Page 33 of Princess of Pride
He helped me, but I also put him in a bad position. I have zero control over my husband, which now has my stomach filling with fear for Raphael.
What do I do now?
I spot a picnic bench under a tree near a high barbwire fence in the back corner. Ignoring the multiple texts on my phone, I head for it and order a ride. Maybe I should buy a Porsche while I’m here. We passed a pretty blue one on the way in. Where would I keep it? I don’t even know where I’ll be living. Ugh. Everything is so complicated.
For example, when Peter, my driver arrives in four minutes, where will I have him take me?
Again, I think of calling Adelaide, but adding one more innocent person to this mess is unfair. I have to deal with this alone. I have the money to care for myself.
I’m still working out my options when Peter pulls up and rolls down his window. I told him to look for the bride under a tree on a picnic bench.
“Emery?” asks the thirty-something man from inside the blue Toyota SUV.
“What gave me away?” I tease and get to my feet. My dress snags on the bench. I tug it free and pile myself into the backseat.
“You’re headed to The Carlyle, New York?” he asks.
“Yes.” I confirm.
“It’s about an hour and seven-minute drive,” he says as he clicks go on his GPS.
“Yep.”
The hotel is the last place anyone would look for me. It was the last place I thought to go, in fact. I’d stayed here a few times when Mom and Dad attended events in the city, and their penthouse wasn’t an option due to a prolonged renovation. Pippa and I were always left under the care of Bridgette, our nanny. She’d take us to Central Park a block away.
It was one of those rare times Pippa and I actually got along—chasing birds, running around, just being kids and having fun without stressing about Mom yelling at us for acting our age.
They stopped taking us with them when I was ten, after one small incident spiraled into one of Mom’s infamous fits. Pippa and I had talked Bridgette into getting us ice cream sundaes at Serendipity on the upper east side. It wasn’t far from our hotel but too far for Mom’s liking. She also didn’t want us to have ice cream without her because she couldn’t monitor the amount we ate.
“Desserts are to be sampled, not devoured,” she always said.
I’d scraped the bowl clean with my spoon that day and loved every minute of it. But that act of defiance from me and Pippa got Bridgette fired and us banned from New York trips.
So no, my parents won’t suspect I’m hiding at the Carlyle. They stopped staying there a while ago, after the penthouse was complete.
My phone vibrates in my hand with a text. I turn on the sound and scroll through the list of them, my stomach in my throat.
Mr. Assford: I need my wife at my side.
Mr. Assford: You have two minutes.
Mr. Assford: You’re embarrassing me.
Mr. Assford: Get your ass to the tent or I’ll carry you here.
Mom: Where are you?
Mom: You have disgraced me for the last time.
Pippa: Mom is devastated by your behavior. She’s having a panic attack. How could you do this to her? Lachlan looks livid. Where are you?
Dad: You have disobeyed me for the last time. When Lachlan finds you and he will, he has my permission to treat you as he wishes. You’re on your own, just like you wanted.
Mr. Assford: There is no place you can hide that I won’t find you. Consider yourself warned.
Chills slice through my bones at the last text. I can picture those aqua eyes glowing with rage. Would he hurt me? I want to believe he wouldn’t, but then, I don’t know my husband at all. Up until this afternoon, I believed he was gay.
He threatened to fuck me and expose mybeautiful breaststo the wedding guests if I didn’t kiss him like his bride. I thought he never noticed my boobs. I thought he wasn’t interested. To know he is and has been since I was eighteen… Lachlan will do something to me, of that I’m sure, which is why I can’t let him find me until he simmers down—way down.
