3. Darius

Chapter three

Darius

T he last thing I wanted was to drug her, but I guess Hans could see she wasn’t going to go quietly, and he got a little trigger-happy.

I had plans for a gag and a good set of zip ties. After all, she didn’t look like she weighed much. Easy to carry out into the night and the SUV waiting down the block from the church, then into my private jet. My head of security, slash bodyguard, slash kind of a friend—because when you live alone, you don’t have many friends, and the ones you do have happen half by necessity and half by accident—Hans had other ideas. I guess he wanted to basically carry two of us over his shoulder into the jet.

It is why I’m now currently sitting on the edge of the bed where my new wife is lying, and I’m waiting for her to wake up. She’s tied at the wrists with silk ties because silk is soft and non-threatening. Her head will hurt, and she’ll feel foggy. As it is, she’ll probably scream bloody murder. But I don’t want her to try and escape and hurt herself. We need to talk first.

I swear, I’m really not one for proxy weddings, chloroform, kidnapping, and restraints. Also, my brother is a total asshole for this.

Hans gives me a look from where he’s sitting across the room in a chair that’s barely big enough to contain his brute presence. The guy is six-five or six-six, and he has over three hundred pounds of muscle. He always reminds me of a bull about to go apeshit with delight in any shop he pleases, fine glass dishes or otherwise. With no neck, a shaved head, and tattoos galore, no one would guess that at heart, he’s a big softie who likes aged cheese, cotton candy, any and all books, soft kittens, and even the sappiest of movies.

“Whee am I? You dlugged me? Yowwwrrrr a blig flat dwickheaddddd. Let me go wight wow.”

My wife is awake.

Despite her slurred speech and unfocused eyes with the scary big pupils, Everleigh pulls violently at the restraints on her wrists and then kicks her legs out, testing the ties. She looks at me furiously but also with panic as soon as her eyes are able to lock onto something and fixate there. She’s a feral, hissing cat, spitting with rage and indignation. Not that I blame her.

“Whoa. Okay. First things first.” I’m not that far away, and I didn’t realize how threatening it might seem, so I lifted my hands in a peaceful gesture. She gets even redder in the face. “Alright, so I did take you to my house, but you’re safe here. The restraints aren’t meant to hurt you. They’re soft, and they’re just tight enough to hold you so you don’t run and get yourself into trouble or hurt yourself. You need to stay calm, and we need to talk things out.” I take a deep breath because it seems appropriate here, and I also need it. “I didn’t know what my brother was planning. He said he’d found a way out of our problems. A woman who agreed to a fake marriage for a payment of one million dollars. Then, he told me to be at the church at eleven thirty. I didn’t know he was going to stand in for me as a proxy or that he had tricked you. I thought you knew who you were marrying. The wire transfer came from me. I sent it ahead of time. Same for the paperwork. It wasn’t supposed to be a deception. I swear that much to you.”

Her nostrils flare, her lips twist, and she’s no doubt trying to find the words in her bone-dry mouth and heavy head to curse me out and tell me that I’m a liar and a con, that I can go straight to hell, and that she hopes my dick rots and falls off first from some strange curse. “Where were you when your brother was lying to me and marrying me and standing in for you then?”

“I was at the church,” I admit. “But I needed a bit more time. Things are…Bradford knew…he…” Fuck, well, this is going smashingly well. “What my brother did was deplorable, but it doesn’t change anything. I still need a wife, and we’re still married. You need to calm down and be rational. If you want to leave, you can, but you have to return the money, and from what my brother said, I’ve gathered that you need it. Maybe we can come to another agreement between ourselves—a legit one that has nothing to do with my brother’s treachery. Then, you’ll see that I’m not so terrible despite what people have said and what you’ve already deduced for yourself.”

“I…what do you want with me then?” Her speech is improving. It’s no longer slurred, which is a good sign.

“Beyond having you as my fake wife for six months? Nothing. You can blame this one on my grandmother.”

“I blame it on your brother, your grandmother, your parents, and you.”

“Yes, well, I suppose, indirectly, you’re right. We’re all responsible, right back to the dawn of time. My poor old grandma did this to get back at us. That’s the difference. When we were kids, we played all manner of horrible pranks on her. One time, we swapped out her denture glue with real glue— things like that. We were real shits, just saying. But that aside, let’s start with the basics. Your name I got from the marriage certificate, but how does my brother know you?”

Her eyes flash. They’re an alluring light blue, not dark like mine. I have dark eyes, black hair, and a dark soul, the black sheep of the family. Alright, maybe I’m not exactly the black sheep, but I have been blamed for things that were beyond my control and banished in a way, and even after all that settled down, things were still hard. If a person looked really hard, they’d see that my eyes aren’t so dark after all. They have some color in them, some gold flecks when the sun hits them right. And my soul is kind of the same. It’s actually not so dark.

“I was his secretary.” She garbles the words like they’re thick in her mouth. Right, she’s probably going to need something to drink soon, as soon as her stomach settles in.

Christ, my brother is a ridiculous knob. His secretary? This is a new low, even for him. I’m careful to let none of that slip, though, because none of it is her fault. “I see.”

She narrows her brows at me. God, she’s beautiful. I noticed it on the jet, but now that she’s awake, her hair a pretty, wheat-colored cloud of a mess around her face, her pale skin flushed pink on her cheeks, and straining angrily against those ties in that gauzy Grecian-looking dress of hers, she’s a total knockout—stunning beyond measure. Not that it matters. It doesn’t. Those are just facts presented before me. It’s not like if I hadn’t been sedated twice earlier in the night and endured endless panic leading up until now, I’d noticed. In a rather physical way. In an in-the-pants kind of way.

“You’re a creep, aren’t you?” Her tone drips venom, and her eyes shoot to kill. Her hands curl into fists as she pulls again at the ties holding her arms. “You’ve tied me up because you’re a creep, and that’s why you’ve been banished here. Wherever here is. Oh my god, wherever here is. My mom and sister! They’ll be so worried about me.”

“We texted them for you on the flight. They know you’re fine.”

Her lips part, and she tries to hide her surprise but not her disgust. “You broke into my phone?”

“Phone wasn’t password protected,” Hans chimes in with a shrug. He speaks perfect English, but this is his favorite thing, doing the accents and keeping people guessing. Sometimes, he likes to play the big, brainless, brute card, but mostly, it’s the accent thing. I’m not sure what he’s doing right now, though. Russian maybe? Most people just assume Hans is all muscle with a miniscule brain. Most people wouldn’t guess he has a PhD in physics, then got tired of that and did some sketchy things after that I don’t ask about before getting into the bodyguard business and fulfilling the lifelong predictions of just about everyone who ever met him and thought he’d be great at a job involving muscle.

They’re right. He’s the best. He’s also killer with a razor and excellent with buttons.

“Okay, so you made sure my family knows I’m safe, but that’s debatable.” Everleigh’s lips finally work like normal again, and she just says what she’s thinking. “If you’re not a creep who enjoys tying women up after you’ve drugged them, then why do you live alone here as a recluse? Your brother did say that, didn’t he? Probably why he had to resort to this trick and was unable to get someone else to marry you. It’s because you’re too strange, and no one wants to live in a hole in the ground.”

“Does enjoying my privacy make me a creep?”

“Are you going to try and convince me that I actually like being tied up and then do wicked things to me that I won’t like at the start, but I’ll slowly realize I was destined to enjoy it, and I’ll soon be melting and begging for you?”

“Whoa.” I hold up my hands again. “What? I’m not sure what books you’ve been reading or movies you’ve been watching, but that’s not my M.O.”

“Oh, really? So why are you all alone then? Let me guess. You’re the puppet master, pulling all the strings from a distance, and everyone else dances to your bidding so you never have to leave this fortress that you’ve built.”

If only she knew. Warmer, my sweet little wife. You’re getting so much warmer.

She pauses, and I can only imagine what’s going on in her head. She seems to have a very vivid imagination. Then again, she’s just been through a rather hellish experience compounded by a fake marriage agreement and a bait-and-switch. The stuff of romances and fairy tales that I don’t believe in. The stuff of nonsense. The same kind of nonsense that got into my grandma’s head and brought us to this fine mess we’ve found ourselves in right now.

“This house isn’t a fortress. It’s just an old house at the edge of the city. An old, huge, and rather rambling house that I liked, so I bought it.”

She pauses, and I can see the wheels turning. “Are you agoraphobic?”

“What’s that?”

“In this case, it essentially means you’d rather not leave the house,” Hans fills in for me.

“No. No, I can leave here just fine. I’m not afraid of that.”

Her delicate little nose—heaven help me, I’ve never found a nose to be cute before, but hers definitely is—wrinkles. “Then what?”

I get off the edge of the bed and walk around to the foot since she can see me clearly there without turning her head. I think it’s better if she looks at me straight on for this. Might as well have it all out in the open. Maybe if I give her this, she’ll trust me and stay put for the next six months and make my life that much easier.

A bit of a headache now will save me endless migraines later. Very worth it, in my books. I wasn’t kidding when I accused my brother of marrying me off to a spitfire. I was proud of Everleigh when she tried to stomp on my brother’s foot twice and elbow him, also twice, to get away from him. Anyone who has had to spend a few minutes in Bradford’s presence would understand the sentiment. The Lion. What a fucking joke that is. He’s more like the annoying kitten looking for scraps and a bowl of milk to mooch off of. Not that I have anything against kittens. I like cats. I’m just not overly fond of my brother. It’s even more irksome that I need him.

“Hans?”

He gives me a once over, and I know it is his way of expressing extreme doubt without moving his facial muscles or speaking. I return the look, and he gets out of the chair and walks over. Then, he stands in front of me, blocking Everleigh’s view as he slips the black suit jacket from my shoulders and then unbuttons my shirt for me. He takes the jacket with him while I peel the shirt away myself because fuck it if I’m going to treat Hans like my personal valet. He helps me with what I can’t do so people don’t know I can’t do it.

“Gah!” Everleigh gasps and wrenches her arms against the bonds as I slip my shirt off. I remove my right arm first because I can tug with my left, and then the rest comes easy. With a breath, I let the shirt fall to the floor. Unlike my brother, I don’t care whether my clothes are or aren’t tailored. I have Hans buy something if I need it. It’s easy to locate suits, shoes, and whatever else I might want. I suppose he buys the best, but that’s because he has good taste and an unlimited budget to do it with. “Why are you undressing?” Everleigh shrieks. “Oh my god, you’re undressing! Help!” she screams. “Someone help me!”

“Stop!” I hold my left index finger to my lips. “Stop and open your eyes and look. I’m trying to show you something. Establish a baseline of trust. You won’t believe me otherwise.”

She freezes, and her eyes flutter open. When she sees me, she makes a second gasp, a shocked inhale, and then a noise of regret in her throat.

“Yeah, it’s ugly. I know.” I let her see my arm. Something that I’ve let very few people know about.

“W—what happened?” Wide eyes, parted lips, and shock. But not disgust. Everleigh is no stranger to the hard parts of life, it would seem, given her desperation to enter into a marriage of convenience. She’s well acquainted with pain and sacrifice, especially if what Bradford said is true.

I grasp the footboard at the end of the poster bed. They’re rather handy when tying someone up, though when I bought the house, it was fully furnished, mostly with old, heavy, and antique things. I didn’t care one way or the other. Now, I’m rather thankful that someone either just liked beds like this or had a bit of a kink going on.

“Car accident. Eight years ago now. I have limited range of motion in my arm, but that comes and goes.” It doesn’t hurt so much now until I have my physical therapy sessions, which I still do once a week in hopes that this shit will improve. But it never does. “The car rolled. It flipped and rolled and rolled and rolled. I was the passenger, not the driver.” The scarring continues down the right side of my torso for a ways, but then it ends there. My shoulder and arm are definitely the worst of it. “Sixteen surgeries. My family only knows about the first few. I told them I was fine after.” Hans, however, knows the whole truth. My doctors and physical therapists know the truth, too, but that’s basically it. And here it comes. The real reason I’ve had to strip down and humiliate and expose myself. “I’m a recluse because I can’t stand getting into cars. When I need to go somewhere, I have a helicopter that takes me to my private jet or a smaller plane or whatever I choose, and I go from there. Never anywhere that I can’t walk to.”

“What about a bike?” Of all the things I thought she’d say, that wasn’t it. I find myself smiling but ducking down as I reach for my shirt so she doesn’t see it. “A motorcycle, I mean, not a bicycle, but that would be an option, wouldn’t it?”

“I have no ability to handle a motorcycle with my arm like this.” It was a good suggestion, though. “A bicycle? Hmm.”

“So you walk everywhere?”

“Yes. I also run every morning to stay fit. Walking isn’t a problem. I enjoy it. So now you know. It’s just easier to stay here and be the puppet master, as you called me. Have people come to me.”

“But you…you came to the church. It’s in the middle of the city. There’s no way you could have walked that far.” Everleigh tries to push herself against the headboard and fails. I finally decide that keeping her feet tied up isn’t exactly dignified, so I motion for Hans to release her, which he does expertly and quickly. She doesn’t try to kick him in the face for his efforts, and it seems we’ve reached an uneasy truce. My secrets for her cooperation. Not a bad bargain, though it would kill me for anyone else to know.

Pride and all that. I still have what’s left of it.

I slip my shirt back on. It might be difficult, but I’ve had lots of practice over the years. Hans steps in front of me again and buttons it with quick, methodical precision. If it bothers him to button my buttons, shave for me because I fucking suck at that left-handed, and after nicking myself badly one day, I decided enough was enough, and tie my shoes, he never says. But I don’t think it bothers him. He doesn’t even think about it. It’s just part of his job. I’m his job. Keeping me safe. Keeping me healthy. Mitigating my discomfort. It’s not his job description, though. It’s just what I think he’d say if anyone asked.

“I…” She deserves the truth. “We rented an SUV, and Hans sedated me. I was in the church basement, coming off of it. They’re prescription, just so you know. And…and Bradford gave me the wrong time on purpose. If I had known, I would have been up there at the correct time to marry you because I thought you knew. Hans went up because he heard voices, and he pulled and tugged and shooed me up there when he realized what Bradford was doing.”

“Is that why you were just staring?”

I ruffle a hand through my hair in embarrassment. “Sorry, I was kind of still a little out of it, and I had no clue what was going on.”

“So it’s like anxiety medication?”

More like enough of the prescription shit can knock a whale upside down for the better part of a week, but yes. “Something like that.”

Everleigh tucks her feet up under her, folding her knees. “You could have just given me some of that.” She sits up straight and gives me the hairiest eyeball I’ve ever seen. She’s still highly dubious, and my getting vulnerable with her for a few minutes isn’t going to change that. I haven’t won her trust. I’ve just temporarily mollified her into maybe coming to a different agreement. One between ourselves, not one between her and my fart of a brother. “So…” She stops and assesses me. Her face is quite expressive, and there is way too much going on right now. “You’re basically fucked then, aren’t you? Without me?”

I shrug my left shoulder because, of course, that’s the only shoulder that will cooperate, but she deserves to know the truth of at least this, so I nod. “Basically.”

“You’d lose everything. This house, your ability to take care of yourself, the doctors you need, whatever company is supplying you the means to do that…”

I have money stashed away that no one can touch, but she doesn’t need to know about that. She’s right about the company and the house. “Basically.”

“But if I stay, you can afford all this…private jets, the best healthcare, and more.”

I smell a hard bargain coming. “Yes.”

“And your super scary bodyguard who drugs people.”

“That was unfortunate. I’m sorry about that. I didn’t know he was going to do that.”

Everleigh gives Hans a scathing look. “Who just keeps that kind of shit in their pocket? Chloroform? Really?”

Hans actually looks a little chagrined. “It was a backup,” he says and then shrugs like I did. “Sorry.”

“I’m never going to trust you or forgive you for that,” Everleigh growls at him.

Hans doesn’t move, and his expression doesn’t change, but I can tell he’s thoroughly amused.

One of Everleigh’s hands raises from the bonds, and she flips him the bird. She keeps that finger flying high when she turns back to me, an adorable yet furious and sinister expression darkening her pretty face. She might be petite, but she’s looking at us like she might be considering taking both of us on. God, she’s sweet when she’s about to metaphorically castrate me. Here it comes. She’s going to name her price. “Compliments of your horrible, deceitful, lying asswad of a brother, the drugging, and tying me up, the price for my cooperation just went up. I don’t want one million. I want two… two millions.”