Chapter Eight

The gala was a big affair for the Rutherford family, and standing alongside them I definitely felt like a foreigner. Not that I didn't look well polished after all that grooming session they spent lavishly, but my inexperience was surely reflecting in my eyes.

And maybe the biggest reason yet was the absence of my husband beside me. Daniel didn't show up at the gala and my in-laws weren't so happy about it, especially when they had arranged me as his wife for the sole reason. I could feel my father-in-law glaring in direction every time a business associate enquired about my husband and I had no answer for them.

"He had a very important business matter to handle." Nathaniel had come to my rescue the third time I had been gunned with that question.

"Thank you for being my savior." I whispered and my husband chose that exact moment to stagger into the banquet. No one could save me from his impact on me. In a black suit and crisp white shirt, his hair a messy arrangement, gave him a look that could drag any woman in the banquet towards him, including me. But I stayed in my place, knowing I shouldn't be attracted to him, not when he wasn't all by himself.

It was obvious right away that he was drunk. I stiffened beside Nathaniel and watched as his family shared a wary look. His mother looked anxious while his father had blood running into his eyes. But my husband's eyes instantly roamed around the room and landed on me. He was mean drunk, I concluded when he flashed a boyish grin at me, taking me in from head to toe, very slow and unapologetically wild when they paused at my chest, then settled on my face. I squirmed at my place, knowing everyone in the room could see how crudely he regarded me.

That was until his father walked over to him and whispered angrily into his ear. His face instantly grew cold and unyielding.

Daniel's hostile gaze flickered towards me while his father pulled him to the corner and from the angry veins lining my husband's forehead to his ticking jaw conveyed the message that whatever his father had to discuss with him in the corner wasn't pleasant.

I was suddenly a bundle of nervousness and anxiety, when his angry charcoal eyes remained unmoving on me.

"Thank you all for your warm wishes. But I would now like to leave with my wife." Daniel's voice suddenly boomed through the room. "As you see we are so much in love, I can't wait to take my wife back to our villa."

His father looked furious as pinched his nose and shook his head at his son's ludicrous behaviour. The next thing I knew my mother-in-law moved to my side and pulled at my forearm forcefully. "Just go to your husband, Lily."

I looked at her vise grip on my forearm then at her commanding, anxious eyes and realised that was why I had been married to Daniel. If I couldn't be a good wife to him, I would have nothing in their eyes.

I gave her a slow nod and moved to go to my husband. As I passed him, Nathaniel's hand gripped my arm as though to hold me in place. "Don't go with him when he is like this. He's not in his correct state of mind. I'll handle him."

"Nathaniel, I-"

"Oh please, it's not like I'm dying to go home with her." My husband cut me off, coming right beside me, the stench of alcohol infusing in the air around us and his voice low. "If it weren't to protect my family's perfect image, I wouldn't be married to her in the first place. Don't you know that, dear wife?"

His words didn't hurt me as much as the fact that he said it in front of his family.

When I looked up at him, his gaze was on Nathaniel's hand around my arm. He bent down enough to speak in my ear. "This is the second time, little brat." And with that Daniel turned towards his lackey with something more than anger, it was the same possessiveness he showed when someone else touched me. "You're her bodyguard but right now she has her husband beside. Why don't you just fuck off!"

Nathaniel eased his hold on my hand and backed away.

Well, wasn't that romantic?

"That's enough." It was Alfred Rutherford, coming up to his son and giving him a warning glare. "Take your wife and leave. You've embarrassed us enough already."

My husband left without another word but not before bumping into a server and scattering all the champagne glasses across the floor.

After an awkward silence, my father-in-law spoke, "Do not make me regret this marriage, Lily. He was supposed to behave like a responsible man tonight but it seems he isn't out of his stubborn self yet. Just make sure his tonight's behaviour doesn't show up on routine."

I didn't miss the silent reprimand. He did feel the need to explain that I was slacking off my duties as Daniel Rutherford's wife.

All the while my face was so stiff it felt like it might crack. It'd been a mask of utter stubbornness since I signed up to be a Rutherford wife and a defense mechanism against my vulnerable position in the arrangement. Irrespective of the twisting in my gut, I gave him a clear and smooth response.

"I'll take care of him."

I said my goodbyes not that they mattered but I had to maintain my perfect trophy wife image.

To my surprise Daniel was leaning lazily against the limo to prop himself up, his white shirt half-way unbuttoned and his suit jacket thrown on the hood of the car. He looked up as I gathered my dress in one hand and walked down the exit steps. My knees were a little jelly due to his hard gaze on me and the disastrous high heels strapped on my feet.

I couldn't figure out from his dark expression whether he wanted to pull me beside him in the limo or leave me there and drive off. He was either really too drunk or was pissed off with his married life. I bet the latter.

"You shouldn't have come drunk at the party. All your business associates are here." I said calmly, letting go of my dress and halting in front of him.

He straightened and glared at me. "Wouldn't you care if I get disowned by my father, gold digger?" He scoffed, stepping inside the limo clumsily, dragging his suit jacket along from the hood.

This was the first time he used a tag for what he saw me as and it stung all the same.

I got inside the limo beside him and snapped as soon as the door closed. "You can judge me all you want but the truth is you married me for all the same reason. I know you need your shares in the company back from your father. He wouldn't give you that unless you married and started a family. So spare me the hypocrisy, dear husband."

He remained silent beside me. With his hands thrown across the headrest of the seat and a dark look on his face, he watched me for a long time. The car started and the windows pulled up enclosing us inside the limo. We sat side by side, hip to hip and I kept my gaze straight ahead, knowing I had given a taste of his own medicine.

I glanced toward the front of the long cabin. The partition was up and I wasn't able to see who was driving the car or whether he was accompanied by any security. If my husband decided to strangle me to death, no one would know about it. My heart vibrated inside my chest when Daniel's hand reached for my shoulder.

The metal of his finger rings were cold against my neck as he brushed a strand of my hair and dipped his head close enough to speak into my ear. "Let's find out what else you learnt as a Rutherford wife."

His words were so unexpected and unclear that I didn't respond at first. I only stared at him. He settled back on his seat, giving me a glance of his magnificent chest from the opened button of his shirt and that sexy scowl of his.

But then he motioned for me to come closer, unzipping his pants and leaning back in the seat. "Come here, little brat."