Dangerous Games

29

The urge to drive my thumbs into his eye sockets is nearly overpowering. I hate him so much he should drop dead from the sheer electrical force of it leaving my body, like being struck by a bolt of lightning.

As Tolya picks up his tape and measures the length of my leg from hip to ankle, his fingers icy against my bare skin, Dimitri turns philosophical. “Love and hate are two different sides of the same coin, Evalina. Your hate binds you to me just as much as your love did to your mother. Or Nasir.”

I look away, unnerved that he read my thoughts and despising the sound of Naz’s name on his lips. I can’t bear to hear it.

Tolya gives a measurement to his father, who dutifully jots it down. Then Tolya rises, nervously licking his lips. He stutters, “E-excuse me please, madam, b-but I . . . may I . . .”

He gestures toward my breasts. His ears are scarlet.

“No, you may not. Thirty-six.”

He glances at Dimitri, who waves his cigar, smirking and thoroughly enjoying himself. “As she says. Bring in the gowns.”

I don’t know who’s more relieved, me or Tolya, who exhales and wipes his forehead with the back of his hand before scurrying out the door, tape measure flying. His father follows.

As we wait for the dresses to be brought in, Dimitri transfers his cigar to his other hand, then reaches out and trails a finger down my spine. I suppress a flinch and bite my lip.

“You found the cream for your welts,” he says, tracing a line across my back.

“Yes. The maid helped me.”

“Your skin always marks so nicely. It will be even better when the tan fades. You’ve spent too much time in the sun.” His finger drifts down to the upper curve of my bottom, then lingers on my tailbone, tracing a figure eight. He murmurs to himself, “My initials would be perfect tattooed here. No—branded.”

Horrified at the prospect, I swallow and draw a shaky breath.

Across the room, Stefan watches, his face darkening.

Standing next to him, the guard with the broken nose has a visible erection.

I force myself to breathe and relax my muscles. Despite Dimitri’s offhand remark about giving his men permission to have me, I don’t believe this is a prelude to gang rape. He’s never allowed anyone in his employ to touch me, or offered me to a business associate during one of those many past meetings where a variety of girls were presented as gifts.

On the threat of beating me and bending me over in front of the staff, however, I have no doubt.

Dimitri slaps my bottom, making me jump. “Look at me.”

When I do, he demands, “Tell me what you were just thinking.”

“You don’t share me.”

His gaze bores into mine. “Not yet, I haven’t.”

After a moment, I decide to take a risk. I lower my gaze to the floor and say quietly, “I’m grateful that you don’t.”

I’m surprised to hear him laugh. I look up at him again, taken aback. “I was being honest.”

“You were being calculated.”

He’s not angry. If anything, he seems pleased. “And you like that because . . . ?”

He cups my bottom and squeezes, sinking his fingers into my flesh. “The same reason a gardener likes watching the seeds he plants bloom into flowers.”

A flash of anger tightens my stomach. Lord save me from his stupid creation analogies. “I’m not a thing you made.”

His smile sours. “Don’t be boring. You’re a queen. Wear your crown proudly.”

Tolya and Alek return with the dresses, pulling them in on rolling garment racks, a profusion of silk, tulle, chiffon, and seed pearls, everything the purest snowy white.

“Such a long face,” notes Dimitri, puffing on his cigar. “The gowns don’t please you?”

I scowl at the sea of frothy confections being assembled around me. It isn’t the color I hate, but the thought of what they symbolize: a legalized union with this creature sitting beside me, this monster posing as a man with his elegant manners and expensive suit.

If I marry him and then kill him, I’ll be a widow. A black widow. A murderer times three. I’ll be . . .

Oh my God. If I’m pregnant and we marry, my child will be his heir.

Dimitri picks up a folded newspaper from the table next to his chair and flips it open over his knee. As more racks are rolled in by a handful of guards, he says, “Or perhaps you’d prefer something more appropriate for a woman in mourning? Black, I suppose?”

There’s a triumphant tone in his voice that makes me look at him sharply.

He’s reading an article, a smile stretching his lips wide. When he finishes, he offers it over without a word.

A dark premonition strikes a chord of terror deep in my heart. I stare at the newspaper, no longer aware of the room or the gowns or my exposed flesh, no longer caring about the state of my humiliation.

Dimitri turns his head and looks at me, and I know. His smile is so vicious, I already know.

I whisper, “No.”

“Shall I read it to you? It’s quite short. There’s a picture, too.”

All the tiny hairs on my body standing on end and my heart racing like mad, I glance down at the newspaper.

At the story’s headline: American One of Ten Killed in Violent Shoot-Out.

At the picture of Naz’s face.

Dimitri tosses the paper back onto the table and takes a puff of his cigar. “You thought I was lying, didn’t you? Ouch. That must really hurt.”

Shattering into a thousand jagged pieces, I sink to my knees with the sound of his soft laughter ringing in my ears.