“Because you’re … your lips. You’re licking your lips. I thought maybe they were dry.”
“No,” he says gruffly, turning away from me. I’ve embarrassed him. “Now, let’s go. You can change inside.”
He unlocks the door so I can get out. The moment my feet touch the ground, I take off running. I don’t even think. I just do.
Boris runs after me, but he’s not very tall and not very fit. I practice ballet every day, and I do other forms of workouts like yoga and Pilates. I’m in great shape. I can outrun Boris any day of the week.
Except I’m in my ballet shoes, which were not made for running on the sidewalk. I accidentally step onto broken glass shards and stumble. I cry out, clutching at my foot. Who leaves broken glass shards on the ground? It’s New York, I remind myself. The streets are filthy.
I hobble around, trying to look at my foot. Blood is already seeping through my ballet shoe. “Oh my god.”
“Got you,” Boris says, grabbing my arm. I wrench away from him and start running again, but it’s harder with a messed up foot.
“Stop!” Boris shouts before a loud gunshot goes off. I freeze and look back at him. He has his gun aimed to the sky, but then he lowers it to face me. The few other people on the street run away screaming. “Get into that church. Now.”
“If you kill me, you can’t marry me.”
“No. But I can just marry your younger sister, Mila.”
And that does it. Boris doesn’t want Vik because she’s impossible to control. But I am. I’m softer than Vik. I don’t have the same backbone.
As for Mila—she’s the sweetest out of us. The most kind. She would crumble if she had to marry a man like Boris.
I can’t let that happen.
So, I limp back to his side, trying to keep weight off my hurt foot.
“Good choice,” he says, tucking his gun away. “Now, let’s get married.”
The inside of the church is grand and ornate. Russian Orthodox, after all. Boris pushes me into a small office where I can change into my gaudy wedding dress.
I expect Boris to shut the door and lock me in here until we’re ready to be married, but instead, he joins me.
“What are you doing?” I ask.
“I’m going to make sure you actually change into your dress. I paid good money for it. I don’t want you trying to escape again.”
“But I have to get naked.”
Boris smiles darkly. “Exactly.”
Oh my god. I think I might pass out. My foot is throbbing. If I don’t get it looked at soon, it could get infected. How am I going to do this?
Boris opens his jacket and shows me his gun.
It’s enough of a reminder to grab the dress from him before I start to undress. First, it’s my tutu. I hate the way Boris eyes me over once I’m just in my leotard and tights. Then comes my ballet shoes. I wince as my injured foot screams in pain as I take the shoe off. A piece of glass is sticking in my foot. I peel it out, which only causes me to bleed more.
Boris doesn’t even bother to help me.
I stand back up and take my leotard off. I have nothing underneath it, so Boris can see my naked breasts. He licks his lips again, and vomit comes up my throat before I push it back down.
Lastly, I remove my tights and am fully naked before him. My hands are shaking as I grab the wedding dress.
“Take all the time you want,” Boris says. “Your naked body will soon be under me.”
I’m frozen in fear. This is my life now. Being tied to a man in marriage who will hurt me. Rape me.
The day of my parents’ funeral was an omen. It was a sign of the other bad things to come. Boris walked right into my life, and I was too powerless to stop it. There’s nothing I can do—not if I want to save Mila.
Then the door bursts open.
Mikhail storms into the room and stops when he sees what’s happening.
Boris jerks back and reaches for his gun, but Mikhail strides across the room, grabs Boris’s gun, and sticks it into his own jacket. Mikhail straightens his jacket before turning to me.
His eyes seep into mine.
It’s only then I remember I’m fully naked.
I squeak and press the dress to my body while my face turns hot. I wonder how I look—a mess, my foot bleeding, stark naked.
Mikhail inhales deeply and takes a moment to look at me longer than is appropriate before he faces off with Boris. “So, you thought you could kidnap my woman.”
My woman? I didn’t think I belonged to Mikhail, but for some reason, I’m not as bothered by the thought of belonging to Mikhail as I am to Boris. I just don’t want to be property.
“She’s not your woman, Mikhail,” Boris says. “Her father permitted me to find his daughters husbands. Seeing as I’m a man in need of marriage, it only makes sense.”
