Chapter 2 : He Will Find You

I didn’t move at first. My legs felt like they belonged to someone else.

“Velma.” He said it again, the same flat tone. “Now.”

I stepped over the broken vase and walked past him into the office, because there wasn’t really another option. He shut the door behind me.

On any other day, I would’ve shrunk back, feigned ignorance, kept playing my role as the naive daughter.

But not after this. Not after all I’d just heard.

“I heard what you were discussing.”

I raised my chin up at him defiantly.

A small frown appeared on his face. It was the one he had whenever a negotiation or contract deal wasn’t going his way.

I never knew I’d one day be on the receiving end of it.

“Velma, I don’t know what you heard. But please, before you throw a tantrum...”

I cut in, glaring at him. “I don’t throw tantrums.”

“Right.”

His unconvinced tone, and the way he looked at me with condescension, made my blood boil.

“Velma, we’ll discuss everything in the morning. You need to rest. Tomorrow is going to be a big day.”

“No,” I said firmly. “I’m not a child that needs to go to bed. You will explain everything now.”

Father sighed heavily, then turned to face Marcus.

“It’s your fault she heard. Kept dragging the conversation on.”

He gestured toward the red couch and I sat, because my legs needed somewhere to be other than under me.

I knew this office like the back of my hand, after years of watching him work when I was little. None of it felt familiar anymore.

As Father settled into his chair, I glanced at Marcus, who sat opposite me. He avoided looking me in the eyes, and seemed to find the wall next to him suddenly interesting.

“Velma.”

Usually when Father called me, it was with affection and fondness. Now his tone was just frosty.

“Your mother and I were supposed to let you know tomorrow, but I guess, as Marcus said, the earlier the better.”

Well, that answered my question about whether mother was aware.

“I did not say that.” Marcus snapped.

Father ignored him, and went on.

“As you know, our family has been the most powerful syndicate here in America.”

He sounded proud, while I only felt disgusted by his words.

“For years, we’d been rivals with the Volkovs in Russia.”

“So? Hadn’t you always said how powerful our Moretti family was? That you led an empire that feared no one?” I asked sarcastically.

He clenched his fist, and narrowed his eyes at me.

“I never knew my daughter to act so crude.”

I laughed. “Crude because I’m finally talking back?”

Before Father could respond, Marcus spoke up.

“Victor, just tell her everything.”

Father pinched the bridge of his nose as though I was the difficult one in this situation, as though I hadn’t just discovered that my entire future had apparently been decided without my knowledge.

Then he leaned back in his chair.

“You want answers?” He asked.

“Yes.”

“Fine.”

“War nearly broke out between our family and the Volkov family years ago.”

I folded my arms. “That sounds like a you problem.”

Marcus coughed into his hand to hide what suspiciously sounded like a laugh, while Father looked like he wanted to punch something.

“Velma.”

“No, seriously. Since when is any of that my responsibility?”

Father ignored me.

“The tension between both families reached its peak twenty years ago. There were deaths. Retaliation. Threats. Everyone believed a full-scale war was coming.”

“Neither family wanted war. War is expensive. It destroys businesses. It weakens power. It attracts attention from the authorities.”

I stared at him. “Get to the point.”

He sighed. “The point is that both families agreed peace would be more beneficial.”

I could already see where this was going. “The agreement created an alliance.”

Father looked directly at me. “The alliance would be sealed through marriage.”

“Oh, that’s hilarious,” I said, not a single trace of humour in my tone. “Whose marriage exactly?”

Even though I already knew the answer, I wanted to hear him say it.

“Yours.”

“When was this arrangement made?”

“The contract was signed eighteen years ago.”

I stared at him, floundering for words. “Eighteen years ago?”

“Yes.”

“I was five.”

Nobody denied it.

While I worried about scraped knees and cartoons, the adults in my life had already decided who I would marry.

My eyes moved toward Marcus. “You knew?”

His expression immediately gave him away. “Velma, I had honestly forgotten all about that...”

“You knew.”

His silence was answer enough.

I looked back at Father. “Mother knew too?”

“Of course she knew.”

The answer threw me off. Even my own mother had kept me in the dark!

“Who else knew?”

Neither man answered, and exchanged a look. I immediately knew there was more.

“Tell me who else knew.” I repeated.

“Your cousin, Ruby, was aware of the arrangement.”

I closed my eyes, feeling like the ceiling was collapsing unto me.

Ruby, my cousin and best friend, had known all this time. She was the person I trusted with everything.

Yet she had kept this from me.

Anguish washed over me, and the two men must have sensed it, because Father frowned, and Marcus gave me a sympathetic look.

“Wow. Just incredible.” I drawled, sarcastically.

“Velma...”

“No.”

I stood so quickly the couch shifted backward.

“Don’t even try to justify anything.”

Father clamped his mouth shut and watched me carefully.

I paced across the office.

I couldn’t marry that monster. Not only was he evil, but he was also ten whole years older than me.

This was not how I’d planned my life.

“I can’t believe this.”

“You’ll understand eventually.” Father said.

I stopped walking and turned toward him. “I’ll understand?”

He nodded. “Yes.”

“You think I’ll understand that my own family sold my future before I was old enough to read?”

“It wasn’t a sale.”

“Really? Then what would you call it?”

“An alliance.” He responded calmly.

I pointed at myself. “And what exactly am I in this alliance?”

Nobody answered Because we all knew the truth.

If I married Izaak Volkov, I wasn’t a partner. I was the offering.

Their silence confirmed it.

I nodded slowly to myself as the situation fully sank in. Then I turned and made my way to the door.

Father’s called out to me. “Where are you going?”

“Away.”

His expression darkened, and he stood up from his chair. “You aren’t leaving.”

I laughed. “Oh, I absolutely am.”

“Velma.”

“No.”

I pointed toward the door. “No more orders. No more decisions. No more pretending any of this is okay.”

“Stop.”

But of course I didn’t listen.

I got to the door, and it was at the moment I reached for the handle that he spoke.

“You can run if you want.”

The certainty in his tone made me pause. I slowly turned around and watched him open a drawer inside his desk.

Marcus remained silent on the couch and watched Father as if he knew what was coming. The room became strangely quiet.

Then Father pulled out a photograph and placed it on the desk.

“What is that?”

“Come look.”

Every instinct told me not to. But curiosity won.

Slowly, I walked back toward the desk.

My eyes dropped to the photograph. And immediately landed on a man I’d never seen before.

He had dark hair, and every feature on his face was pointed. There was a defined scar near his jaw.

Even though the picture was low quality, you could tell he was handsome.

But that wasn’t what held my attention.

It was his eyes.

They were incredibly cold. The kind of eyes that looked straight through people. For some reason, they made my pulse skip.

I could sense that this man was dangerous.

“Who is he?” I asked, even though instinctively, I already knew.

Father answered, confirming my suspicion.

“Izaak Volkov.”

I looked back at the photograph.

This was the man I was apparently supposed to marry. The stranger who’d been connected to my future since I was young.

I hated him immediately.

I pushed the photograph away.“I’m still leaving.”

Father’s expression didn’t flicker.

In fact, he seemed even more confident. “Go ahead.”

I frowned. “What?”

He folded his hands together, watching me calmly.

Then he said words that sent a chill down my spine.

“If you run, Izaak will find you first.”

And I realised Father wasn’t making a threat.

He was simply stating a fact.