Chapter 98: Amelia

Amelia

I stare at him for a long moment, waiting for the punchline, waiting for some flicker of cruelty in his pale eyes that tells me this is just another game, another way to watch me break. It doesn't come. He simply stands there at the foot of the bed, hands loose at his sides, patient in a way that terrifies me more than anything he's said since he first walked through that door.

"You're not actually asking," I say slowly. "You already told me you don't need me to say yes. So what exactly is this? Some kind of performance?"

"Call it whatever helps you sleep tonight." He tilts his head, studying me with the same unhurried curiosity he's used every single time he's come into this room. "I'd prefer you say yes on your own. It makes things considerably smoother going forward. But I'll admit, your answer isn't strictly required."

"Then why bother asking at all."

"Because I like the idea of you choosing it." He steps closer, and I force myself not to flinch, forcing my spine straight against the headboard even though every muscle in my body wants to curl away from him. "There's something satisfying about watching a woman decide to survive instead of simply being dragged into surviving. I'd rather have that from you than the alternative."

"The alternative being what, exactly?"

"The alternative being considerably less pleasant for both of us." He says it lightly, almost conversationally, and that's what makes it land so hard, the casual way he lets the threat sit there without ever raising his voice to give it weight. "I'd rather not have to explain that part in detail. I think your imagination can manage it well enough on its own."

I hold his gaze, refusing to let him see exactly how well my imagination is currently managing it. My pulse is hammering hard enough that I'm certain he can see it in my throat, but I keep my voice level, keep every word flat and controlled the way I was trained to years ago, back when staying calm was the only thing that ever kept me alive through worse rooms than this one.

"You do understand," I say, "that even if I said yes right now, even if I smiled and thanked you and let you slide a ring on my finger, it wouldn't mean anything. You'd just be marrying someone who's counting down every single second until she finds a way out."

"I'm aware." Something almost like amusement flickers behind his eyes. "I've never once expected loyalty from you, Amelia. I expect intelligence. And an intelligent woman understands the difference between a fight she can currently win and one she can't."

"This isn't a fight I've lost. It's a fight I haven't started yet."

He laughs at that, low and genuine, and the sound of it unsettles me more than his anger ever has, because anger I understand. Anger is a language I've spent my entire career learning to read and counter. This easy, unbothered amusement tells me he's not remotely worried about anything I might attempt, which means either he's arrogant enough to underestimate me the same way every man who's ever tried to control me eventually has, or he genuinely has nothing to worry about, and that thought is considerably harder to sit with.

"I like you," he says finally, and something about the way he says it, simple and matter of fact, crawls under my skin worse than any of his earlier threats. "Genuinely. Most people in your position break within the first two days. You've held out considerably longer than that, and you're still finding the energy to threaten me from a bed you can barely stand up from. That's rare."

"Glad my suffering is entertaining."

"It's not entertainment. It's confirmation." He moves closer again, close enough now that I can see the faint lines around his pale eyes, the only part of his face the mask leaves visible enough to actually read. "Confirmation that I chose correctly. You're exactly the kind of woman worth the trouble of keeping."

"I'm not a possession."

"No," he agrees easily. "You're an investment. There's a difference, though I understand why the distinction might feel meaningless from where you're currently sitting."

I want to scream at him. I want to throw every ounce of exhausted, grief-soaked fury currently burning through my chest directly into his face, but some old, buried discipline holds it back, some part of me that still remembers every lesson about controlling a room instead of letting it control you. Screaming gets me nothing except the satisfaction of watching him flinch, and he's already made it clear he doesn't flinch easily. Information gets me something considerably more useful.

"You said I'm here for other reasons," I say, forcing my voice into something almost thoughtful instead of furious. "Beyond the bait. What reasons?"

Something shifts behind his eyes, brief and calculating, like he's deciding how much to actually give me. "Your military record, for one. Captain, decorated, survived situations that would have broken considerably less capable soldiers. That kind of resume is useful in ways that have nothing to do with your face."

"Useful how."

"You'll learn that in time." He straightens, adjusting his sleeve again with that same irritating precision, and I understand immediately that I've pushed as far as he intends to let me push tonight. "For now, get some rest. I'd like an answer before the week is finished."

"And if I refuse."

"Then I'll simply proceed without one." He turns toward the door, pausing with his hand on the frame, glancing back at me one final time. "I'd genuinely prefer your cooperation, Amelia. It would make this entire arrangement considerably less painful for you. But I want you to understand something clearly before you decide how stubborn you intend to be about it. I have never once needed a woman's permission to keep her."

He leaves before I can answer, the door clicking shut behind him with that same soft, final sound, and I sit there in the sudden silence, my whole body shaking with adrenaline that has nowhere left to go.

I don't cry. I want to, some desperate, exhausted part of me wants to curl into these unfamiliar sheets and let everything I've been holding back finally break loose, Ren's death and this stranger's casual, terrifying proposal and the particular horror of not knowing which country I'm even trapped in. But crying accomplishes nothing right now except wasting energy I don't have to spare, and I've spent too many years training myself out of that particular weakness to indulge it now, no matter how badly it wants out.

Instead, I think.

He mentioned my military record like it matters to whatever he actually wants from me, something beyond simple ownership, something specific enough that he wouldn't have brought it up otherwise. Investment, he called me. Not decoration. Not prize. Investment, a word that implies return, implies a purpose beyond simply keeping me trapped in this gilded room until I either break or die.

I think about the twelve capos scattered across Verona who apparently swore loyalty to Ren this past week, about whatever organization currently pulls the strings behind this entire operation, about four years of patient planning that supposedly led toward exactly this moment. If this man wanted me purely as a trophy, purely as some cruel prize for killing Ren, he wouldn't need my service record. He wouldn't need my training. Whatever he actually intends for me runs considerably deeper than a forced marriage built on spite.

The maid returns sometime later, carrying a tray of food I don't have the appetite for, though I force myself to eat anyway, because starving myself accomplishes nothing except making me weaker than I already am. She moves quietly, efficiently, avoiding my eyes the way she has every previous visit, and I study her while she works, cataloging every small detail the same clinical way I've been cataloging everything else since I woke up in this bed.

"He asked me to marry him," I say quietly, testing her reaction.

Her hands still for just a fraction of a second over the tray, barely noticeable if I weren't specifically watching for it. "Did he."

"You don't seem surprised."

"I'm not paid to be surprised, ma'am." She keeps her eyes down, adjusting the plate with unnecessary care. "I'm paid to help you get dressed and fed."

"But you knew this was coming."

She doesn't answer that directly, though something in her silence answers it well enough on its own. I file that away too, another small piece of a puzzle I'm nowhere close to finishing, but a piece nonetheless.

"What's your name?" I ask, softer this time, trying a different approach.

She hesitates, glancing toward the door like she's checking whether anyone might be listening. "Farrah," she says finally, quiet enough that I barely catch it.

"Farrah." I say it carefully, committing it to memory alongside everything else. "How long have you worked for him?"

"Longer than I'd like." The words slip out before she seems to catch them, and something flickers across her carefully blank expression, quickly smoothed back into practiced neutrality. "I should finish up, ma'am. He doesn't like it when I linger."

"Wait." I reach out before she can turn away, not touching her, just enough to make her pause. "Earlier, when you helped me up. You said things would go easier if I cooperated. For the two of us, you said. What did you mean by that?"

Fear crosses her face this time, quick and unmistakable, and she glances toward the door again before answering, her voice dropping to barely more than breath. "I mean exactly what I said, ma'am. Nothing more."

"Farrah."

"Please." The single word carries more desperation than anything else she's said since walking into this room, and something in it makes me release whatever grip I still have on her sleeve. "Please don't ask me things like that. Not here. Not where anyone might hear."

She gathers the tray quickly and leaves without waiting for a response, and I'm left alone again with nothing but the soft golden light and the particular ache settling deep into my chest, grief finally starting to crack through the discipline I've been using to hold it back.

Ren is dead.

I let myself think it fully for the first time since waking up in this bed, let the weight of it actually settle instead of pushing it away in favor of tactical calculation. I think about the particular warmth in his voice the last time he told me to be careful, about every complicated, furious, devastating thing I felt for him over these last several weeks, and grief finally breaks loose in full, tears coming hot and fast and utterly beyond my control.

I cry until my throat aches worse than it already did, until my whole body shakes with the effort of it, and when it finally passes, some exhausted, hollowed out calm settles in its place, the particular stillness that comes only after grief has run its course enough to let clearer thought back in.

I have a name now. Farrah. I have confirmation that whatever this man wants from me runs deeper than simple cruelty. I have small, scattered details about air quality and distant machinery and an accent I still can't quite place. None of it adds up to freedom yet. But it's more than I had yesterday, and I intend to keep building on it until it does.

The golden light dims sometime later, marking whatever passes for night in this place, and I lie still beneath the unfamiliar sheets, forcing my breathing slow and even, forcing myself toward sleep I desperately need if I'm going to keep my mind sharp enough to actually use everything I'm gathering.

I'm nearly under when the door opens again, softer this time, no announcement, no pause before entering.

I sit up fast, heart slamming, expecting him again, expecting another round of calm, patient threats wrapped in the language of investment and courtesy.

It isn't him.

A figure stands just inside the doorway, smaller, slighter, dressed in dark clothes instead of a uniform, face obscured by shadow rather than mask. For a long, frozen second, neither of us moves, and then the figure steps further into the dim light, and I finally see her face clearly enough to recognize the particular, careful fear written across it.

It's Farrah.

"You need to listen to me," she whispers, crossing the room fast, crouching beside the bed. "I don't have much time. But if you want out of this place, I might be the only chance you get."