BROKEN VOWS

CHAPTER ONE

For the past thirty minutes, Zivan was staring blankly at the small hourglass on top of his grand office desk. He swiveled on his seat while his mind flew, pondering on what would have happened if he had chosen not to proceed with the wedding. Things would have been better if he didn’t have the stupid ring around his finger.

What if he just ran away that day? It shouldn’t even be a question. Clearly, he wouldn’t be half as piqued at coming home if he didn’t have an irritating wife waiting for him.

When he was in the office, he would forget that he was actually a married man back home.

Drowned by the surge of weekly reports in operational functions, work became his temporary distraction to the new life that he had outside of their company’s skyscraper building. As much as he despised the idea of being married to Calmness, he was glad to see that she weren’t immediately acting on her role as a pretentious wife. He thought that Calmness would pay him a visit in the office or swarm his phone with texts and calls, but she complete absence was a breath of fresh air.

It seemed that Calmness really listened when he asked her to stay away when no one was around.

 Good to know, Zivan thought silently. He would have had more reasons to be aggravated had her started nagging at him like a real housewife.

Nevertheless, he was not expecting that his father would show up in his office straight after the meeting with the Board of Directors later past noon. There could only be very few reasons on why his Chairman of a father would even care to personally enter his office. it was either he messed up on today’s meeting or he did something else that highly infuriated the old man. Regardless of what he had done, this wasn’t anything new.

Seeing his father slam the door on his secretary’s face didn’t even shock him. It was the austere look on the man’s entire visage that made the young heir rise up from his seat to stand tall and confident as the son of a CEO should be.

“Dad.” Zivan tried to meet him halfway.

Taking small steps on the carpeted floor until he was greeted with a sudden hard blow that sent his face whipping to the side. The smack resulted into a busted lower lip. wiped briefly by his thumb before he looked back at his father in spite.

His father, whose electric eyes sent daggers straight to his soul, did not hesitate to curse at his own son.

“You son of a b***h! Wanna explain why your wife went back to their mansion last night?”

Zivan wasn’t even aware until now. When he asked Calmness to sleep on the couch last night, he didn’t think that she would be running back to her family’s mansion like a crybaby. He woke up today and left for work thinking that Calmness were just somewhere around the penthouse.

“I didn’t know that she—”

“Caleb called me last night asking why Calmness came home” his father revealed, narrowing his stare towards his son behind his thin-framed glasses. “on the night of her damn wedding, you motherf—” The man had to refrain himself from swinging a hand on his son again, but vicious was the fire in his eyes. “Just because you’re married doesn’t mean you’ve already won her heart!”

Zivan clenched his fists, but stayed silent from where he stood. He was completely powerless in front of his father, knowing that every wrong move would cost him a lot in return.

“I’ll pick her up and apologize.” Suck it in, Zivan. It’s all you can ever do.

“You better fix your shit.” the old man snarled while he fumbled with his cufflinks. “You don’t realize how valuable their family’s shares will be in this company, you ungrateful bastard! I did everything I can just to secure this marriage for you. If we lose them, consider yourself dead to me.”

His father’s words have always stung, but this one certainly took the cake. And the worst part was. Zivan couldn’t even talk back as much as he wanted to. Submission was his only option when it all boiled down to just him and his father.

Seething inwardly, he did as told. “I’ll- do what we’ve agreed on.”

A scoff then left the old man’s lips. “Sure you will. Even if you’re my only heir, I can easily let Zihan take over instead of you. He’s not incompetent like you are.”

Not this again.

Zivan was the only son, therefore the sole heir to their conglomerate, but his asshole of a father had always made him fight for his position against his stepbrother. He was manipulated to do things out of his will just to please the man’s cruel intentions. He was a tool used to benefit the company’s insatiable greed. As an ambitious man himself, Zivan’s last resort to guarantee his role as the future CEO was not by any other means except to marry Calmness Montemore.

So even if he was disgusted at the thought of being tied down to a girl like her, he had to stomach being a husband to a wife he didn’t love.

“Remember this, Zivan Mikael. There is no family when it comes to business.”

It was a staring contest between the father and son, the latter steaming with rage inside of him. Zivan believed that all of this wouldn’t have happened if she didn’t get in the way. If Calmness were with someone else, marrying her would never even be his option. This all her fault. Unlike him, Calmness got married without receiving consequences in return and Zivan was dead set in giving her hell for it.

“Take a week off from work.” the strict instruction came out of his father’s mouth, “You should spend time with her and win her heart. I’ve booked a flight for your honeymoon. Why not step it up by giving her a child?”

A child. Zivan wanted to bitterly laugh. This was not even part of the deal.

Just as his father made a quick pivot to leave, a woman stood by the door carrying piles of folders on her frail arms. This woman was the only one who managed to soften the grim expression on Zivan’s face that could have lasted for the entire day.

“Sir” she spoke to the old man with respect, her sleek brown hair fell on her shoulders gracefully. “Mr. Nakamura’s waiting in your office.”

The Chairman raised a dismissive hand and walked out of Zivan’s office with little care, leaving his son and the receptionist staring at each other intently as though the world just stopped spinning from its axis whenever they were a nigh from each other.

It was her who first broke the gaze, but it was him who called for her name. “Aira”

Zivan felt like his heart would leap out of his chest at the mere sight of the woman that caused his bliss. He wanted to hug her, kiss her, tell her just how much he loved her, but there was little action to be done in a building floor full of prying ears to expose a forbidden love.

“Aira!” One of the Executives impatiently demanded for her presence from a distance. “Where’s my coffee?!”

Zivan hated this. He hated how the woman that he loved was in here being treated like a servant when it wasn’t even her job while Calmness were out there living comfortably without any shame in her bone!

She didn’t deserve the life that her were living. Aira did.

“Coming, Miss!” Before she could bolt from Zivan’s office, she mouthed the words, “talk to you soon” and left her boyfriend alone with a hollow heart and a tortured soul.

Calmness weren’t a pushover, but neither were you confrontational.

she figured that the best way to deal with Zivan’s animosity was indeed to stay away from him. He was right. There was no way she could remain under the same roof with a man who loathed her existence and treated her like dirt. Because she were gravely hurt from the words that he uttered that night, Calmness chose to go back to the only place where comfort was willingly given to her.

It was too late to realize that she probably shouldn’t have left the penthouse without a say, but since Zivan slammed the door on her face thinking that she were going to sleep on the couch, Calmness instinct led her to go back to her family’s mansion at midnight with much surprise from her maidservants’ face.

Regretfully, Calmness weren’t thinking much when she came back because her father was extensively worried the next day by greeting her with a fusillade of questions.

“Why are you here?” was one of the first things he asked. “Did something happen? Is Zivan not treating you right?”

“Dad, it’s-We’re fine” Calmness immediate response was to cover for Her husband. “I kinda just freaked out about the whole wedding thing so I went back here out of panic. He didn’t even want me to leave, but I insisted. Just for tonight.”

There was relief in  Calmness father’s face when he easily bought her lies, sitting at the edge of her bed before patting her shoulder upon losing his interrogative stare.

She had to try hard enough to conceal her face with a reassuring smile while he gave her a piece of advice. “I know it’s hard to adjust from this whole arrangement at first, but you’re gonna have to get used to being a wife.”

It wouldn’t be much of a problem if only her husband accepted her the way she initially thought. “I know.” Calmness said, leaning her back on the bed’s headboard. “Why did you really get me to marry him, dad?”

“Didn’t you always come home talking about him with your nannies back then?” he recalled, amused at the memory. “I’m not your mom so you didn’t talk about boys with me, but I heard enough to know how much you like him.”

The memory alone tugged at her heart with aching gravity. What was once a happy crush had tragically become a spiteful marriage—it wasn’t really anything to happily reminisce about. “That was before, dad. I don’t like him that way anymore.”

How could she freely like Zivan if he was candidly brutal about how much he detested her?

While her father teasingly shrugged, he also took a moment to brush her arm with a comforting a hand. “I’ve known Zivan since he was a kid. It’s better to see you married to a man I trust, not someone who will just use you for what you have. That’s what your mom wanted for you when she was still here with us, too.”

Calmness didn’t know how to break it to her father that he trusted the wrong person. That Zivan despised every inch of her for allowing the marriage to happen. Calmness didn’t want to erase the smile on her father’s face with pure disappointment at the fact that the man he treated like a son just mercilessly trampled on his daughter’s heart. If anything, Calmness dad was probably just holding onto a promise that he made with her mom even if he couldn’t outwardly admit it to her.

As infants, Zivan was only three months older from being born and she were told that her and his moms would take her two to places together, pairing her since the day she were welcomed into this world.

It would have been cute to think about how her mothers played matchmakers back then, but looking at it now, it never really worked.

The only reason why the marriage sounded perfect to the ears of the executives was because he was an heir and Calmness were an heiress to her respective business empires.

It was typical for one affluent family to marry their child off to another wealthy family because such elitism was common to people who were born with inherited wealth.

“Dad, if I liked someone else, would you still push me to marry Zivan?” Calmness asked as the thought bubbled inside her head.

Her father was quick to respond. “If you can prove how much the other man likes you, then I wouldn’t insist on the marriage with Zoren’s son.”

Truly, Calmnness never wished so hard to have found someone else before she married her now husband. It would have been best for the both of her to just continue life without each other—no fake love, no heartbreaks. Even if she had the tiniest feelings still hidden for Zivan, forcing this marriage was something she would have spared him and herrself for the best.

She didn’t know how she would be going back to the penthouse with her reluctance to be around Zivan again, but when the man appeared in her mansion to greet her father the first thing, it was needless to say how she have become a deer caught in the headlights. He came into the estate carrying the same courteous stance that he had on the wedding reception, hiding the antagonism that he usually uncovered when the two them were alone.

Zivan was two-faced, but Calmness didn’t have the energy to be mad because she could understand why he would react that way. Although, she wished that he could be nicer at the very least because it wasn’t like the marriage was her decision alone.

“Zivan” her father welcomed Zivan as he entered the grand foyer. “How’s everything?”

“All good, sir.”

“Please, just call me dad from now on.”

There was no reason for Calmness heart to do somersaults as if the man didn’t torment her with his words last night. But there was something about his sudden presence that brought her a rush of inexplicable contentment inside. Calmness didn’t think that he would come to visit her at all, so seeing him in her home painted a huge question mark on her face.

“I’m just here to pick her up” stated Zivan, standing near the staircase to watch her descend the steps in silence. He was dressed in a long sleeve polo tucked in his black slacks, looking like he had just gotten out of work as the Vice President of the Stavros Group.

He approached her straight away and even made the bold move of leaning in to peck her lips. “Hey, babe. I’m sorry about last night.”

He was acting and he wanted her to play along. With her dad watching on the side, she knew she had to be careful with her actions.

“Hi” Calmness timidly greeted, intertwining her fingers when he held her hand. “It’s okay. I was being stubborn.”

“You two gonna spend the day out?” Calmness father, clearly pleased with the interaction, sounded like he was actually encouraging both of them to spend time together.

Calmness had no idea what to say so it was Zivan who answered. “I’m taking her shopping” he glanced at her with a small smile before he added. “We’ll be flying to Korea in two days.”

An impressed look bathed Calmness dad’s eyes. She’s on the other hand, were dumbfounded at the information. “For your honeymoon? Wonderful place to pick.”

“It is. Can’t wait to take her there”  Zivan claimed, squeezing her hand before he wrapped an arm around her waist.

The sudden affection was causing whirlwinds of emotions inside of Calmness and she just didn’t know how to deal with it. Was he actually trying? Did he realize how mean he was to her?

There was no way to know. For now, She dreaded the moment where both of them would be out of anyone’s earshot because Zivan could be putting on a front. The mere thought of it devastated her.