit or punch him or run away. I’d just…stood there. Waiting.
The memory fills me with a cocktail of shame and anger and fear. I’ve been in Luka’s house for less than twenty-four hours, and I’m already flushing at the idea of kissing him. What kind of slobbering mess will I be in a month? A year? Ten years? Can my moral backbone really be broken so easily because of emerald green eyes and rippling muscles?
“What is he like?” Chiara’s voice pulls me out of my thoughts, and I suddenly remember I’m on the phone. I haven’t heard anything she’s said for the last few minutes.
“Who?”
“Who?”she mocks. “Luka! Obviously.”
“Oh.” I sit up and pinch the thick cotton of my bedding between my fingers. “I haven’t seen him much. He’s been gone most of the day.”
“God, you are so thick,” she moans. “I mean,how was he?Like, sex.”
I inhale sharply like a nun seeing a centerfold for the first time. “We didn’t have sex.”
There is a pause. “Really?”
“Yes, really,” I snap. “I barely know the guy.”
Chiara chuckles. “Yeah, I don’t think men like Luka care much about that. You turned yourself over to him, so I just assumed he’d seal the deal.”
Seal the deal. She makes it sound like a handshake. And, I suppose, maybe to Luka sex is little more than a tool. A social exchange he uses to his benefit. But it’s more than that to me.
I’ve been trying not to think about that aspect of our marriage. Like expired food in the fridge, it is easier to just leave it alone and deal with it later. The problem is that “later” is probably in four days—at most. Luka will want to make our marriage official. He’ll want to consummate. So, even if I can convince him we should wait, I only have four days to figure out how I’m going to keep from falling apart at the sight of his naked body. Because, murderer or not, I almost let him kiss me in the hallway last night. In fact, I would have. If he’d leaned in, his beard scraping against my cheek and his hands gripping my waist, I would have curved my body towards him. I would have pressed our hips together and stretched onto tiptoes to close the gap between our lips. I would have thrown every rational thought out of my head and treated myself to a make-out session with the most handsome, horrible man I’ve ever met.
“Hello?” Once again, Chiara’s voice pulls me back.
“Sorry,” I say, trying to rewind the conversation to figure out what she said, but I can’t recall anything. “What did you say?”
She groans. “I asked if you’ve at least seen him naked. I’m in a dry spell over here, and I’d love some dirty details. Anything. Length, girth…even the approximate size of the bulge. Is it a banana or a plantain?”
“Those are basically the same size,” I say.
“Not true and so not the point,” she says. “You are being evasive.”
I’m about to explain to her that even if I knew something about Luka’s penis, I certainly wouldn’t tell her, when there is a knock on my door. My heart stutters, and I turn towards the door, eyes wide.
“Did I hear a knock?” Chiara asks.
“I have to go.” She is protesting when I stand up and drop my phone on the bed. I straighten the tight t-shirt across my chest and do my best to pull down the tiny pajama shorts that were in my drawer. They were the closest things to comfortable clothes I could find. But it is useless. I’m exposed and there isn’t time to change. So, I take a deep breath and answer the door.
Luka fills the doorway. If I didn’t know better, I could almost confuse him for a gentleman. He has on navy blue dress pants that stretch his muscled thighs, a white button down rolled to his elbows, and well-cared-for brown leather shoes. His hear is coiffed into a shiny black pile on top of his head.
“I wasn’t expecting you,” I say when it becomes obvious he isn’t going to do anything other than stare at me. I should have wrapped a blanket around myself or something. I might as well be standing in front of him in underwear. Though, I suppose, I did that yesterday, so this shouldn’t be bothering me so much.
“Have you eaten?” he asks, casting his gaze over my shoulder.
As soon as I hung up with Chiara, I was going to go down and make something the way I had for breakfast and lunch. Part of me wants to lie to him so I don’t end up eating another under-seasoned lasagna in awkward silence, but Luka probably has ways of knowing the truth.
“Not yet. Have you?”
“I thought we’d go out,” he says quickly. His hands rub together nervously. “I know a place nearby that is really good. Better than what we ate last night.”
“That isn’t difficult to do,” I joke, and to my surprise, Luka smiles. The sight of it nearly knocks me on my ass.
He nods into the room. “Mind if I come in?”
