Chapter 30 Chapter 30 – The Scramble
Chapter 30 Chapter 30 – The Scramble
Mya
Something is wrong.
The feeling is a cold slick of oil on the surface of my consciousness, an instinct so primal it bypasses thought. It started the moment I walked into the dining room. The air in the house is different. Tighter. Dante is different.
He sits at the head of the table, a picture of civilized control, but the faint, predatory amusement that usually glitters in his eyes is gone. It’s been replaced by a stillness so profound it feels like the eye of a hurricane. He’s looking at me, but he’s also looking through me, as if he’s already dissected my secrets and is merely observing the twitching of the corpse.
Dinner is an exercise in silent torture. Every word he speaks is a deliberate pressure point, reminding me of the cage, of his ownership, but with a new weight to it.
“Did you have a productive shopping trip the other day, Mya?” he asks, his voice smooth as polished stone. He cuts into his steak with surgical precision. “Find everything you were looking for?”
The question is a trap, baited with innocence. He’s not asking about the dresses or the shoes. He’s asking if I found my mythical escape route. I force a brittle smile. “Bergdorf’s is a treasure trove. It was almost overwhelming.”
“I’m sure.” He takes a slow bite, chewing with infuriating deliberation. “We must cultivate your newfound interest in fashion. It’s important you look the part of Mrs. Cardello at all times. A reflection of my status. My property.” He pauses, dabbing his lips with a napkin. “Tell me, how are you feeling? After your visit with the doctor. No lingering effects, I hope?”
My blood freezes. He’s toying with me, dangling the knowledge like a baited hook. I grip the stem of my wine glass, my knuckles white. “I feel perfectly fine, thank you.”
“That’s reassuring.” His eyes hold mine, and the coldness in them is absolute. “Health is paramount when you’re trying to conceive. We must be vigilant against any… internal threats. Any betrayals of the body.”
Every word is a deliberate, poisoned dart aimed directly at my secret. He knows. The thought isn’t a suspicion anymore, it’s a certainty that lands with the force of a physical blow.
The doctor’s visit. The bloodwork. Mine must have shown something that raised his suspicions. I have to get rid of the pills before he finds them.
I’ve never actually been scared of Dante hurting me. Under his cold exterior there’s always been a thread of amusement. Right now there’s no discernible emotion at all.
My food tastes like ash and I push a piece of artichoke around my plate, my appetite a dead thing in the pit of my stomach. The clock in my head has been ticking all day. The one counting down to midnight, by which time I have to seduce him. Right now it’s being drowned out by a louder, more frantic alarm bell. I have to get out of this room.
When the meal is finally over, he dismisses me with a lazy wave of his hand. “You look tired, Mya. Why don’t you go up and get ready for bed? I have some calls to make.”
It’s a lie. He’s giving me rope. He wants to see what I’ll do. He’ll be watching my every move on his security system and I don’t dare make a beeline for the hidden stash of contraceptives.
I walk out of the dining room feeling his gaze on my back, a physical weight of judgment. Now, standing in the center of our suite, the silence is a suffocating blanket.
My stomach churns with a toxic mix of humiliation, dread and anticipation. I have to initiate. I have to walk up to that cold, beautiful fiend, offer myself up, and pretend I want it. The alternative, a piece of my father arriving in a box, is a horror I can’t bear to contemplate.
My body is a traitor, already aching with a low, persistent thrum of need that has nothing to do with my will. It seems I can no longer even go a day without fucking my husband before suffering withdrawal symptoms. The bastard really is rewiring me.
But my mind is still mine, and the thought of offering myself, as opposed to simply surrendering to his whims, feels like the ultimate defeat.
I pace the room, trying to build a wall of fury around the fear. He wants a performance? Fine. I’ll give him one. I’ll be the perfect, willing wife. I’ll seduce him, let him take me, and he’ll never know that every touch feels like acid, every thrust a violation. I know I’m lying to myself, but it’s the only armor I have left.
I turn toward the dresser to find something to wear for this grim seduction. A black lace chemise, perhaps. Something that will appeal to his dark tastes. I pull open the top drawer, my fingers brushing against the neat stacks of silk. And I freeze.
The lingerie is… wrong. A red silk teddy I know I placed on the left is now on the right. A slight, almost imperceptible shift, but my mind snags on it. Magdalena is obsessively meticulous. She folds everything with the precision of a surgeon. She would never be so careless.
A cold dread begins to seep into my bones, slow and paralyzing. Magdalena wasn’t the last one to rifle through my drawers. Dante’s already begun searching for my contraband.
My gaze darts around the room, studying it with new eyes. The books on my nightstand are perfectly aligned, but the one on top is flush with the edge, not set back a quarter-inch the way I left it. Some of my shoes have been switched. The black Manolo stilettos are where the red Prada boots were before.
Small things. Tiny, insignificant details that scream a single, terrifying word.
Search.
My breath catches in my throat. They were in here. While I was at dinner, sitting across from him, they were in my private space. Tearing it apart. Did they find what they were looking for?
My blood runs cold. He has the suspicious blood tests from the doctor, but without the pills he can’t know for sure. The search was an effort to find the physical evidence. To hold my treason in his hand.
I’m screwed if he found my pills.
The thought landed like a fist to the solar plexus. The air is punched from my lungs. The walls of the suite seem to shrink, the opulent decor turning into the grinning teeth of a trap.
My hands are shaking so violently I can barely function, but I need to keep my composure for the cameras.
I walk back to the dresser on shaky legs, accidentally yanking the drawer open with such force it nearly comes off its runners. Hopefully he’ll interpret that as anger.
My fingers comb through the lace and silk confections as I pretend to decide which lingerie to wear. I breathe slightly easier when my fingers encounter the small box of tampons at the back.
Surely none of his men would take out each individual tampon? I have the baggie of pills stuffed into the plastic wrapper of a tampon and viewed from above they all look the same. No height or shape discrepancy. If they removed them though...
I keep my expression calm, pulling out bras, panties and corsets with my right hand and discarding them to the side, while the fingers of my left hand squeezes the top of each tampon, looking for the tell-tale give of the fake one.
The pills are gone.
A raw, strangled sound escapes my throat. It’s over. The last flimsy shield of my rebellion has been ripped away. He has the proof. He knows I’ve been lying to him, defying the one condition that keeps my father breathing. There’s no point in pretending for the cameras anymore.
What will he do? The cold, vacant look in his eyes at dinner takes on a new, horrifying meaning. He wasn’t just angry. He was deciding on the punishment. My mind flashes with images. A phone call, a quiet order, a single gunshot in a warehouse. My father bleeding out on the floor.
I hear it then. The sound that cuts through my panic-drenched haze. The soft, heavy tread of his expensive leather shoes in the corridor outside the suite. Unhurried. Inevitable.
He’s coming.
My blood turns to ice. There’s nowhere to run. Nowhere to hide. He’s not coming for a seduction. He’s coming for a reckoning.
Panic, pure and absolute, floods my system. Every rational thought evaporates, replaced by the primal instinct to find cover.
He’s at the door to the suite now. The handle turns with a soft, metallic click.
In one desperate, split-second decision, I lunge for the bathroom door. My shoulder slams against the heavy wood as I shove it closed, my shaking hand fumbling for the lock. The bolt slides home with a loud, definitive thud just as the main suite door swings open.
I’m trapped in here now and no part of me actually believes a locked door will keep Dante Cardello out.
My back is pressed against the cold, unyielding wood of the bathroom door, my hands empty, my lies exposed. I can hear the sound of his breathing, slow and steady, on the other side. The net hasn’t just closed. It’s been drawn tight around my throat.