Page 29 of Defiled Innocence

No.

It’s more like a trip to the dentist.

I’m aware.I type back.

Seriously, it’s been three days since that night at the club. A night I can’t stop thinking about and one that keeps ruining my panties whenever I do.

I’ve tried explaining to myself that just because he’s able to do things to my body that no one has ever done before doesn’t mean this is going to work. It’s a forced marriage. I have no choice here.

So fine. I’ll marry the brute, move into his place tonight like we agreed on, and be done with this whole thing. Come Monday morning, I’ll go back to work and keep doing what I do.

He can do whatever mobsters do, and we’ll just live our lives.

Ours won’t be the first loveless marriage. I watched my mother and father go through life barely even speaking to each other.

It ruined her, having a husband who wouldn’t pay a moment’s notice to her. And when she started on the pain pills, he only became more obsessed with ignoring her.

But I’m not my mother. I won’t turn to drugs to numb my pain. She went into her marriage believing Dad wanted her, that he loved her. I’m not going in blind.

There’s no love here. Only a mutual benefit to fulfilling my brother’s insane stipulations.

Sitting at Lucas’ desk, I lean back in the leather office chair, remembering all the times he sat here lecturing me on my grades or how late I was staying out with my friends.

Losing my father at sixteen had been a weird blessing. No one wants to believe losing their parent is a good thing in their life, but Dad wasn’t exactly a father.

Not in any real sense. I lived with him, at least in the same house. He occasionally showed up for dinner, but as for any actual parenting, he couldn’t be bothered.

Him dying meant I was able to move in with Lucas full-time and have someone around who actually wanted me there. I was just a reminder to my father. The reason he had to marry Mom. Her golden ticket.

My chest aches with the memory of his nickname for me. On the rare occasions he actually had to deal with me, he liked to throw it at me like a dart aimed at a board. And he hit the bullseye every time.

Lucas, even though he was my half-brother, never treated me as anything other than his little sister. Overprotective sometimes and nosey to a fault, especially when it came to my social life, but he was never cruel.

Unless you count the current situation.

A framed picture of the two of us sitting on the corner of his desk catches my eye. It was taken at my college graduation two years ago. His arm is slung over my shoulder and I’m holding a huge bouquet of flowers he’d brought for the occasion. We’re both smiling like nothing in the world could hurt us.

He’d been so excited for me. We’d already gotten the foundation started, but with my degree finished I was put in charge of the center.

It had been his stipulation when I finally got him to agree to my plans. Finish school, then he’d give me full control of the center. I’d already been working there since we opened it a year before, but he’d hired outside help to get it on its feet.

For the first year the center was opened, I trained every day with the manager he’d hired to open it. She’d shown me all of the ins and outs, making the transition after graduation a smooth one. And Lucas had been standing behind me every step of the way, supporting and encouraging me.

Tears threaten, but I shake them off.

I don’t have time for a breakdown right now.

I have a mission. Last night, it occurred to me that if Lucas had thought ahead enough to put this insanity into his estate will, he might have left something behind explaining it to me.

He’d never mentioned Dmitri to me, so I have no reason to believe he would have pushed this union if that car hadn’t stolen Lucas from us.

Lucas always kept our personal documents in a safe here in his office, but I’ve never actually seen it. After looking around, I don’t see any obvious looking safe, so I start opening drawers and file cabinets.

I finally find it in the closet full of file boxes. Grabbing the key ring with a mess of keys his assistant gave me after the funeral, I sit in front of it, trying each one. It would have been nice if they’d been labeled.

The fifth key does the trick and the door opens. I scoot out of the way and move in front of the opening, expecting to find a few files inside.

There are several file folders beneath a leather-bound ledger, so I lift it out of the way, dropping it on the floor beside me. Each file folder has a name on it. One for him, my father, his mother, my mother, and then mine on the very bottom.

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