The Biker King's Forbidden Bride

MY FAMILY CHOSE MY DEATH

POV: Maeve Vesper

My breath comes fast, hard, as I run through the hotel halls away from the suite. My feet carry me straight toward my parents' rooms. I still think they will help me stop this madness. I bang my fists against their door until my father pulls it open with a scowl on his face.

"Maeve, why are you away from your room? What is wrong with your hair?" my father asks, his voice cold, annoyed.

"Father, you have to help me, because I just saw Dmitri with Odessa. I heard them talking," I say, my words tumbling over each other. Tears stream down my face; I grab his arm.

"What are you talking about, Maeve? Stop crying because your makeup will smear," my mother says, walking over from the sofa with a glass of water in her hand.

"I walked into the VIP suite. Odessa was in his arms. They were together. They were laughing," I cry out, turning to my mother. "Then I heard Dmitri talking to his man Viktor. They said they are going to kill me after the wedding."

My mother sets the glass down on the table. Her face does not change at all, looking at me like I am speaking a foreign language.

"You misunderstood what you heard, Maeve, because men like Dmitri talk about business in harsh ways," my mother says, her voice flat.

"I did not misunderstand anything, Mother. He said I am going into the water by midnight, nobody will look for her," I yell, my chest heaving as I look between them for any sign of shock.

"The wedding will happen exactly as planned, Maeve. You will stop making up stories right now," my father says, crossing his arms over his chest.

"Why are you protecting him?" I scream, my voice cracking. "How can you let him do this to me?"

My mother steps forward, hitting me across the face. The slap echoes in the room. My head snaps to the side, skin burning where her hand landed.

"You have embarrassed this family enough already, Maeve," my mother says, her hand dropping to her side.

"You are my daughter. You are supposed to protect me," I sob, holding my cheek with my hand, shaking my head.

"The marriage was arranged before you were old enough to understand what it meant. The contract is signed," my father says, his voice unwavering.

"You are forcing me to walk into a trap. You know he is going to kill me," I say, backing away toward the door.

"We are not forcing you to do anything, because you agreed to the union when you accepted his ring," my father says, pointing a finger at me.

"Just let me leave the house. I will go away, never come back. You will never see me again," I beg, reaching for the door handle.

"Guards," my father calls out. Two men step into the room from the hallway. He points at me. "Take her back to her room, lock the door."

"You cannot do this! I am your child," I scream, fighting against the men as they grab my arms. I look at my mother. "How can you let them do this?"

My mother turns her back to me, refusing to meet my eyes, picking up her glass of water again without a word.

"Let me go!" I yell, kicking my legs as the guards drag me out into the hall. My father steps up close to me before the door closes.

“You will marry Dmitri tomorrow. Whether you survive the marriage is no longer our concern,” my father says, pushing me into the room, slamming the door shut.

The click of the lock turns in the metal. I slide down the wood of the door until I hit the floor, pulling my knees up to my chest, spending the hours crying into the dark room. I try to understand why my own parents would choose the Bratva over me. I think about how they treated me my whole life, remembering how they always looked at Odessa with pride. They always favored Odessa over me. They bought her gifts; they let her live with us like she was their real daughter. A cold feeling settles in my stomach. I keep asking myself why they never loved me, trying to figure out what I did wrong to make them treat me like a stranger. I talk out loud to the empty walls because nobody is here to answer me.

"Why did you do this to me?" I say to the empty space, my voice echoing off the walls as I pull my knees tighter to my chest.

"You are just angry because you do not see the big picture," I imagine my father saying in my head, but nobody replies.

I stand up, walking around the room, checking the windows to see if I can open them. They are latched shut from the outside. I kick the baseboard in frustration because I am trapped. I talk to myself again to keep from going crazy in the silence. "I have to find a way out of here before morning comes. I cannot let them hand me over to Dmitri."

I walk back to the door, pressing my ear against the wood. I hear the guards talking softly in the hallway about their shift change, waiting patiently until the voices fade away. I know my mother, my father are still downstairs talking to guests, planning the final details of the ceremony. I wonder how they can smile, shake hands with people while their only daughter is locked upstairs.

"How can they act like everything is normal?" I whisper to the door, my hands gripping the edge of the frame.

"They do not care about you, Maeve," I tell myself. The harsh truth finally sinks into my mind; I grit my teeth because I know I am completely on my own.

Looking through the locked bedroom door, I whisper, “What did I ever do to make you hate me?”

From the other side, my mother quietly answers, “You were never supposed to find out.”