Page 5 of Unworthy Ties
She turned her head away from me, and a silence settled over us, as heavy as the humid summer air. The delicate sound of water trickling from the garden’s fountains was all that punctuated it.
The silence was painfully awkward. I hated it.
“Is there anything you want to do?” I asked.
“Nothing with you,” she responded coldly, her gaze still firmly fixed on the garden in front of us.
I was done being civil. Her attitude was that of a petulant child and had worn my patience thin.
I grabbed her wrist and turned her to face me. When I lifted my hand, she flinched, expecting a slap. But I merely held the side of her face, my thumb stroking along her jaw. I would never hit a woman.
“So far, you’ve been nothing but a pain in my ass. I wanted a sweet, docile wife who leaves me alone.”
“I can definitely do the ‘leaves you alone’ part,” she said, her tone biting, but not trying to break free from my grip.
A subtle crackle of static hummed in the air between us, a delicate thread of sexual tension so understated and faint that I questioned its existence. It was like a gentle whisper, barely audible, that seemed to dance just out of reach, leaving me to wonder if it was merely a figment of my imagination. Surely, it had to be imagined.
Instead of letting go, I pressed my lips against hers.
Chapter 3
Gabriella
Computers only had so much storage. I didn’t know if it was gigabytes, terabytes, or megabytes, but they all had a cap on how much information they could store. That was how my brain had been feeling these past couple of days. I had reached the maximum number of bytes in my brain, and there was no more room left.
Rocco had kissed me. And before I had time to say anything about it, he stood up and walked away like nothing had happened.
After it had happened, I went through the seven stages of grief. Not because he had kissed me, but because I might have liked it. My seven stages of grief looked like this:
Step 1: Shock. At the moment, I wasn’t able to comprehend that he had actually kissed me.
Step 2: Denial. There was no way that I could have liked it. It was probably because he looked exactly like Felix.
Step 3: Anger. Why the fuck did I (maybe) like it?
Step 4: Bargaining. Maybe a higher being would let me turn back time for a re-do, and I could dodge the kiss.
Step 5: Depression. I had spent the past few days locked in my room, mulling over the incident constantly.
Step 6: Testing. I talked to my stuffed cat—I should probably get a therapist, but that was a problem for another time—and had worked out how life might be now that I had to be married to Rocco.
I actually hadn’t reached step seven yet.Acceptance.Acceptance of my upcoming new reality or that kissing my future husband might not actually be terrible.
“No, no, it’s going to be terrible,” I said to Giuseppe, my stuffed cat, staring expectantly at him as if he could respond. “I was supposed to get married to Felix.”
His button eyes were non-judgmental, a silent reassurance that at least someone (or rather, something) was not about to ridicule me for my bizarre predicament.
“Are you talking to your stuffed animal again?” Fiorella said from the other side of my bedroom door.
“N-no!” I said, stuffing Giuseppe under my pillow. “I was on the phone.”
She didn’t bother masking her scowl as she walked into my bedroom. Tonight was my engagement party, and Fiorella hated dressing in ‘fancy’ attire. Her gown was black, of course, and it could double as funeral attire.
“Whatever. People are arriving toyourengagement party, and Dad is pissed you’re not downstairs.”
My palms were sweaty, my pulse erratic. The prospect of descending into the throng of well-wishers nauseated me. I didn’t want this arranged marriage, but it was non-negotiable.
“Yeah…” was all I could say.
