Chapter 5 Lessons in Obedience
947 Words
Xavier's voice was cold and clipped, like he was in a hurry to prove he'd done the right thing.
"Take Mrs. Lucero to charm school. Let the instructors teach her a lesson. She can leave when she learns how to control herself."
Charm school was where I'd been sent at sixteen to learn how to be a proper woman. It was also where the Lucero family sent women who disobeyed to be corrected.
Two bodyguards in black stepped forward and grabbed my arms.
I didn't struggle.
I looked at Xavier one last time.
He avoided my gaze.
Charm school was just as oppressive and rigid as I remembered, but this time, the cruelty was out in the open.
Everyone there knew I had been sent there because I had fallen out of favor.
That meant every filthy job and every miserable chore was dumped on me.
They made me scrub the floors on my knees, inch by inch, and if I left so much as a drop of water behind, they would punish me even more harshly.
They made me cook to everyone's liking, and if the food came out too salty or too bland, they forced my hands into icy water.
If I resisted even a little, they locked me in a dark room, forced me to kneel for hours, or had men beat my lower back with sticks.
"You are nothing but orphanage trash and have never been fit to be Mrs. Lucero."
"Such a jinx, a woman who couldn't even save her own child and only brought death to the people around her!"
Any resistance only brought harsher punishment.
So I worked in silence, endured in silence, and faded a little more with each passing day.
The only thing keeping me going was the signed paperwork in my pocket, the one thing that would get me to Antarctica.
On the fifth evening, Xavier finally arrived.
When he stepped into that suffocating courtyard, I was hauling a heavy bucket of filthy water, struggling to drag it to the corner and pour it out.
The skin on my wrists and ankles was mottled with bruises from rough hands and swollen from frostbite.
A dark bruise bloomed at my temple where one of the instructors had slammed my head into the wall the day before.
Xavier's gaze locked on me.
All the cold composure that came so easily to him vanished, replaced by shock.
He stared at me like he couldn't believe the broken, hollow shell of a woman standing in front of him was really Aurora.
"Aurora?" He swallowed hard. "What the hell happened to you?"
I lowered the bucket, and dirty water splashed over my torn clothes.
I lifted my head and spoke in a calm, detached voice.
"The instructors said you sent me here to teach me manners and beat every last flaw out of me. They taught me well. I was perfectly obedient."
Xavier's expression darkened by the second.
He turned sharply toward the sweating headmistress and the instructors standing behind her, all of them pale.
"Who did this?"
His voice was quiet, but cold enough to make everyone shiver.
No one dared answer.
One of the younger instructors broke down and dropped to her knees.
"Mr. Lucero, Aurora crossed you, so she deserved to be punished."
Xavier closed his eyes. When he opened them again, they were rimmed red.
I smiled faintly, set the empty bucket aside, and turned toward the gate, though my steps were unsteady.
"Aurora!"
He called my name, his voice rough and raw.
I did not stop walking. He reached for my wrist.
The second his fingertips brushed my torn, ice-cold skin, I jerked away as if he had burned me.
His hand froze in midair.
"Do you think this still isn't enough? I'm sure the shock baton still works. Want me to go back and kneel for that too?"
He parted his lips as if he wanted to say something.
In the end, he only turned to his assistant, who had gone pale, and barked,
"Investigate every last person who laid a hand on her! I don't care who they are! Make them pay!"
The assistant nodded frantically.
I had no interest in hearing how he planned to handle it.
I picked up the few things I still had and walked straight for the gate.
This time, Xavier did not stop me.
I went to the cemetery on the west side of the city and stood in front of Joe's grave, looking at the small photograph set into the headstone.
He was smiling so brightly in that picture.
He had never known how ugly and cruel this world could be.
I didn't know how long I had been standing there when I heard heavy footsteps behind me.
Xavier came to a stop a short distance away. His hair was disheveled, his eyes were bloodshot, and his expensive suit jacket hung loose over one arm.
He looked at my thin, fragile figure, then at Joe's smiling face, and when he finally spoke, his voice was hoarse.
"I'm sorry."
I said nothing, and the wind moved through the pines with a low, mournful sound.
"What do you want?"
He turned to look at me, and there was a rare urgency in his voice.
"A house, cash, company stock, whatever you want. I'll give it to you, Aurora. Just say the word."
I thought for a moment, then took a stack of documents out of my bag and handed them to him. The divorce papers were buried among them.
"I want a house. Everything's in there. You just need to sign."
Xavier didn't notice a thing. He signed without hesitation.
- Writer
