Page 3 of Bound Bride
I don't notice the crowds of people on either side of the aisle, or the heavily decorated seats or rafters.
I don't notice the colorful flowers everywhere or the line of men in dark suits lining the hallway looking ready to spring into action at the first sign of danger.
I don't even notice my father sitting in the front row with his lips pressed into a thin line and both his hands clasped anxiously in his lap.
My mother and sister should be next to him, but their spaces remain empty.
All my focus locks onto the man standing at the end of the aisle, dressed in a black suit with a crisp white shirt.
He's tall.
Taller than Calvin (and definitely taller than Mathew).
Thick, dark hair piles atop his head, gathered over shaved sides that taper around the back.
Several streaks of silver are combed through his hair almost as if they're intentional decoration rather than signs of age.
A soft, dark shadow of hair clings to his jaw, melting into dark, tanned skin.
Konstantin Belyaev.
My future husband.
He doesn't react while I walk down the aisle, but he never takes his eyes off me, barely blinking as I approach.
From where I started, his eyes looked black, but now I'm closer, they're clearly gray, and they twinkle slightly as the wrinkles around his eyes deepen with a shift of his jaw.
At least he's handsome.
More than handsome. He looks cut from a dream and pasted over reality.
With every blink, I expect him to fade and the real Konstantin to take his place, but it never happens.
He remains standing there, watching me until we're right next to one another and Mathew is passing my hand into his.
A silence falls over us like a blanket, forcing me to realize that people had been clapping and cheering along with the music while I walked down the aisle. I barely even noticed.
Everything remains fuzzy in my periphery while my heart pounds in my chest, and a tremor moves down my arm the moment Konstantin's hand closes around mine.
If he notices, he doesn't say.
His hand is warm in mine, slightly weathered and rough but not unpleasant. He firmly threads our fingers so we're palm to palm, then he turns to the minister and the ceremony starts.
It's a blur.
The man, draped in robes, speaks of love and fate, loyalty and soulmates, and how lucky we are to have found one another.
It's a speech as fake as the 'love' that exists between us, as if everyone in the hall doesn't already know this is nothing more than a deal.
A deal I have to seal if I have any hope of saving my family.
Everything goes in one ear and out the other, including the vows I'm forced to recite to make everything perfect.
The only constant is Konstantin's hand in mine and the occasional flex of his fingers between my own. It's a nice hand.
The warmth is almost comforting, and if I squint, I can pretend his palms are rough and calloused because he's a simple working man who likes carpentry or something.
A weak mask for the truth—that he's just as much a monster as Mathew is, although I pray they're cut from a different cloth.
