Total pages in book: 113
Estimated words: 106541 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 533(@200wpm)___ 426(@250wpm)___ 355(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 106541 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 533(@200wpm)___ 426(@250wpm)___ 355(@300wpm)
When his aggression gets him nowhere as it has the past two days, Kirill takes another direction. “What do I need to do to get you to eat? Magic. A threat? T—”
“Bring him back.”
He throws a wedge of grilled bread onto his plate before rubbing the grease from his hands on his napkin. “Who back?”
“You know who.” For the first time in days, my fighting spirit emerges. “You killed him. You fucking killed your brother.” He backhands me so forcefully my teeth crunch together, but it doesn’t slow me down. “You’re a murderer.”
He stands from his seat and flattens his palms onto the tabletop, his face as red as a beetroot. “Because he deceived me! Because he went behind my mother’s back! I should have killed him years ago.” I’m lost as to what he’s referencing but am not given a chance to seek clarification. “And I’m over spoiled fucking princesses who think their bloodline is more important than their status.” His angry breaths fan my stinging cheek when he snarls, “So how about I teach you a lesson.” When he jerks up his chin, Watermelon Head snatches my wrist in a painful hold and drags me to kneel at his feet. I snarl at him, baring teeth when he murmurs, “Barbed wire, right? That’s your favorite form of restraint.”
With the last of my energy, I spit at him.
My defiance only doubles his grin. “Let’s see how long that attitude lasts.”
With a second head nudge, I’m plucked to my feet by a rough grab of my hair and yanked out of the room.
My first stay in the orlop lasted four days.
My second was a little shorter, coming in a day short.
My third is by far the shortest, only lasting a little over twenty-four hours.
I’m not giving in. I just don’t have the energy to fight the goon forcefully returning me to the dining room where my initial punishment began.
“Eat.”
I’m thrust onto a seat across from Kirill by Watermelon Head. Well, I think it is Kirill. My hunger is so apparent my vision is blurry.
For the first time, I look in Kirill’s direction with something other than disgust on my face when he compromises. “If you eat, I will feed the women in the orlop along with you. If you don’t…” I should have known there was more to his compromise than he led me to believe when he ordered my return to the dining room, “… I will kill one woman for every meal you refuse.”
“What?” My voice is brittle and weak.
He smirks, grateful he forced me to respond. “Starting with her.”
My heart falls to my shoeless feet when Anastasia is brought into the dining room by two goons. We’ve bonded the past week, and I learned things between her and Ghost weren’t as perceived. Up until his death, he was striving so much to get me free that he didn’t have time to eat, much less fool around.
The meals Ghost, Alek, and Anastasia shared in his office added to everyone’s belief that Ghost was doing more than burning the candle at both ends, so they pushed their beliefs to gauge Kirill’s reaction.
It wasn’t as anyone expected.
I’m drawn from my thoughts by Kirill asking, “What will it be, Kate?”
My head naturally shakes, my stubbornness hard to overcome until the briskest movement sees Kirill waving his hand through the air like a king granting a kill shot. “Okay,” I shout, my voice brittle and in pain—both physically and mentally. “I’ll eat. I will do as you ask.”
Kirill doesn’t believe me. I’m not surprised. It sounded dishonest even to me.
To prove my point, I pluck a bread roll out of the basket, tear it apart, then push a massive chunk between my lips. My mouth is so dry since none of the food scraps are delivered with water, and it is hard to swallow the bread, but I manage—eventually.
“More.”
Once I finish my bread roll and move on to the pasta dish Vera places down with a rattled hand, Anastasia is returned to the orlop untouched.
“It’s okay,” Vera whispers as quietly as a church mouse. “I’ll make sure they’re fed.” She squeezes my hand, her kind gesture concealed by the tablecloth. “I promise they’ll be okay.”
Her pledge confirms what I already suspected. Our meals were designed to look like scraps, but they were much more generous than previously served and not rotten.
I thank Vera with a halfhearted grin before shifting my eyes to Kirill. His ticking jaw has me worried he overheard our conversation, so I steer him away from Vera before he can reprimand her. “What now?”
He keeps his eyes locked with Vera for three painfully long seconds before he eventually drifts them to me. “You are my wife, so it is about time you act like you are.”
When he gestures for me to follow him, I swallow down the food I just scarfed before shadowing him to the side of the ship where the cabins are located.