Chapter Five - Who Are You?

Varda's POV

My heart began to beat rapidly as I watched mum and dad escort Stephen McCall into the house. I can not help but find it extremely hard to process all of this. Stephen McCall? The guy I had sex with happened to be Stephen McCall? I wondered if he always knew that I was the one he was to get married to? Had he been pretending all these while?

Many questions swirled in my head but what was most important was escaping the reality. I was not ready to face him. I turned around and attempted to flee to my room but it was already too late because Dad and Mum had already walked into the living room with Stephen behind them.

"Great timing Stephen. Varda just got back from work." My father lied. I saw a mischievous smirk grow in Stephen's lips. He arched his left brow towards my direction and repeated. "Really? She was just getting back from work?"

Dad nodded his head in agreement. "Yes, of course. Varda is a very hardworking lady, she...." I lost interest in whatever dad was saying because he was starting to embarrass me.

I stared into Stephens eyes and i could not help but wonder if he would be slightly considerate. Maybe I could reason things with him. After all we both were not interested in the marriage, there had to be a way to settle things with him.

"Hardworking? I see.." Stephen trailed off, slowly nodding his head to every single detail my dad spewed out of his mouth. My mother on the other hand had rushed to the dinning room to set the table. I stood there and watched my father advertise me like I was some kind of product.

"Oh my manners. Varda, say hi to Stephen." My dad snapped at me. I sighed heavily and turned to Stephen. "Can we talk privately?"

My father gasped in shock, he shot dagger glares at me, trying to signal me to keep quiet but I ignored him.

"Yeah, we can." He replied in a surprisingly cold tone. I was beginning to wonder if he was the same man from last night or if they both just happened to look alike.

I led Stephen to the staircase and once I was sure no one was watching us. I turned to him with an apologetic look on my face. "Look, I am so sorry, I did not know that you were Alex's brother." I said with my head bent low. I was too embarrassed to even face him.

"If I knew you were my dead brother's wife then trust me I would not have had sex with you." Stephen said with a straight face.

I gulped a lump down my throat and said in a confused tone. "So what are we going to do about this shitty arranged marriage?" I asked.

"What do you mean what are we going to do? Get married of course." Stephen blurted out. "What?" I yelled at in response.

I clearly remembered yesterday where he talked about not wanting to get into an arranged marriage. Why was he suddenly acting like an entirely different person.

"Look, Varda. I may have seemed like an entirely different person to you yesterday but I am going to need you to forget that. This is really who I am and I am going to marry you." He said confidently.

I scoffed and eyed him in disbelief. "Are you fucking kidding me right now? I was going to get married to your dead brother? Are you just going to ignore that fact?" I snapped at him. Stephen's face was expressionless, I could not tell what he was thinking, he was so good at hiding his emotions.

"I am not having this conversation with you. The plans have been made." Stephen said. Without waiting for my reply, he turned around and began to walk away from me. "Hey, you!" I yelled severely but Stephen chose to turn a deaf ear.

That was the moment I realized that our marriage was bound to happen no matter what I tried to do to escape it. For the second time in a row, I was forced to marry a man I did not love.

The wedding happened so fast, I moved into the McCall mansion, the same mansion that I and Alex had shared several memories, good or bad.

I had spent only a few days as Stephen's wife and I hated it already. Stephen was an entirely different person, he was cold, collected and possessive. Stephen never let me out of the mansion. He always warned the bodyguards and staffs to never let me out of their sight.

I was treated like a total prisoner, I had no freedom of my own. All I did was sleep, wake up, eat and sleep again. I kept repeating the same routine and it was messing with my sanity.

I needed to escape, I badly wanted to leave this place so I began to plot, any means of escape at all. I drafted out several plans but I realized that I needed the keys to the back door, the only door that had no bodyguards lurking around but the only person who had the keys to the back door was Stephen.

So one particular night when Stephen had stepped out of his office to quickly tend to something the bodyguards had called his attention to. I snuck into his office. My eyes roamed the walls and i noticed some weird posters hanging carelessly on the wall.

It had different symbols of skulls, spirals and guns drawn on them. Really, who was this Stephen guy?

Suddenly, I heard footsteps drawing closer. I knew I had to do my plan in a haste. I rushed towards the drawer and began to search each one of them.

All I could see was a bunch of newspapers and trash files. I finally reached the last drawer and I could still hear footsteps drawing closer.

Just as I pulled the drawer open, I was extremely shocked to see a gun, not just any gun but the same familiar pistol that was pointed at Alex on the day of our wedding.

I gasped in shock as I picked up the gun. All of a sudden, the door to Stephen's office flew open wide and I saw him stand by the door, watching me with the gun clutched tight to my hand.