The Golden Cage
929 Words
The sun never rose in the Thorne Mansion, but compromised his way by the heavy, velvet curtains.
Ava awoke in a bed that was bigger than her credit rating and was covered with sheets having a higher thread count than her credit rating. She felt like it had been a fever dream of the night before a second. Then it could be the load on her left hand that was pulling her back to reality.
The diamond. It hung on her finger shiny like a shackle.
She was looking at the fancy ceiling, and he was reminded of herself a year later. One year to save Leo. Then I disappear.
There was a faint ringing in the room. The master is waiting to have his breakfast with you in the solarium, Madam.
This was spoken by somebody on the wall. Ava didn't recognize it. "Madam." The word felt like a slur.
She wore clothes that had been magically transported to her apartment during the night - a testimony of the fearsome extent that Cyrus had. High-collared white dress, modest but sharp was her choice. She would at least pretend to be a lawyer in case she was going to be a prisoner.
She discovered Cyrus in a room of glass which looked over a precipice which plunged directly into the swashing Atlantic. He was seated in the same carbon-fiber seat and looking out at the grey water. Morning light was glancing in on the silver of his watch and the perfect stillness of his pose.
He did not turn around and stated, You are late.
Well, I was obliged to waste ten minutes persuading myself that I should not jump out the window, Ava answered, sitting at the opposite end of the table.
The table was laid with a smoked salmon, not fresh at all, poached eggs, and out-of-season fruits. Ava's stomach twisted. She couldn't eat.
Eat, Cyrus ordered and at last looked at her. at noon we were a press conference. You look pale. It is the expectations of the people to believe that a woman is in love, not a ghost.
It is that the people want a miracle, Ava said. How are you going to account this? The girl who was caught bugging his office then becomes the trophy bride of the most eligible bachelor in the city?
Another crystal glass of water was picked by Cyrus. I have already dealt with the narrative. You are the daughter of a pre-established family friend. We met in Paris years ago. After my... accident we came back in touch. You were my secret power at my healing.
Despicable fool, he is a great liar, she said to herself.
"I'm a businessman, Ava. There's no difference."
He stooped and a space of time passed when the coldness in his eyes wavered. The board is going to go out there today trying to provoke me. They will attempt to appear weak of me, or you look like a gold-digger. You are tasked to embarrass them into the fools. In case of failure, the contract is discharged. And you are aware of the results of that.
One of the silver forks was taken up by Ava, whose knobs were white. "I don't fail, Cyrus."
"Good."
He turned to swivel himself round on his chair, but the wheel got in the ridge of a heavy Persian carpet. The chair was having a death list.
Ava acted on instinct. She sprung over the table to seize his arm, and expected to touch the wasted and shrivelled muscles of a long-slept man.
Her hand was clinging to his arm.
She froze.
His arm was made of iron under the fine wool of his sweater. It was not merely firm, but corded, with strong and dynamic muscle. More to the point, when the chair began toppling, she caught a glance of his foot-shod in an elegant leathers loafer-dig into the floor a couple of seconds to even out his load.
It was a micro-movement. A reflex. A man with a cut off spinal cord should not be able to have reflexes such as that.
Ava raised her eyes, and was staring wide, her hand still holding his arm.
Cyrus had not changed his expression, though the eyes were now as keen as a predators. Solar truncheons made the air in the solarium electric. He didn't pull away. He instead reclined and crucially peeled her fingers off his bicep, very slowly.
Careful, Ava, careful," he growled in low menacing tones. You would have things in this house, maybe, that was not to be touched.
"You..." Still started yoursuming and trembling. "Your leg. I saw it."
Cyrus bent a little nearer his face inches closer to hers. The smell of sandalwood of him was suffocating. He gazed upon her lips, and turned again to the eyes, and a dark dangerous smile ran over his mouth.
He saw a man making his mind not to fall, you see, said he. "Nothing more. Now, go put on some lipstick. We have a world to deceive."
He swiveled his chair about with quick grace and rolled off, abandoning Ava alone in the rising sun room.
Her heart was thudding. She was not just a bride to a billionaire. She had witnessed a lie that might make her die. And as she stared upon her shakings hands she saw the worstest part of all:
She had not only felt muscle when she had touched him. She had experienced an electric feeling of heat which had nothing in common with the contract.
- Writer
