“So I’m a business transaction.”
“Essentially, yes.”
Most people would break at this point. The confirmation that they’ve been reduced to a negotiating chip, that their autonomy has been stripped away by the two men who should protect them most—father and husband. I’ve seen it happen before. The collapse into tears, the bargaining, the desperate attempts to find some emotional leverage.
Serena Souris doesn’t cry. Instead, she straightens her spine, lifts her chin, and looks at me with open contempt.
“You’re going to regret this,” she says with absolute conviction. “I don’t know when or how, but I promise you—forcing me into this will be the worst strategic decision you’ve ever made.”
The threat would be more impressive if she had any power in this situation. There’s something in the way she delivers it—not desperate bravado, but cold certainty—that makes me reconsider my earlier assessment.
Most people in her position would be focused on escape, on survival, on minimizing damage. Serena seems more interested in identifying my vulnerabilities for future exploitation. She’s not trying to bargain her way out. She’s declaring war.
I’ve handled countless negotiations, managed dozens of reluctant alliances. Experience taught me to expect resistance and plan accordingly. This isn’t standard resistance. This is someone who fundamentally refuses to accept the role assigned to her, regardless of consequences.
Useful, I had thought earlier. She might be more useful than expected.
I’m beginning to suspect I underestimated exactly how much trouble useful can create.
“Fedor will show you to your room,” I say, moving toward the door. “Food will be brought up within the hour. You’ll find appropriate clothing in the closet. The windows are reinforced and alarmed. The doors lock from the outside. Don’t waste energy testing the security—it’s thorough.”
“I’m not staying in a room you’ve prepared like some doll you can dress up and control.”
“Then you’ll stand in the hallway until exhaustion forces the issue.” I pause at the doorway, glancing back at her. “I don’t think you’re foolish enough to choose discomfort over strategy. You’ll want rest, time to think, privacy to plan whatever resistance you’re already formulating.”
Her jaw tightens, but she doesn’t contradict me.
“The marriage will happen,” I tell her quietly. “How difficult you make the process is entirely within your control. One way or another, you will become my wife. That is not negotiable.”
I leave before she can respond, closing the door behind me with controlled precision. Fedor is waiting in the hallway, his expression carefully blank.
“She’s going to be a problem,” he observes in Russian.
“Yes,” I agree, heading toward my study. “She is.”
Chapter Three - Serena
The room they’ve given me is tastefully decorated in shades of cream and gray, with a four-poster bed that looks utterly ridiculous.
There’s a private bathroom stocked with expensive toiletries, a walk-in closet filled with clothes in exactly my size, and floor-to-ceiling windows that offer a picturesque view of the wooded grounds.
It’s also a prison cell dressed up in high-thread-count sheets and designer curtains.
I spend the first hour after Pavel leaves sitting on the edge of the bed, forcing my breathing to slow, my hands to stop shaking. The adrenaline from the abduction is finally crashing, leaving behind exhaustion and a creeping sense of unreality.
This can’t actually be happening. People don’t get kidnapped and forced into arranged marriages in the twenty-first century, not in America, not to senator’s daughters.
Except apparently they do.
My father agreed to this. The thought keeps circling back, sharp and bitter. Pavel could be lying, manipulating me to ensure compliance, but something in the way he said it rang true.
I’ve always known my father sees me as an asset. A well-educated, photogenic daughter who can charm donors and make the family look respectable. But this? Trading me to criminals to save his own skin?
The hurt tries to surface, and I shove it down ruthlessly. Emotion is a luxury I can’t afford right now. I need to think, to plan, to find a way out of this before Saturday’s forced ceremony becomes reality.
I stand and move to the window, testing the frame. Locked, as promised, and when I press against the glass I can feel the reinforcement—probably bulletproof or at minimum shatterproof. The second-floor height wouldn’t be impossible to survive if I could break through, but the fall would likely injure me enough to make running difficult.
Not an option, then.
