“This can’t…”
I look up at Damian.
“Did you know it was my sister’s wedding day?” he asks me.
I want to ask what the hell he’s talking about. What this means. But my throat is as dry as a desert and I can’t speak.
“A candlelit wedding. Her dream.” His words sound sad, but then his face hardens, and his pupils become pinpoints as he focuses on me. “She never made it, though. None of us did.” He turns his hand just a little, and I see the scarred flesh.
I think about the accident that stole my mother and brother from me. I don’t remember it. I don’t remember much, but the one thing I wish I could forget is my brother’s face just before he went through the windshield.
I shake my head, momentarily close my eyes to block it. I can’t think about that now. Not in front of him.
When I look up at Damian the sorrow I’d heard in his words doesn’t show in his eyes. I get the feeling that sorrow has festered over time and turned into this. Because what I see is the monster he warned me about eight years ago.
I see hate inside him.
Hate for me.
The box and roses spill onto the marble floor when I rise, crushing the contract in my hand.
“This can’t be,” I whisper.
“But it is.” He steps closer, looming over me, and all I can do is stare up at him. “Enjoy your last few hours of freedom, Cristina, because come midnight, you belong to me.”
***