Prologue

"Self pity is a sin. It is a form of living suicide."

-Charles J. Shields-

***

Adonis Ravenwood’s heart was beating loudly as he pulled the chair and turned on his computer. If his calculation was right they should have sent him the news that day. He logged into his email and checked if there was any reply or feedback from them. He had been waiting for it all day long. His expectation was really high and he wanted nothing more than to hear a positive response.

He saw the email and could have sworn his breathing nearly stopped.

He carefully read the letter, only to be disappointed in the end. It was a negative.

"God, what else am I supposed to do!?"

The man stood up from his seat and kicked the wall. Frustrated, he rubbed his fingers harshly around the edge of his head. It was probably the fourth company he had tried to send his CV and resume to that month and for the fourth time he got rejected as well.

"My work samples are already good enough, but they only care about the names."

Their excuse was always the same, he did not have the education background they were looking for. Even though he had gone through several trainings and earned himself a few micro credentials from courses, they rejected him since he had never graduated high school.

Yes, in this digital age they say formal education doesn’t matter as much but when you are at the very bottom of the social hierarchy, having a high school diploma or a degree would make it easier for you to get out from the poverty circle.

Yes, he could have worked in one of those fast food restaurants for three dollars an hour, but being married to one of the wealthiest household in Houston made it impossible for him to be seen working in one of those places. At least not without him disgracing the family's name and added more social burden to his wife.

Defeated, he laid down on the floor and closed his eyes. He had no idea what else he was supposed to do, he felt like he had tried everything in his power to land a job. He was not asking for much, anything that would allow him to provide for himself and his wife would be enough. If only he could land a job first everything in his life would be so much easier.

Adonis stared at himself in the mirror, he was sweating from the heat and the ruined anticipation, there was a bit of dark circle under his eyes from the lack of sleep and stress. When one looked close enough they might even spot fine lines and wrinkle starting to form around his mouth and forehead.

Despite his handsome, well defined cheekbones and jawlines, deep set hazel eyes, straight tall nose and muscular figure that could only be compared to the Greek gods, he still felt like a sore loser. It was a sense of uselessness and helpless in his current circumstance. The worst part was he knew it partially was not his fault, because unlike some people out there, he was actually trying. He made an effort, he took actions, he grabbed on every opportunity he could have, only to end up in the same dark spot over and over again.

There were moments when he wondered how did he even end up there? How did he end up in the circumstance he was at? Then he remembered everything all over again.

It all began the day he was born. Yes, exactly since the beginning. His mother was a the only daughter of a generational carpenter’s family in North Dakota. Ever since he was born he had never known who his father actually was since he left him before he was even born. So his mother had to raise him on her own without a husband.

Fortunately, he grew up having an uncle who always taught him things and acted as somewhat of a father figure. He was her mother’s older brother who had taught him carpentry, he spent most of his childhood and teenage years doing the exact same job outside of school to make some extra income for the family.

His uncle was never married due to horrible relationship and trust issues with women, mixed with his PTSD from his military past, he pretty much would never get married, hence why he did not mind paying for Adonis' education growing up while his mother tried to help by selling some homemade snacks to the neighbor’s kids.

His whole life, his mother had always encouraged him to go to school so at least he would not end up uneducated and miserable like her.

"Knowledge is power, do you know that?" His mother used to tell him. 

He could have better work outside of their dying family business, but not everything in life came out as expected. On his junior year of high school, his uncle fell from a truck when gathering raw materials and did not survive the accident.

Adonis had to drop out of school and continued working as a carpenter to make a living for him and his mother who had only gotten old and weak each day. When he was twenty-four years old, his mother became truly sick, he had brought her to the hospital but they could not do much for her since they knew he would not be able to pay up the hospital bills.

He had to take care of her at home while working at the same time for a whole year. It was pure madness and hell, but he thought at least he still got his mother by his side, that alone was enough for him to continue surviving.

However, like everything else that he lost, his mother could no longer beat the illness that was biting through her body and passed away when he was twenty-five years old. He was eventually left alone in the world with no one else.

"That poor child, he could have become so much more if it was not for his unlucky background. I hope he'll leave this place and find a better life elsewhere." It was what the old women and men from his old town used to whisper about him. 

At one side he thought God must have truly hated him, he took away everything he loved and destroyed his future. At the same time, he had felt like it was a signal for him to move to a new stage in his life, for there was nothing else holding him back.

At least he thought so, until he went to clean up their run down house which could not even be sold due to the location and condition and found an old box in the storage room containing her mother’s stuff from the past.

Driven by curiosity, he opened it up to find his mother’s diary which remained locked since they had lost the key. Besides it, there was also a few scattered notes which demanded to be read. He had to be careful since the paper were already crumpled and dusty, which indicated they were probably written a long time ago.

One of them was a letter from a woman, who appeared to be a friend of his mother, which mentioned something about an arranged marriage between her daughter and him had the two of them had not found suitable partners by the time they turn twenty-five years old. On the back of it was written a location which appeared to be a home address.

There were also a few pictures of his mother holding him as a baby with a woman besides them, holding a baby who he assumed was hers. The other baby was wearing a pink dress with a white bow on her head which indicated she was a little girl. He flipped the picture once more and saw a writing which belonged to his mother.

Marie Anne Rutherford and Dorothy Ravenwood, with little Adonis Levine Ravenwood and Vivianne Marie Sterling. 1994.

"What is this letter even?" He checked it several times until he finally understood what it meant.

It was how he figured out a part of his life his mother had never mentioned before. An arranged marriage since birth he barely knew even existed. He never even remembered meeting the girl although the picture clearly said otherwise.

Adonis was not sure what had driven him to find out more, but in his impulsive state of mind from the mind blowing discovery, he spent nearly all his savings to go to Houston and rented a place there, working odd jobs while searching for the address written on the letter.

There was an old saying that if you are not ready to accept the truth, it is better to not seek it, it’s a messed up philosophy but works perfectly well for cowards, but Adonis was no cowards. He had the courage to seek, therefore he eventually found.

Although it was not exactly what he had expected. That day should have never come, he should have never walked toward the front yard of that house, should have never knocked on the door and rang the bell. Should have never smiled at the tired looking middle aged lady who looked like the matured version of the woman in the picture.

Because ever since that day, nothing in his life was ever the same anymore. Along with the needs to fulfill the long promised arrangement, gone was his freedom.