“Go about your life as though nothing is amiss. Once everything is in place, I will return to give you further instructions.”
This time, when Rían vanished, I did not call him back.
* * *
As much as I didnotwant to make plans for a wedding I hoped would never happen, I didn’t have much of a choice. If whatever mysterious plan Rían had come up with didn’t work, I’d be forced to go through with it.
That afternoon, a designer visiting from Vellana and her assistants came by to fit me for my gown. I had asked my father how we could afford such luxuries, and he’d explained that Lord Trench had agreed to finance the wedding and my trousseau as part of the betrothal contract.
Meaning I got to stand still for hours while being poked and prodded by pins, holding my arms out or up, being told I should go on a diet of tea and brown bread until the wedding. Even the designer’s assistant had nodded in agreement.
I wasn’t going to starve myself to marry anyone, least of all Robert.
As they finished, the bakers arrived, toting baskets of cake samples. Every time the designer or one of her assistants gave me a judging look as they packed up their bits, I ate another bite of cake. By the time everyone left, my stomach was so bloated I looked as though I was with child, and I spent the next hour in the privy, sick from overindulging.
Wedding planning was torture, and it was only day one. How would I survive another four weeks of this?
“I am proud of you, Aveen,” my father said, settling himself on one side of the tet-a-tet in the parlor. “Now that your wedding is on the horizon, it seems as though you have finally accepted your lot in life. Contentment suits you.”
Contentment. I hated the bloody word. I was as far from content as a woman could be. Still, if he believed it to be true, then I must be playing my part perfectly. I wanted to pick up a cushion and launch it at his head. Instead, I smiled acontentedsmile and said, “Thank you, Father.”
I excused myself, saying I had to change for dinner, already dreading more conversation. More pretending.
Would there ever be a time when I could be me?
Upstairs in the hallway, an arm snaked out of the bay window.
I opened my mouth to scream, but a hand stifled my cry.
“Shhh,” Rían whispered in my ear.
What was he doing wandering around my house? What if someone saw him? What if someone sawus?
“Listen carefully, there isn’t much time.” He let me go to dig something out of his pocket. “Put this on.”
He handed me a silver ring with a sapphire the size of my knuckle. Why in the world would he give me a ring? When I slipped it onto the index finger on my right hand, he groaned.
“Not thatfinger.” He flicked his wrist, and it reappeared on the ring finger on my left hand. “Now pretend to be madly in love with me.”
“W-what?”
“Pretend you love me,” he repeated, slower this time, the words emerging in an exasperated huff. “Oh, and we’re engaged.”
“You cannot be serious.”
“Deathly serious,” he said with a chuckle, peering around us to scan the hallway. A moment later, he linked our arms and towed me toward my bedroom.
With my heart hammering, I couldn’t find words to protest as he opened the door and thrust me inside. I found my back pinned against the closet, Rían staring at me with an intensity that made my knees weak.
“I’m going to kiss you now.” He wet his lips, his gaze landing on my mouth. “Try your best to play along.”
The warning barely registered before his mouth captured mine. This wasn’t a kiss like the others. No hint of magic, only his tongue lashing and lips punishing. I clutched his collar, bringing him closer. This wasn’t real. I was only playing along. I wasn’t enjoying the feel of his hard body overwhelming my softness or his hands tangling in my hair.
“I do hope I’m not interrupting,” a silken male voice drawled from the corner nearest the window. A voice that held the promise of darkness.
Rían dropped his forehead against mine for a split second before stepping aside and turning to face the intruder.
Stubbled jaw. Golden curls.