by Sienna Blake
I feel a firm hand grip my elbow. It’s my husband. He’s frowning at me. Oh, right. The ceremony is over.
I am married.
Married.
The word echoes inside my body as if I am an empty cavern.
I also turn sixteen today. Nobody mentions that.
My new husband drapes a thick fur coat over my shoulders. It’s real. I can smell the hint of earthy wildness in the fur. My Jimmy Choo heels clack against the marble as he leads me to a limousine waiting outside. I’ve never been in one before. Through the flakes of snow stinging my eyes, I see the driver holding the back door open for me. I stumble as I get into the heated vehicle. Right into the black leather seats. My new husband shoots me a smile and pats my knee. We drive in silence. I know nothing about my new husband—God, that word sounds strange to me—except he is English. And he’s older than me.
The limo stops in front of the Belmond Grand Hotel, an imposing building with rows of tall casement windows guarded by stone statues. Within minutes, we’re being escorted up to the Presidential Suite by the manager himself, a slim, polished man who speaks to my husband in proud, accented English, his hands as graceful as a conductor as he points out this and that. We are trailed by porters who carry my husband’s luggage and our coats.
On the top floor, the manager holds open the door to the penthouse suite, sneering at me behind my husband’s back. I don’t have the heart to tell him that his shallow judgements are specks of shit on the ass of a flea in the spectrum of things I give a fuck about right now. I walk into the suite after my husband and halt right inside.
This place is a palace. I’m standing in the living room, crystal chandeliers glinting off gold and coral wallpaper, clusters of red velvet armchairs, a bucket of champagne and two flutes sitting on the low cherry wood table. Like the rest of this hotel, it’s heated enough not to need a coat. This room alone is twice the size of the studio I shared with Dimitri—thinking his name sends a stab of something white-hot through my numbness. This room probably costs more per night than I’ve ever seen in my life. There are more rooms showing through open doors, a closed glass wrap-around terrace showing through thick gold curtains held aside with wide ties. The snow is falling harder now, the flakes beating at the glass.
Here I am in a penthouse suite. Let’s toast with champagne to my charmed life.
The door clicks behind me like the cocking of a pistol. I suddenly realise that I am alone here with my husband. The manager’s gone. So are the porters. Just him and me.
This time his hand rests on my lower back—too low—as he leads me through one of the doors. To the bedroom, another spacious, opulent room. Anxiousness ties another knot in my stomach. The bed looks monstrous enough to swallow me whole.
He unzips my dress from behind. The material peels off me down to the plush carpet. In seconds my strapless bra and panties are stripped off me too.
I am naked.
Naked.
I’ve never been naked in front of anyone before.
Dimi was supposed to be the one undressing me today. I was supposed to be wearing white lace instead of cream.
My husband walks around me, inspecting me as if I were a steed that he just bought at a market. I suppose I am. I think he likes what he sees because he smiles and mumbles something, his fingers exploring my breasts and down the quivering plane of my stomach. His touch is foreign. Removed.
Still, my nipples harden when he rubs and tweaks them. This single reaction of my body feels like a betrayal. Not just to Dimitri. But to me.
He fashions me into position like a doll, kneeling on all fours on the mattress that sinks like quicksand. I stare at the painting behind the bed of a ship on the horizon, wishing I were on it, wherever it was going. My fingers grip the sheets as I hear the tinkling of his belt coming undone. Dread coagulates in the pit of my stomach, making me feel ill. I feel his fingers on my hips, his erection between my legs and I shut my eyes.
I hiss as he invades my body, a sharp pain cutting through my numb shield. He smells all wrong, like tobacco and a woodsy perfume that tickles my nose. He starts to move. With every thrust of his I chant.
I hate you, Dimitri.
Fuck you for leaving me.
I hate you.
I hate you.
I love you.
My husband jerks behind me. He comes with a moan, calling out what sounds like another woman’s name. When he pulls out, relief floods me like warm liquid. No, it is warm liquid, running down the inside of my thigh. I stumble to the en suite, a museum of marble and mirrors, and clean myself up, taking my time. There is it, stark red on white tissue, the remnants of my innocence. I look up, catching my reflection in one of the full-length mirrors. I don’t recognise the girl I see. My cheeks burn. I find the robe behind the door and cover my body up.
When I return to the bedroom, my new husband is lying across the sheets, mopping the sweat pouring from his forehead with a handkerchief. He asks me something in English.
I shake my head. “Sorry,” I say in my heavily accented English.
He points at me and yells, “Brother? Brother?”
It takes me a moment to recognise this English word. He is asking about Dimitri. Where is Dimitri?
My numbness grows brittle. It starts to crack. The tears seep out before I can stop them.
My husband makes no movement to comfort me. He merely frowns at me.
In the back of my mind, I realise that my tears are annoying him. I can’t annoy my husband so soon after we’re married. He’s all I have now.
I gather all my childish feelings like scattered toys and place them into a box in my mind. I am a woman now. A married woman. I have no room for these things anymore.
I wipe my face and try for a smile. “I sorry,” I say in an attempt at English. It’s a language I will have to learn. I doubt my husband will learn Russian for me. Besides, Isabelle told me we’d be living in England after our short honeymoon here in St Petersburg.
“Brother?” my husband asks once more.
Dimitri’s face appears in my mind again.
Dimitri left. I am all I have.
I shake my head, my lips pinched. “Brother dead.”
16
____________
Alena
The present…
It’s late afternoon. Emily, my husband and I are standing in a row in the foyer waiting for the venerable Mr Wolf. Standing opposite us are Terrance and Mrs Bates. It feels so formal I almost want to burp, just to break the tension. It’s like we’re about to receive the queen. My husband demanded that we make ourselves presentable, i.e. uncomfortable. He keeps tugging on the sleeves of his tailored black suit and fixing his navy-blue tie. Emily looks sweet in a pale pink chiffon spaghetti-strap evening dress that falls to her knees, her hair pulled up into a French twist, showcasing her slender pale neck.
I’m dressed in a couture champagne-coloured dress that fits like a glove, feathers and beads dressing the skirt of the dress, made specifically for me by Vivienne Westwood, a present from my husband. He’s always sorry after he lashes out at me. He only says it with diamonds or couture. On my feet are a pair of Jimmy Choos, a stylish stiletto in a nude colour. My usually wild hair has been styled straight as a waterfall, cascading down over one of my smoky eyes and bright red lipstick.
My husband demanded that I wear the most expensive pieces of jewellery, so dripping from my ears are a pair of vintage chandelier diamond earrings. Around my neck is a heavy centrepiece necklace of white and yellow diamonds. It’s almost like a collar. The gold and diamond links drip down between my breasts. My husband thinks I look fit to stand beside him. I think I look like one of those stars you place on top of the Christmas tree. Funny how I used to dream of wearing things like this. Now I would trade it all to have Dimitri back.
Through the frosted glass in our entrance doors, I spot a car pulling up into our circular driveway, gravel crushing underneath the tyres.
My husband stiffens a
t my side, then hisses down to me. “I’m sure I don’t have to tell you that this investor is very, very important to us.”
“I know,” I say quietly.
“Charm him. You have a way. Make him feel welcome. Make him feel at home. Whatever he wants, he gets.”
“Of course.”
He straightens his tie once again. “Whatever you do, don’t fuck this up for me.”
My blood curdles. If anything goes wrong on this investor’s trip, I will be to blame. I have a feeling my punishment, should anything go wrong, will be worse than I’ve ever experienced.
I steady my nerves as a figure appears out of the black town car and walks up the steps to completely darken the width of the glass. My breath sucks into the back of my throat. He is huge. At least six feet two. His shoulders are wide as a rugby player.
The footman at the door clears his throat. “I present, Mr Wolf.” He opens the front door with a flourish. Mr Wolf steps into our foyer, his long grey overcoat swishing at his ankles.
Oh. My. God.
My heart seizes. My lungs cramp. My world shatters into a million little pieces.
There standing before me is Dimitri Volkov.
He’s Mr Wolf? The American investor? There must be some mistake.
Then it hits me. Volkov is Russian for Wolf.
Why hadn’t I made the connection?
Because I never thought, not in a million years, that Dimitri would come here to find me.
Everything fades around him. He is all I see. He is all that exists. He was always handsome. Now, as a man of twenty-four, he is devastating. His hair is combed back into a more conservative style. I can see pieces of it attempting to escape, wanting to dance like a wild wind. His jaw has become wide, sterner, stronger. His beautiful cheekbones, even more sculpted. His boyish beauty has been honed into a sharp and savage masculinity.
The footman proceeds to take his overcoat from him as Dimitri scans the foyer with the polished ease of someone used to all this opulence. He is no longer lean from lack of food and being overworked. He is thick and built like a man who works out every day. His torso is wide and his legs are strong, filling out his gorgeous light grey pinstriped suit. That, along with the pale blue of his shirt and the silver of his tie, looks so much more sophisticated than my husband’s self-conscious attire. Dimitri wears Armani as if he were born in it.
My head spins. I am in a dream. Dimitri. Here.
My body tumbles with so many questions. Where have you been? How did you come here? What have you been doing for the last five years? I want to know every single detail of every single day. Where do you live? Who did you meet? Do you remember me?
And mostly, the question burning in my heart…do you still love me?
It’s been five years. But my heart still beats for you.
Five years.
How—how—is he here?
Is this a strange coincidence? Did he happen to come across my husband in London?
Or did Dimitri know who my husband was? Did he come here to see me? My insides surge with hope, my soul dusting off her wings once more. He’s here for me. He’s going to take me away from this awful place. We can go to America like he promised all those years ago. Oh, Dimitri. I knew you hadn’t forgotten about me just like I haven’t forgotten about you. You have to know that I forgive you for leaving me behind all those years ago. I don’t care, because you’re here now and all is forgiven. You came for me.
Finally his gaze comes to rest on me. It hits me like a sucker punch to the gut.
My lips part as I struggle to breathe. It gets worse as my mouth completely dries. My heart beats wildly in my chest like a tribal shaman’s dance. My entire soul is vibrating for the first time in five years. I was dead. Now I’m alive. I am whole again.
Oh my God, Dimitri. You have no idea how many times I dreamed of seeing you again. Every day I thought of you. Every night I prayed you were safe and happy.
I want to say all these things, but they jam up against my voice box. Not even a squeak leaves me. Not even a gasp. I want to run to him, fling my arms around his neck and cover his face with kisses. But I am too rooted in the ground, too dizzy to move.
17
____________
Dimitri
Five years I have waited. Five years I have planned.
Five years I have worked towards this moment.
Now I am treading the first steps down destiny’s path. The path that she set me on all those years ago.
Revenge. A dish best served cold.
As my eyes rest upon her, I don’t expect to be smacked in the face with how she’s changed. I didn’t expect this savage surge of fiery hatred in my veins.
She is no longer a girl of fifteen. Her body has bloomed with womanly curves, being hugged and shown off by her dress, her stunning neckpiece falling between generously formed breasts. I try not to think of what she would look like under her clothes. Her hair is long and straight, falling over her shoulders like a golden waterfall. Straight hair? I frown. I don’t like it this way. Where have those wild curls gone?
Some things haven’t changed. Like her eyes, still the same dappled green and yellow, like leaves when they start to turn. Now they’re filled with shock and, there it is…the longing underneath. It feels like she sees right into me. The love in her eyes is like fingers prying open my heart again. A tumble of unwanted feelings that I thought I had crushed underneath my boot begin to rise like a phoenix out of the ashes. I shove them down.
Fuck her. Fuck her for gazing at me with such longing and desire in her eyes. Fuck her for looking the way she does.
I do not love her. I am not that stupid little boy anymore. She ripped out my heart and tore it to pieces all those years ago. I will not fall for her charms again. This is just…wisps of nostalgia threatening to derail me. I will not be derailed. I slam down the cold mask across my face and my soul. She will never get inside again. Never.
Her soft, supple mouth parts in a gasp. I force myself to remember all those brutal words that spilled from that pretty mouth all those years ago. I feel the wounds they made as if it were yesterday.
“He’s nothing but a thief and a simpleton. He’s never going to be anything more.” I repeat her cursed words in my head, the words that revealed the truth of her cruel, shallow heart. “It would kill me to marry Dimitri.”
My heart hardens, turning to ice. Yes, good. I remind myself of the only reason I am here.
Revenge.
If she still loves me then this will be icing on the cake to my plan. It will make her hurt all the more.
Bit by bit, she will watch her charmed life crumble to the ground.
Then, when she needs me the most, when she is desperate, scared and alone like I was all those years ago…
I will destroy her.
18
____________
Alena
Dimitri is here. He is here.
My husband’s voice greeting Dimitri breaks through my reverie.
Shit. I’m not alone with Dimi. Emily and my husband are here next to me. My husband.
Thankfully, my husband is so besotted with Mr Wolf that he doesn’t notice the gale force of emotions tearing through me. My husband uses lavish words, his voice tighter than usual, his desperation to please is so thick, it’s almost suffocating. This nags at me. My husband is never as flustered as this. He’s never the one to need the approval of others. He must want Dimitri’s investment badly. Why?
Dimitri’s large hand practically swallows my husband’s. I remember how those hands used to find the skin of my belly, the way he’d touch me with them, full of tenderness and fire. Heat coils in my lower belly.
Dimitri turns to me. Emily steps in our way. I feel a small stab and have to repress the urge to shove her aside.
“Oh, Mr Wolf,” she gushes, her voice light and breathy, “we’ve heard so much about you. We’re so happy you could come and stay.” I can almost imagine how her eyelashes are fluttering, like
that time she had a crush on the young gardener and wanted to spend all her time “enjoying the outdoors,” even though it was in the middle of a freezing winter.
Oh God. Emily is developing a crush on Dimitri.
I can’t blame her. Dimitri is utterly mesmerising. Still, a sickness starts to grow in my heart.
“I am very happy to be here, Miss Emily.” Oh God, his voice. Dimitri’s beautiful baritone has deepened even further. It reverberates through the air like a bass note in a slow blues number.
Finally, Dimitri steps around Emily and faces me. We are less than a metre away from each other. Longing rips through my ribcage. I shouldn’t be staring. I can’t tear my eyes away.
It’s Dimi. My Dimi. He’s here for me.
His deep-set piercing blue eyes used to simmer with heat and fire as they looked at me. Now as his gaze comes to rest upon me, they are as cold as ice. There’s no warmth in his face. No surprise. No happiness. None. Like he doesn’t know me. The only outward appearance of emotion is a slight narrowing of his eyes.
“Mrs Worthington,” he says.
It sounds so formal I could cry. Don’t be like this, Dimi. It’s me. It’s Alena.
“It’s so lovely to meet you.” He stretches out his hand.
How can I accept a mere handshake when my body is screaming to throw itself into him arms?
A realisation slaps me in the face. Of course. Dimitri can’t act like he knows me. We need to keep our past a secret if we have any chance of leaving here together. My husband won’t let go of me—his possession—so easily. His pride won’t let him. Oh, Dimi. I’ve waited for you for so long.
I force a steady breath. “Likewise, Mr Wolf.” I reach for him, my fingers trembling.
My hand slides into his.
Our first touch in five years.
A riot of fireworks whizz and flare up my arm and down my body. My breath catches. Emotions jam up in the back of my throat.
His eyes widen imperceptibly. For a second, a mere second, the ice in his features melt. I see the Dimitri I used to know looking back out at me.
