Amber struggled to stay calm at the back of the car seat, nibbling on her thumb as she fidgeted and twiddled with everything she could get her hands on. Her ring spun on her finger and she even tried scratching at Sieon's soul mark, but the thing was all virtual, petals and string vanishing the moment she considered playing with them. She contemplated ripping off the skin at the edge of her thumb just because she could.
For a moment she sat pensive and numbed, then shuddered at the memory of what peeling skin would do to her. Fire burning pain when she showered, fire burning pain when she soaped her hands, and deep coursing regret for days. She tightened her grip on her trembling hands, closing her eyes as she whispered a soft plea for strength.
Anyone would be afraid when they had to meet their soulmates' family, more so when the family was a group of traditional, stuck up billionaire Asians with a ravenous hunger for propriety. And possibly a fucked up attitude towards modern independent women striving for success. She would decide later when she met them which type of in-laws they were in the spectrum of outdated, old-fashioned assholes that she was so deeply acquainted with in K-dramas.
Her eyes danced to Casper's unmoving form, twitched and squinting at his oddity. His eyes were suspiciously far as he gazed out from the limousine his family had exclusively hired to pick them both up. It'd been the final kick to his falling mood—a peculiarity that began when a letter arrived and then a butler called to invite them both. A text to his mother and an unanswered call had sent him cursing. She caught him screaming at the world on the balcony, glass door swept shut so that his voice would be muffled in the wailing wind.
He was in a horrid mood.
A really, really bad one.
Just because they were going to a family party.
She twitched at the thought, biting down the need to get the fuck out of the car and steal Casper away to KFC. A bucket of chicken would top the supposedly glamorous gala they were summoned to that day.
But she couldn't do that, of course, she couldn't. Not with Casper acting all odd and quiet. Casper on a normal day would have long taken her hand in his. He would have been gentle and sweet, trip three times down the stairs, forget his fucking phone, then lose his shit when he realised that he'd locked the car keys in the house.
When Casper was happy and content, his huge head was stuck in the clouds of music, love and philosophy. And his brain would then decide that it didn't give a fuck up mundane things like steps and common sense.
But today he did none of that, forgot nothing, no intellectual quips, no little side bump as he fumbled to pull open the door for her. Casper was subdued and quiet, dread taught in his muscles, and his face as pale as the goddamn milk.
This was a man that hated his family.
This was a man that left the moment he could.
Of course, he would hate going back
She moved, not here to stare and contemplate his distress but to provide him with a sense of camaraderie, shifting until their bodies were flushed and his bowed head turned to look at her. He was a little scary when moody, she had to admit, his brows knotted so tight that a crease formed between. She smiled, a twitch of lips as she settled the storm within her and covered it with thickly sprayed imitation courage from the dollar store.
Cheap, easily broken and forever fake.
"You'll be fine," she whispered, "I'm here with you now." She might be his worst backup plan, she wasn't all that good with people. But she could be a great kisser and consoler, possibly his only ray of sunshine in the cave they were about to enter.
His lips stretched and curved. "I forget that I should be worried for you."
"You usually are," she agreed to the dynamics of their relationship.
Subtleties which were a result of her age gap with her seven. If they weren't lovers, a name that demanded some form of equal footing, she was sure that they would treat her like a little sister that needed spanking.
"But when you aren't worried for me and my stupidity, it means you've got worse demons to fight." She patted his hand. "I've got the lucky end of the stick. Just need to fail another exam to ace this. An Asian's wet dream. You could ask my Mom how good I am at failing physics and math."
"I doubt they would need you to do papers, love," he chaffed.
"I'm prepared for anything."
They'd theorised and discussed the contents of said test she was supposed to fail. And after dissecting the cryptic texts that a family butler had sent. The test seemed to be nothing different from an interview for the President's scholarship.
A mindless IQ exam, a panel of judges, a bunch of psychologists, and then a final decision made by reruns of tape recordings of her. Possibly a doctor's exam to check her health because the winner couldn't be fucking sterile. Perhaps something about owning a stake in a company. Maybe, questions on what housewives should do.
But this would all begin with the party that his grandmother had organised at her home. A gathering of conglomerates, a thousand CEOs had been invited, a hundred investors, insiders, market makers, people from the top of the system in Asia. No doubt exchanging illegal insider information on stock market crashes and the best fucking investment deals.
"It could be art," he hummed and she snorted.
"It's easy to fuck up art. Dip a brush in paint and toss it at canvas."
"Unless they're looking for abstract."
"I'm sure, love of my life that if I drew cocks all over a canvas they would fail me immediately." She raised a brow at him with a shrug. "No prude in an Asian household would enjoy a wondrously graphic rendition of penises and vaginas."
"Some do enjoy Renaissance nudity..."
"Not when it's the idealized male," she snorted. "Most rich prudes only want to see baby cherubs and boobies on a demure woman. Give them a horse cock, ballet dancer with an overly lecherous smile." Then she narrowed her eyes. "Or is that too predictable from me? I could go for a naked body builder with a big head but a tiny penis, pumping a girl dressed like its north pole."
"That was creative."
"I suppose I could just do a detailed rendition of crap floating in the toilet bowl."
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