THE PUCKING FORBIDDEN LOVE.

Chapter 3: Bound by Legacy

Chapter 3: Bound by Legacy

Evelina’s POV

Oops.

That was weird. I thought I saw something.

The static thing didn’t leave.

Even after I left the library, even after I wrapped myself tighter in my hoodie and shoved my earbuds in with nothing playing, it was still there. Buzzing…like it was crawling. Like I had swallowed a hive of bees and they were just too damn happy to keep humming in my bones.

And of course, whose fault? Silas Everheart's.

Golden boy, golden eyes, golden everything. I didn’t even like him before. He was too… loud. Too popular. The type of guy who had girls scribbling his last name with their first names on notebooks while he skated around the rink like God’s gift to college hockey. Definitely not my type. My type was fictional men in books who stayed on paper where they couldn’t ruin my life.

So naturally, the universe decided to screw with me.

I kept replaying the way his smile had fallen when our hands touched, the way he looked at me like I was some disgusting piece of insignificant thing. Then that jolt…God. I rubbed my hand against my jeans even now, like friction could erase it. It couldn’t.

I was almost to my dorm when my phone buzzed. Finally. I had charged it just enough at the library.

I glanced down. And then froze.

MOM.

Then immediately after: DAD.

Both within minutes of each other.

My parents don’t call. My parents don’t text. Unless it’s “tuition money sent” or “rent due, check your account” or “don’t forget to forward that mail to our office.” They don’t just… contact me.

My thumb hovered before I opened the voicemail. My mom’s voice, cool and crisp, like she was giving orders to a boardroom instead of her daughter:

“Evelina. Come home tonight. It’s important.”

No “hi.” No “how are you.” No “we miss you.”

I laughed out loud, earning a weird look from a frat guy who was passing. Important? To them, important usually meant tax season or a last-minute dinner party they wanted me to show up at to keep public appearances.

Still, my chest tightened. My parents never asked anything from me. They demanded.

For a moment, I thought of not going. I thought of ignoring my parent's message and being the rebellious child even if it was just this once, but then, I thought about how relentless my parents, especially my mother could be when she needed something, or when she tagged something as important.

I sighed and found an uber to take me there. I didn’t want my mom coming into my college room and finding things to nitpick about, or worse, tell me not to stay there.

Soon, I arrived at the mansion that once felt like a prison to me. It stood tall in the compound, giving every bit of the middle upper class family we were. I paid off the Uber and took a deep breath, mentally preparing myself for this meeting or…whatever it was.

The walls in the dining room shone, and the clock ticked slowly. I sat at the end of the long polished oak table, my fingers digging into the seam of my jeans, waiting for whatever lecture was about to be dropped on me this time.

My parents didn’t call family meetings unless it was serious. The last time, they’d told me they were selling the cottage we used to spend summers in. Before that, it was about how my grades weren’t good enough, how my future was slipping through my fingers because I didn’t take life as seriously as they wanted. Every “serious” conversation with them felt like being carved open, little by little.

But this time, it was different. I could feel it in the air. The house was too quiet. The air felt too heavy.

My father sat across from me, perfectly straight-backed, his hands folded on the table. His jaw was sharp enough to cut glass, eyes as cold and gray as the steel pens he used at work. My mother sat beside him, not touching him, not touching me. She was just a wall of perfect posture, her fingers clasped in her lap like she was a statue. They didn’t look at each other. They didn’t look at me.

They looked through me.

I hated that most of all.

‘Evelina,’ my father said finally, his voice clipped and cold. It sounded as if he had rehearsed it, as if he had already spoken these words in his head a hundred times. ‘You’re twenty-two now. You’ve had ample time to explore your independence. It’s time to stop wasting it.’

My chest tightened. ‘Wasting it?’ I echoed, my eyes darting in panic from my mom to my dad.

My mother finally turned her head, her eyes resting on me with that same calm, detached expression she always wore. It was those same looks that she usually gave to a painting as if she was studying it and didn't like that painting, but still decided to leave it hanging on the wall because it was expensive. ‘You’ve drifted long enough. It’s time for you to settle.’

Something in me flinched at the word. Settle.

‘What does that mean?’ My voice came out sharper than I intended, my nails carving crescents into my palms under the table.

My father didn’t hesitate. ‘You’re getting married.’

The words landed like a slap to my face. My ears rang.

For a second, I thought I had misheard him. The ticking clock filled the silence, my breath catching in my throat. ‘I’m sorry. What?’

‘You’ll be married,’ he repeated, slower this time, as if my brain needed extra time to process it. ‘The arrangement has already been made.’

‘Arr—arrangement?’ My tongue tripped over the word, and suddenly my throat was burning. I looked between them, searching for any c***k in their faces, any sign this was some kind of sick joke. ‘You—you’re joking. You have to be.’

‘This isn’t a joke,’ my mother said, her voice steady, level. Not cruel. Just empty. ‘It’s been decided. You’ll marry Silas Everheart. His family is stable, respectable. He’ll take good care of you.’

I felt my world tilt sideways.

Silas Everheart. The same Silas who had flinched at my touch like I was some major inconvenience.

Something inside me snapped. For once in my life, I didn’t keep quiet when my lige was being dictated for me. I couldn’t take it this time. I shot up from my chair, the legs screeching against the wood floor. ‘Take care of me? Like I’m some child you’re shipping off to a babysitter? Like I’m a stray dog that needs a new owner? I'm still a college student for Christ's sake, mom and dad! What about my career?’

My mother's gaze hardened. ‘Watch your tone, young lady!’

‘No!’ The word slipped out of me before I could stop it. All those years of being obedient quietly… all those years of swallowing the pain of their disapproval, came boiling up all at once. My chest heaved. My hands shook. ‘No, you don’t get to sit there and talk about my life like it’s some chessboard you get to play with. You don’t even know me! You never cared enough to ask what I wanted, and now you’re deciding who I spend the rest of my life with?’

My mother’s lips pressed together, but her expression didn’t change. My father leaned back slightly, unimpressed by my outburst, like he had expected it and was already bored of it.

‘You’ve proven time and again,’ he said, his voice low, dangerous in its calmness, ‘that left to your own devices, you’ll squander your potential. You flit from one job to the next, one interest to another, always searching for something you never commit to. Marriage will ground you, my dear.’

My vision blurred with hot, stinging tears. ‘Ground me? Or cage me?’

None of them flinched. They just kept staring at me.

A sharp, broken laugh left my throat.

‘You’re unbelievable. Do you hear yourselves? You’re not even asking me. You’re telling me as if I'm some sort of property.’

‘You’re our daughter,’ my mother said finally, her voice soft, but there was no warmth in it, no love. Just a statement of fact, like she was reminding herself.

‘Daughter?’ whispered, my voice shaking, my nails digging into my palms. ‘I’m not your daughter. Daughters get loved. Daughters get asked how they feel. Daughters get chosen. I’ve been nothing to you but a disappointment you had to manage. And now you’re getting rid of me, aren’t you? Passing me off because you don’t want to deal with me anymore.’

My father’s jaw ticked, but his voice didn’t waver. ‘Enough, Evelina.’

‘No!’ My voice cracked this time, and my tears finally broke free. They blurred the edges of my parents’ faces, but I didn’t care. I didn’t care how pathetic I sounded. ‘All I ever wanted was for you to see me. To actually see me. And instead, you’re selling me off to some stranger like I don’t matter.’

‘You matter,’ my mother said. But her eyes slid away from mine when she said it. Like she wasn’t sure. That hurt me more than anything else.

I sank back into the chair, trembling, my heart hammering against my ribs so hard I thought it might break free. There was silence. My father shifted slightly like the conversation was over.

Like my future was sealed.

I wanted to scream. I wanted to run. But my body wouldn’t move.

Suddenly, a knock sounded at the door.

All three of us froze.