Deception

Chapter 52 - Hot Summer Night

The air today is sweeter than anything I'd ever tasted. No breeze, no ice pinching my nose and trying to slip me from beneath. Just a hot summer night on an estate worlds away from the city.

I close the front door and and look up at the stars ablaze against the sky. Bunching up my floor length dress in my hands, I go down the three steps outside the mansion but slow when I realise how much my dress twinkles in the dark.

It's just like the sky, midnight blue and sparkly. Silas is the one who it bought for me so I want to hate it but I can't, I love everything about it. The long, tight sleeves. The way its loose below where it hugs my waist, making it flow like water.

Once I pull my eyes off my dress and reach the driveway, my eyes momentarily meet with Silas's as he leaves his car, slamming his door shut.

I fight a swallow and can't help but be intimidated by his unwavering stare. Right now, he looks like everything that's going to destroy me one day, if I let him. A jawline as sharp as his not so hidden knife. Dark eyes that don't even have to look at me to make me ache.

I said I felt nothing for him. I wish it was truth.

I start moving again and ignore the flutter in my stomach when he drops his gaze over the curves of my waist, before pulling them up to my face.

"Red?" He asks, eyes focused on my lips.

"Thought I'd go for your favourite colour." I reply as I walk past him, and kind of expected it when he grabs my hand and stops me. "Que? Does it turn you on? There's plenty more where that came from."

His lips twitch and he puts his hand into the pocket of his coat, pulling it out to reveal something silver and shiny - my wedding ring.

My expression goes smug. "I'm wearing Leone's." I tell him and try pulling my wrist away but he only pulls it closer, also moving my entire body.

My lips part as my chest brushes his muscled front. I lower my eyes to where he holds my hand and keep them there before forcing myself to meet his gaze again. He slowly pulls my hand up between us and his rough fingertips graze mine as he opens my fist. A curl of longing forms inside me at the intensity of his touch.

Silas does everything with a cold heart but when it comes to me, he has the warmth and urgency of a flame. I shouldn't be as afraid of that as I am right now, but I can't help it.

My mother never showed affection to me, neither did my Papa and now every time Silas touches me, I don't know how to act. Maybe its why I tried pushing him away before.

Silas slides the ring on my finger, and my chest rises high with a slow, steady inhale. I never thought I'd have my engagement ring forced on. How romantic.

As he runs his thumb along the shiny band, vehemence lights at the backs of his eyes. Something that looks like sleepless nights, hands in my hair and a smell so familiar I could drown in it.

"Until this marriage is over you're my wife."

He drops my hand, and for a second his calm and collected facade too before he brings it back and gestures to the car. Tense and frustrated, I allow him to open my car door.

The entire drive I don't dare look in his direction, and we only exchange a few words when he tells me where this dinner is taking place - a luxurious restaurant on the ground floor of a skyscraper in the flashy, rich side of New York.