Mafia Boss’s Arranged Bride by Bella King
Chapter 13
Annika
Today is the day that the anxiety ends, or at least the day that I hope it does.
I’ve been awake since 2:30 AM, taking in every sight and sound that pours into my bedroom from the outside world as my thoughts chase each other around my head. Now, as the sunrise creeps across the floor, I know there is no more time for me to deliberate, to attempt sleep one last time as my own person.
Once 7:00 AM rolls around, I’m startled from my daze by a neurotic pounding at my door. “Annika,you need to start getting up now, or you will fall asleep and be a zombie for the ceremony,” my mother’s shrill voice pierces through the door like a knife. “We need to check your skin to make sure nothing is trying to break you out.”
I groan. “My skin is fine. Please just let me get up at my own pace, mama,” I reply. I listen closely for an impatient snort of some kind, but all I hear are footfalls departing. My fate is already sealed, so there’s no point in arguing with me. I’m sure she knows that.
I gather my things and head out of my room, arriving at the salon at 9:00. The hours feel slow and fast at the same time. After everything I’ve been through, everything I’ve said and done, it all boils down to this moment when I make the final preparations.
I’m almost devoid of emotions completely when I walk into the salon, save for a small, superficial part of me that is just a bit excited about the prospect of seeing myself at my full beauty potential.
I’ve never thought myself bad looking, but knowing women who spend a minimum of two hours on their hair, makeup, and clothes per day has kept me on the more practical side of things for most of my adult life.
In high school, I went through a very brief phase of straightening my hair every day, but I burned off a significant portion of my bangs one morning and have never touched a flat iron since. My routine is quite simple these days, so changing it up gives me a small spark of enjoyment to contrast how gray it is today.
“Dobrye utro, future Mrs. Ivanova!” I hear from the back of the salon.
The building interior is made almost entirely of stone and tile, giving off a very modern feel while simultaneously being dungeon-like.
The voice belongs to my mother’s ride-or-die stylist, Vanya. I have known her since I was about twelve when she waxed my eyebrows for my confirmation day. The wax was too hot, and I got burned, but she said I was so brave about it.
“Hi, thanks so much for having me,” I reply awkwardly as I walk toward her.
What is this, a job interview? I’ve never held a proper job in my life- perks of being a woman in the mafia. We don’t really work. We’re just traded down the line until we shrivel up and die of old age.
Or a bullet to the head. That seems to happen pretty often as well.
“Have you chosen what kind of look you are going for?” Vanya asks as she sorts through the makeup on the vanity in front of me.
“Um, I think just something simple and classic?” I say, curious what that would look like to a woman who attended Russian beauty school in the mid-80s. “Just a slight smokey eye and tinted lip, maybe?” I continue, overcorrecting.
Vanya laughs, and my stomach jumps. “You are too modest! It is your only wedding day! Well, hopefully, I suppose. The divorce rates are looking very unpromising these days!”
My mother makes a neck-slashing motion as Vanya recognizes her lack of politeness at suggesting I would ever remarry on the day of my first wedding.
Vanya clears her throat and reaches into her box of makeup. “How do you feel about gold? Gold eyelids would look divine on you. Here, look at this and let me know how you like it.” She takes a brush and swipes a streak of shimmery gold dust across my forearm.
The light catches it immediately, and suddenly I cannot stop shifting my arm around watching the light dance through the glitter. “Okay, I guess we can do that,” I agree, still nervous but growing less apprehensive by the moment.
Vanya goes to work, taking great care in her immaculate strokes and dashes as she prepares the face that will be smiling up at Michail at the altar.
Should I be smiling, or is this more of the type of scenario when a blank expression is appropriate?
Once my makeup is done, I feel as though I have stolen my face from a painting of a beautiful woman. My skin is dewy and bright, a diffuse blush warming my face under a subtle highlight. For the first time, I feel divine.
Excitement races through me as I imagine Michail seeing me for the first time like this. I hope desperately that he is intimidated by my beauty if only this once. Beauty has power, possibly even enough to keep him in my control. This is what it’s all about, after all – power.
After Vanya has styled my hair, it falls into thick waves across my shoulders, placed deliberately to look effortless and candid even though the whole style took Vanya over an hour to complete.
“You have too much hair, Annika. You could shave half of it off and make hair for a whole other person!” she says with a laugh.
I don’t know what to say. My hair has always been thick.
I glance at a clock and realize the ceremony is hurtling toward us at a frightening pace. It’s almost time for me to give my hand to Michail and seal this dreadful deal for good.
I must look sick at the thought of it because my mother immediately begins to orbit me, nitpicking and buzzing around my head. “Why is your face that color? Have you eaten since you woke up? Do you need a Xanax? I have some in the car-“
“Mother, please! Enough!” I shout.
My own words shock me as they leave me. It’s as if something in me had finally snapped under all the tension I have been under, throwing shrapnel and lodging it into the unsuspecting civilians in my perimeter.
“You need a Xanax, darling. Please let me go get one for you,” she replies, completely ignoring me.
I relent as she rushes to the car and returns with the pill. “Take only half, or you won’t be able to have any champagne later!” she says.
Of course, her concern is with the safety of my drinking, but I’m not going to be drinking. I take the entire pill without water and slouch back down in my seat. I’ve had enough of these damn things not to feel them anymore.
I think of Nikolai’s smoking and wonder if he’s the same way. I wonder if his tongue feels the bite of tobacco as it burns or the rush of nicotine as it enters his bloodstream. I used to smoke too, but my mother hated it. She said women didn’t smoke, only men.
Maybe I’ll sneak one at the wedding if Nikolai is there to provide them. I’d like to see him, if not to say goodbye to the fantasy that was never allowed to flourish between us. Perhaps he felt it too, running through his body like electricity in the clouds, or maybe it’s all in my troubled head.
