Deceitful Vows by Brook Wilder
Chapter 33
Paige
The diamond earrings Andrei gave me gleam brilliantly under the overhead lights, sparkling as if they’re only a moment away from exploding into stars. I stare into them intently, marveling at my own reflection in their surface. I can see the costly highlights in my hair, the intense red of my lipstick, and the iridescent sheen on my spa-pampered skin.
I see the woman I am, and the one I will be. All while the one I was … fades away.
The thought of my past twists at my heart slightly, and the familiar guilt that I’ve carried all my life returns. I think about my father and Emma. Are they okay? Do they miss me? Did Andrei really become a benefactor to them as he said he would? Or was that all just empty words?
But at the same time, I can’t take my eyes off the earrings. They’re so pretty. Prettier than anything I’ve ever had my entire life. Nobody has ever given me gifts like these. I close my eyes and swallow back the guilt.
I’m allowed to indulge. I have to be allowed.
Gingerly, I put one on. The weight hangs heavy and unfamiliar on my lobe. I feel like the edge of the diamond might slice my finger if I’m not careful. As soon as I put it on, I look around the room and am disappointed when I see no mirror to marvel at myself in.
A woman enters the room and sits down at the table while I put on the other earring.
I continue as I watch her from the corner of my eye. She’s well-dressed, and her diamonds almost outshine mine. Almost.
Her haughty confidence convinces me that I must know her. She’s acting as if I should.
There’s something unspeakably intimidating about her picture-perfect beauty.
Her black hair appears to bounce and shimmer as she sits perfectly still. She’s wearing a dress that hugs her curves as if it is custom-made by a staff of tailors. She looks like she belongs on a runway or on magazine covers, not here with me in this pretentious restaurant.
Her piercing dark eyes demand attention. Slowly, my shoulders slump and happiness dissolves into ash in my mouth under her steady gaze.
“Having fun?” she asks, resting her elbow on the table and her chin in her hand. Her glossy red nails tap her cheek.
“Yes,” I answer cautiously, not sure who she is or why she’s here. “I am.”
“Good,” she replies with a smile that reveals a row of perfect teeth. “I’m sure you’re having fun with Andrei.”
I’m about to ask her why she’s sitting at my table when a waiter enters to serve sparkling water and a basket of fresh-baked rolls.
Feeling awkward, I try to make chitchat to fill the silent void.
“Do you know the Barinovs?” I ask. “Are you another sister of Andrei’s?”
The woman’s tweezed eyebrow slants and then falls back into place. She calls me a fool without speaking the word.
Then it hits me. I’ve seen her before.
Those dark eyes that can slice a person to pieces with a single gaze. She’s the woman that scowled at me in the store! She’s the one that made my feet stick to the carpet.
Suddenly, her eyes no longer demand attention. They’re demanding blood.
My arms tense by my sides as Andrei’s words of warning loop through my brain. There are worse people. My eyes dart from hers to the door, hoping Andrei—or anyone for that matter—will appear and rescue me from her. But no one is coming, and I figure the best thing to do is to leave before things get ugly.
Slowly, I start to stand, as if she is a coiled snake waiting to strike.
“Sit.” Her commanding voice freezes me in place. “I want to talk to you, Paige.”
How does she know my name? I obey her command and sit down, holding onto the table to keep myself from trembling. My gut tells me that if I betray even a hint of fear, she won’t hesitate to do something bad—something unthinkable.
Why me? But I don’t ask that, not now.
“Who are you?” I ask sheepishly.
A bitter laugh peals from her throat. And her baleful gaze lands on the wedding ring on my finger. Before I can react and take my hand off the table, she strikes like lightning to grab my wrist.
She admires the cut of the diamond, and I can feel her nails digging into the flesh of my wrist. My eyes follow her gaze to the ring. It’s slightly too big for my hand. And suddenly, I’m reminded that I’m owned, not loved.
“My name is Talia Nikitin.” Her lips twist to the side. “I am Andre Barinov’s fiancée. His real one.” Her smirk morphs into a cruel smile. “I see he didn’t use his grandmother’s ring.”
I try to tug my wrist out of her hand, but her grip tightens painfully as she turns my wrist so that the massive diamond flashes at us in mutual mockery.
“What do you mean?” I ask, wincing from the pain. “He never mentioned a girlfriend.”
“Not a girlfriend. His fiancée,” she corrects me icily. “We’ve been engaged for so long that no one can remember when we weren’t, including us.”
My eyes stare into hers as the horrible memory replays in my mind, despite never wanting to see it again. Carole hunched over a moaning Tim, who is too wrapped up in his ecstasy to notice me standing in the doorway of our bedroom. Her mouth wrapped around his dick while he lies in our bed, enjoying it. The bastard.
“It’s not possible.” I begin to plead my innocence, and for a moment, my aching wrist is forgotten. “I don’t do that. I don’t steal other women’s men. I don’t break up relationships.”
“Spare me the theatrics,” Talia scoffs loudly, rolling her eyes.
“I’m serious,” I reply. “When I met Andrei, he didn’t mention being with someone. I didn’t …”
The words falter as the crushing pain on my now tender wrist intensifies. I wince from the pain as her iron-hard grip increases more than I thought humanly possible. My hand starts to tingle as the circulation is cut off. I try to break free, but that’s a mistake as Talia squeezes harder.
Nothing I say will convince Talia that I didn’t know. And it’s not like I’d believe myself either if our roles were reversed.
An attractive man with insane wealth in control of an army being single? How can a man like that not have a woman by his side? Or at least in his bed?
The hatred in her eyes convinces me that she’ll never believe anything I say, even if what I say is the truth. She would laugh if I told her I was kidnapped and forced to marry Andrei. Who would believe that a man like him wanted to kidnap a woman like me? But he did.
Andrei kidnapped me, and now his fiancée will make me pay the price.
I gasp as the pain sharpens. My hand turns a deeper shade of red while the skin on my wrist is ghostly white. It’s clear that Talia doesn’t just want me out of their life.
She wants to hurt me more than he hurt her.
She wants me dead.
“Has he fucked you yet, Paige?” Talia gives my wrist a vicious tug as she continues her taunt.
“I—”
“Of course he has,” she seethes. “I should’ve asked how many times a day.” Her gaze lowers to my breasts, encased in a pushup bra that almost spills out of my dress. Suddenly, I feel dirty in the revealing dress and my heels. “You look like someone that only has sex in a bedroom.” She laughs bitterly. “And only if he’s on top.”
Her expression and composure change slightly, as if the thought of Andrei on top of me is doing something to her. I know what’s zipping through her mind. I’ve had those thoughts too. What’s wrong with me that my ex would cheat? And what makes my fake husband able to resist me?
Fantasies of Andrei barge into my head. I envision the way his lean body stalks me across the bed before he crawls over me. The way his eyes watch me moan as his tongue presses against my clit. The taste of his cum returns to my nose like a stubborn perfume.
My face grows hot, and when I look at Talia, her hostility is so tangible it’s like a part of her has grown strong enough to survive on its own.
Sneering, Talia digs her nails deeper into my wrist, forcing the skin into crescents. The pain makes me gasp loudly. She hears it before I can swallow it and pulls me toward her. Her mouth twists as she yanks my arm down, forcing me to bow down to her.
“If you have any sense in your thieving head, suka,you’ll back off,” she hisses. “And stop playing with what doesn’t belong to you.”
I hold back unwanted tears of pain. I won’t let her make me cry. “You’re hurting me.” My words of warning come out in a pathetic squeak.
“Good.” Smiling, her nails bite in deeper. “If you can’t handle a talk, then you better run, Paige. Because it’s only going to get worse, you cheap fucking whore.”
I may not know how to pick a fight, but my old neighborhood—and my cousin Kenney—taught me how to get out of a situation just like this. I relax my wrist, letting my arm go slack, and then quickly turn it toward Talia’s thumb.
The move frees me, and quickly, I move away.
Talia looks annoyed at her empty hand. And before I can fully recover, she grabs hold of my other wrist and jerks me down onto the table. I sense her looming over me as I struggle again to get away. She won’t fall for any cheap tricks this time.
“You’re very pretty, Paige.” Her voice lifts the hairs on the back of my neck. “Almost beautiful. But beauty is only skin deep.” Her nail traces a line across my cheek from the corner of my mouth to my ear. “It won’t take much for me to take that beauty away from you. And then who will Andrei love?”
I close my eyes, hating myself for being a coward. The room suddenly feels small, as if the ceiling is pinning me in place. I know this woman has no compunction about destroying me. My knees start to shake. I wonder if she’ll saw my throat open with the butter knife and leave my bloody corpse for Andrei to find.
“I didn’t know,” I whisper. “I’m sorry.”
“There’s always a reason,” she hisses. “And it isn’t always love. But why you? You’re a nobody. You’re nothing.”
Cool air rushes into the stifling room as the door opens. I can’t raise my head, but I turn my gaze and see Andrei step inside, closing the door behind him. He places a wine bottle on the table, the neck clutched tightly in his hand. Relief floods through me at the sight of him.
“Let her go, Talia.” His voice is low, and I can hear the concern as he speaks.
“We’re just talking, Andrushka,” she replies in a tone filled with cracks. “About our future.”
Andrei takes a quick step forward, and his large hands pull Talia off me in one swoop as if she’s a piece of lint on my shoulder. I gasp for air, and for a moment, I hold onto the table before moving quickly away, determined not to be caught again. I take a step back, positioning myself by the door and wondering why Andrei hasn’t called a guard.
“Your quarrels are with me.” His voice remains calm. “Not my wife.”
My wife.
My shoulders drop to a natural position as relief sweeps over my heated face. I hold onto my stinging wrist, wondering again why Andrei hasn’t called a guard. I glance at the door and then back at them.
They face each other, and though Talia is a foot shorter than Andrei, her body conveys a predator’s skill that effortlessly matches his. Their hard gaze and fearless stance mirror one another as if they’re a set of tigers on the verge of combat.
His eyes darken, but Andrei does nothing as Talia curses him in English and Russian. My throat tightens as I realize he’s not going to call his guards on her. Andrei won’t want the guards to hurt her.
Fists at his side, he stares silently at Talia as if he deserves her unhinged abuse for destroying her heart.
And then I realize it.
You bastard.
Her eyes shine, but no tears fall. Her anger burns them away. No one could feel that much without having been in love. She almost certainly still loves him.
Ever since I was young, falling in love has been the most terrifying thing in the world to me. Because to fall in love means to risk losing it. Love always fills me with an overwhelming sense of dread, but I fall anyway.
But tonight? Guilt and dread and anger mix together in my stomach as I stare at the two of them in their silent standoff.
Because Andrei has made me become the one thing I hate more than anything else in this world, the one thing that hurt me the most, the one thing that I’ve always resolved to never become:
He made me the other woman.
