by K. M. Scott
No matter how much I still resented him for making me leave my home for two long years.
As I hurried past his office one night before Ryder and I planned to leave forever, he called out my name. “Serena, come in here. I want to talk to you.”
Not fast enough.
Resigned to my fate, I took a deep breath and plastered my best fake smile on my face as I entered the room. “Yes, Dad? I was just going to my room for the night.”
At eight o’clock. Actually, I had planned on going out to get some last minute things Ryder and I would need, so I hoped whatever he had to say didn’t take long.
“Sit down. We have to talk.”
Nothing good could come from any conversation that began with those words. In just seconds, he’d gone from I want to talk to you to we have to talk.
Every muscle in my body tensed as I looked around the room to see Ryder and the other young guy who worked security for my father. The last thing I wanted to do was have some serious conversation in front of them.
“You look busy, Dad. We can talk later or tomorrow.”
He looked over toward them and shook his head. “No need. They’re used to being around when I have business conversations. Sit.”
So this was going to be a business conversation. Since I had no part whatsoever in anything even remotely connected to my father’s businesses, I couldn’t imagine what he wanted to talk about with me. Maybe he wanted my opinion on some acquisition he was considering.
Left without any choice, I did as he ordered and sat down in one of the chairs in front of his desk. “Sure, Dad. What’s up?”
I didn’t know if he believed the chipper tone of my voice. I wouldn’t have if I were him. Then again, if I had been a bastard to someone and basically banished them from their home for two years, I probably wouldn’t have expected them to want to ever speak to me again.
He looked across his desk at me and smiled that broad grin that never failed to make my stomach knot up. It always made me feel like he saw me as prey.
“Your sister’s wedding got me to thinking. It’s time you make some decisions about your life, Serena.”
“Some decisions about my life?” I repeated, feeling my stomach cramp even tighter.
“Yes. Janelle is only two years older than you and she’s already married. If you ask me, she waited too long. I don’t want to see you make that mistake.”
“I’m only twenty, Dad. It’s the twenty-first century. Females don’t need to get married right out of puberty. In fact, they don’t have to get married at all.”
My comment about not marrying anyone made him sit up straight in his chair. Shaking his head, he looked horrified by the mere thought that a woman would choose to remain single.
“That’s absurd. Of course you’ll marry. It’s the way things are done. I don’t care what century it is. A woman needs to be married.”
“Why?”
I felt Ryder’s gaze on me from the side of the room, and I turned to see him staring at me with a look of panic in his eyes. I had no idea if he knew what was coming next or if the mere mention of me marrying someone terrified him as much as it did me.
Now that he had joined the ranks of my father’s henchmen, he couldn’t do a thing but stand there and stay silent or risk having my father know we were together. But I didn’t need him to fight my battles for me. I had no interest in marrying anyone my father chose for me, and I had no problem telling him that.
“Because it’s the role she’s most prepared for in life,” my father explained, sounding like some caveman fast forwarded in time.
“I will have my degree in social work next May, so I’ll have far more roles open to me in life. If I do ever get married, it will be once I’m established and am my own woman.”
My father’s face screwed into a look of pure confusion. I truly believed he had no idea what I was talking about.
“Regardless, you’ll be married this fall. His name is Oliver Landon, the man you met the other night and so rudely walked away from that I had to make my apologies just to keep him interested.”
I couldn’t believe my ears. Had he just announced that he’d picked a husband for me, even after I’d just told him how I felt about marriage?
Standing to leave, I smiled. “We’ve had this conversation, Daddy. I’m not getting married to anyone, and especially not in a couple months. And I’m not marrying anyone I just met and didn’t even like enough to remember his name.”
His expression hardened, and his mouth set into a tight line across his face. “Yes, you will. It’s been arranged.”
My eyes narrowed into angry squints. “No, I won’t. I’m not Janelle. I’m not going to be traded for whatever this Oliver person has to offer you. Good night, Daddy.”
I didn’t take two steps before he slammed his hand down on his enormous oak desk. Too frightened to turn around, I froze and stood facing the door as he began to bark orders at me.
“You will do this, Serena. I will not take any disobedience on this. You remember the last time you disobeyed?”
My blood began to boil at his thinly veiled threats, and I spun around to go toe-to-toe with him. “Are you threatening to throw me out of my house again, Daddy? Because if that’s it, I can be gone tonight and you’ll never see me again. Is that what you want?”
Nobody ever threatened my father. I had never done it before, and as his eyes flashed the purest look of rage I’d ever encountered, I knew why. I quickly glanced over toward Ryder on the other side of the room to gauge if he’d help me if he attacked me and saw him standing there shocked. For his part, Ryder appeared ready to move, but I wasn’t sure he could defend me this time any more than he did the last time.
“Serena, you’re on thin ice with me, and I would suggest you watch your mouth. I won’t be disobeyed in this matter. Oliver is coming here tonight to spend time with you, and you will be your charming self. Do you understand?”
My emotions began to spin out of control as tears welled in my eyes. I wouldn’t be sold off to the highest bidder as if I was some piece of contraband at my father’s disposal. I wouldn’t! If it meant I had to go live on the streets instead of marrying some strange man, then I’d do that. Anything to keep my freedom.
“No! I am not yours to do with as you see fit. I will not marry anyone and that’s final.”
My father looked stunned at my declaration of independence, but I knew he wouldn’t let me go that easily. He’d threaten me with something, probably disinheritance or something else awful that had to do with money, but I was ready for that.
I wasn’t afraid of poverty. I was afraid of enslavement.
He took a deep breath and slowly let it out before he said in a voice full of iciness, “So you’ve given up on ever seeing your mother again? Is that what I’m hearing?”
Stunned by his words, my mind whirled. What a monster he was! He knew he couldn’t control me with threats of taking money away like with Janelle, so he went for the one thing in my life he knew full well I cared about.
But I wasn’t as naïve as he thought. Leveling my gaze on him, I answered, “So now you’re claiming you know where she is after years of saying you couldn’t find her? Maybe that’s because it was you who sent her away, not her who left us?”
His mouth hitched up into a terrifying grin I knew signaled how enraged he truly was under that cool façade he liked me and his employees to see. “If you ever want to see your mother again, Serena, you will do as I tell you regarding this marriage. And if you choose to disobey me, I cannot promise you others won’t suffer for your actions. Keep that in mind as you choose what course to take.”
My uncle had said my father would do anything to keep control over me. I hadn’t been one hundred percent sure of it until that very moment, but now I knew he’d willingly led me to believe he didn’t know her whereabouts for all those years when he had been the one to force her out of our lives.
My chest tightened at the thought that he’d hurt m
y mother because of me. Or maybe he knew about how I felt about Ryder and would hurt him. How could I risk him taking out his rage on either of them? There had to be some way to make him see how wrong forcing me to marry someone I didn’t love was.
Reaching out, I softly touched his hand as tears filled my eyes. “Please don’t do this, Daddy. I’m only twenty years old. I’m too young to marry someone, but even more than that, I want to be with someone I love. I don’t love this Oliver person. Please don’t make me do this.”
His expression remained stony as he listened to my pleas and obviously felt nothing in response. “Your actions have consequences, Serena. You’ve never wanted to understand that, but you will now. Choose wisely.”
I’d overestimated my power and he’d taken advantage of my weakness. I didn’t have a choice. I couldn’t live with the knowledge that he’d hurt someone because of me. Hanging my head, I sat down in the chair again and mumbled, “Fine. I’ll meet with him.”
Oliver arrived a few minutes later and although he was certainly pleasant enough, all I saw in him was a jailer. As my father talked up my accomplishments like he actually felt any pride in anything I’d ever done, I silently pleaded for him to change his mind to no avail.
As he and Oliver talked like old friends, I looked around the room and saw Ryder simply staring straight ahead like a statue, his expression unfeeling and emotionless as I sat there in that room for yet another time and saw my father take my world away.
Chapter Fourteen
Ryder
I stood at the edge of Robert’s desk as he explained that we’d have yet another wedding in just a few weeks and ran through a list of things he wanted to do differently for Serena’s ceremony. Meticulous with every detail, he didn’t seem to notice his daughter didn’t want to marry this Oliver person.
As I watched him torture her with the threat of hurting her mother the night before, I wanted to speak up, to defend her. I wanted to do what I couldn’t do that night two years ago, but I didn’t.
I stood there sickened by what he did to her and did nothing. And a few hours later when I’d drunk myself into a stupor so I couldn’t think anymore, I thought about going to her and telling her how sorry I was that I, of all people, hadn’t defended her.
I didn’t do that either.
“…so I think that this time I’ll have you outside with me because that asshole Maddox ended up boring the hell out of me for nearly a half hour at Janelle’s reception. I don’t know where Gannett and Pike were while the whole damn thing was going on. They’re lucky I didn’t have their heads after that.”
A knock on Robert’s office door brought me back as he rambled on about some guy he had wanted to avoid at Janelle’s wedding. Looking up, I saw Serena standing in the doorway, her eyes tentative and hopeful, so I backed up away from the desk, not wanting to even be within earshot for their conversation.
“I’m going to find Jesse and bring him up to speed on your plans,” I said quickly and got the hell out of that room in a hurry.
As I headed down the hall, I heard Serena begin to speak. “Please, Daddy. Please don’t make me go through with this marriage. I’m begging you.”
I didn’t want to hear anymore.
Instead of trying to find Jesse, I made my way out onto the grounds to take a walk and clear my head. Never before had fighting bothered me. Hell, I spent nearly a year beating the shit out of other guys and in some ways I liked it. Being forced to do it wasn’t top on my list of things I ever wanted to do again, but when I was one on one with some guy and had him at the point that I knew all it would take would be one more hit and he’d fall to the ground in defeat, I liked the way that made me feel.
But the way Robert and Serena fought gave me no pleasure at all. He was cruel, bordering on vicious when he made up his mind about her, and she was stubborn. Not that she shouldn’t be. I wouldn’t just roll over and take it if someone was going to force me to marry someone I barely knew.
It was just that I didn’t know how much more she could take, and that made being around them when they fought feel like a ticking time bomb. I didn’t think Robert saw it, but I had a sense one of these days she’d explode and all that resentment she held inside would finally be let out and turn his world upside down.
The fucker had it coming. He treated everyone around him like pawns on a chessboard, moving them around whenever he saw fit and without even the slightest interest in what they wanted. Janelle never seemed to mind, but that didn’t surprise me. She wasn’t much better than a parasite, as far as I’d ever noticed.
A wealthy brat who would do whatever necessary to make sure her cushy life wasn’t disrupted by those nasty realities of the world like work and bills.
Robert saw everyone as an employee, there for him to do his bidding. If you did as he wanted, you survived to see another day and another ugly demand. If you didn’t, then you found out how quickly you became meaningless in his world.
And Serena was no different. He’d shown her the consequences of disobeying him two years ago, and now I had no doubt he’d show her them again if she didn’t marry this Oliver guy.
As I thought about the possibility I’d lose her again, the sky grew dark as a storm rolled in. Caught a few hundred yards from the house, I realized too late I’d walked to the secret spot she and I met at. The first drops of rain began to fall, so I turned back and began to run, but it was a useless effort and by the time I reached the house, I was drenched.
I heard Robert screaming as soon as I opened the doors from the garden, so I immediately made my way to my rooms to change. Peeling off my wet clothes, I imagined Serena standing in front of him as he bellowed his orders at her, those brown eyes of hers pleading with him and getting nowhere.
He wasn’t going to change his mind. To him, she was a tool to help him achieve a goal. Nothing else. Merely a means to an end.
She had no power, like the rest of us, and he relished showing her that as often as he could.
And just like the last time, he wanted to take her away from me again.
Dressed in dry clothes, I slowly walked toward the main house and hoped whatever had happened between them was over and she’d left because I couldn’t bear to see that look in her eyes again. It wasn’t just sadness. It was like she was begging someone, anyone for help. When she looked at me like that, I felt like a knife was being twisted into my chest.
I didn’t get my wish, though. As I turned into the main hallway, I heard him bark, “You will do as I say, Serena, or I promise you you’ll regret it.”
His words made me stop dead, and I waited to hear her speak, but she said nothing and left his office in tears. I stood there watching her as she broke down and buried her face in her hands and wished I could take her away from this place at that moment.
Her shoulders shuddered as she sobbed quietly, not knowing I was there. I wanted to tell her to run away. That I’d distract him for the rest of the day and she could escape from this place. She had to have friends who could help her. Someone who wasn’t under her father’s control.
Lifting her head, she dried her eyes and saw me there. She opened her mouth but nothing came out. Finally, after a few moments, she said quietly, “I’m not going to let him do this to me. I’m not.”
I checked to make sure Robert wasn’t anywhere nearby and pulled her into the side hallway to the south wing. “We can go tonight and never look back. I just need an hour or so.”
Choking back tears, she shook her head. “I can’t. You heard what he said about my mother last night. I can’t be the reason she’s hurt. I just can’t.”
Her mention of what happened the night before made me feel guilty for not standing up for her. “I’m sorry I didn’t do anything last night. If I did, I was worried he’d figure out about us.”
Fuck, that sounded lame.
Serena’s expression hardened, and she looked away. “I don’t expect anyone to fight my battles for me, Ryder. No one has ever done it before, so
why would they start now?”
I winced at her thinly veiled reference to that night I stood by and watched without saying a single word as her father sent her away from the only home she’d ever known. She had every right to blame me. I blamed me.
Cupping her shoulders, I turned her to look at me. “He’s going to make you marry that guy. Do you honestly think he’ll do anything to your mother? Do you think he even knows where she is? Just leave with me like we planned. It can work.”
Serena hung her head and slowly fell back against the wall. “I don’t know what he’ll do. I do think he knows where she is. I can’t be why he does something to her, Ryder. I wouldn’t be able to live with that. I’m just going to have to find another way to stop this wedding.”
“If you’d just get away from him, he might find something else to care about, Serena. While you were in Italy, he didn’t bother you, did he?”
“It doesn’t matter anymore. As long as there’s the chance he could do something to my mother, I can’t leave.”
I let my hands fall away from her body and shrugged. “There has to be something we can do.”
She forced a smile. “You’re not my savior, Ryder. In many ways, you’re just as trapped as I am, I’m guessing. If you weren’t, you wouldn’t still be here, would you?”
“I’m thinking the only person who would be is Janelle. She seems to be the only one who wants the life your father dictates for her.”
“That’s because she’s just like him. She doesn’t care about anyone else but herself, just like him.”
Someone’s footsteps on the marble floor of the entryway made me look around the corner and I saw Pike going to Robert’s office. Knowing I had to get back, I said, “I love you, Serena. Come with me. We can do this. We’ll go away and be happy, just like we wanted to.”
