I thought all we had to do was get married. Now that we’re legally wed, it’s becoming clear I entered into this bargain without a full understanding of what I was committing to. Nik offered ten million dollars, and I, in my hazy abduction reasoning, decided that was enough reason to go along with it.
He probably doesn’t even have ten million dollars.
Nik’s jaw is tight as he takes my hand and drags me out into the night. He clutches our marriage certificate and five photographs commemorating the occasion in his free hand. The desert sky yawns overhead. Mountains loom in the distance. I have the peculiar sense that I’m in a natural cage. There is no escape. Nowhere for me to run. The lights of the Strip burn the Las Vegas skyline into my retinas, so fake and false it doesn’t belong in this dry landscape. My heart aches. I miss Los Angeles. I’m done with this misadventure. I want to go home.
But that kiss still lingers on my lips. IfI leave now, I’ll never feel that again. I therefore say nothing as I fold myself into the passenger seat of his sports car. Nik slams the door and starts the engine, peeling out of the parking lot so fast I’m thrown to one side.
“Where are you taking me?” I ask in a small voice. The part of me that has watched a little too much true crime over the years wonders if this is the moment when he’ll kill me.
What in the hell was I thinking, kissing him like that?
Fear shouldn’t be an aphrodisiac.
“Not home,” Nik growls.
“Back to Los Angeles?” I ask with undue optimism. He glares at me.
“To a hotel.”
“A hotel.” Dread and excitement knot my stomach. Somehow, I know he’ll be good. My body is definitely into this fucked-up scenario. He’s my husband. It’s expected. Allowed. Yet part of me is terrified that if I go into that hotel room with him, I will never come out again.
“That’s what I said. The Four Seasons.”
I blink at the Strip lights coming closer and closer at astonishing speed. I’ve never stayed in a luxury hotel before. I know the brand. Alisa Morozova used to get mail from them. I might never have another chance to experience it again. Surely nothing bad can happen in a Four Seasons?
With ten million dollars, you could rent a Four Seasons suite for an entire month,I tell myself. Yet lurking deepdown is a sick feeling that I’ll never see the money Nik promised me.
“I don’t have any clothes,” is the stupid thing that comes out of my mouth. My brain is struggling to process the events of the past few hours. I’ve been kidnapped and bribed into marrying a suspiciously handsome, apparently very rich, corporate executive. Men like him don’t look twice at women like me, unless it’s to undress us with their eyes and move on to another target. I’m operating on a heady cocktail of whirlwind feelings and mixed vibes.
“You won’t need clothes,” Nik says.
I suppose that answers my question aboutwhat do you mean, next part.He means sex. I’m not…completely disinterested in the idea. On some level, I knew that’s what I was agreeing to.
We careen into a parking circle with a velvet curtain and the words Valet Parking in gold script on a podium. A man in a suit with white gloves reaches for my door before I can unbuckle my seatbelt.
“Mr. Orlov. We heard about your father. My condolences,” he says, barely glancing at me.
“Thanks.” Nik comes around the car and takes my elbow.
“Any bags, sir?”
“None yet. On the way out.” He guides me into the spacious foyer. There’s a bland sameness to “luxury”—rich people seem to love gray, beige, and gold. I see it in the houses I clean for a living. Which reminds me that I really need to contact my boss. She’s going to think I stole the company car. I’ll get fired. I have rent due andbills to pay. I can’t stay here in Las Vegas on a whim. I need that money.
I try to corral my whirling thoughts on the elevator ride up. Nik keys the entry to the penthouse suite. I admit my breath catches when I walk in. It looks like a miniature apartment. Way nicer than mine.
“What do you think?” he says, watching me move around the space, awestruck. “Good enough for a wedding night?”
“You’re not thinking we’ll…I wasn’t imagining we’d actually do…that.” I finish lamely. “I thought you only needed a wife on paper.”
“I need you to be my wife in every sense of the word.” He pours me a drink from the stocked bar, never asking my preference. I hold it, feeling ridiculous. Stupid, in my borrowed dress with my nipples visible through the thin fabric. Why didn’t I see this coming?
Or…did I, and I went along with it anyway? I know what marriage entails. I saw the way he looked at me.
Nik glances at me. He keeps his gaze resolutely above my neckline, but I sense the way he wants to look. He’s been fighting it ever since I came out of his bathroom. Part of me wants him to stop being a gentleman, but it’s restrained by years of trying to be good.
I genuinely believed that if I were virtuous, I would be rewarded with all the things I longed for in life. And so I worked hard, saved myself for marriage despite boyfriends who dumped me or cheated when I wouldn’t sleep with them. Paid my bills and built my credit only to watch the prices of homes skyrocket out of reach.
What use was any of it? I’m still broke, still single, still renting a shitty apartment, working a dead-end job, with no light at the end of the tunnel. Nothing will change unless I do.