Page 33 of 10 Days to Ruin

“Jesus, Ariel. You look like the ‘Before’ picture in a Prozac ad.” Gina’s waiting at my desk with two Starbucks cups, a frown, and helpful compliments, as always.

“Thanks, friend.” I collapse into my chair, sending a stack of unopened mail cascading to the floor. “I just had a heartwarming father-daughter chat. I said,I want to be free.He said,Marry the worst man alive or watch everyone you love die. You know, standard family stuff.”

She shoves a quad espresso at me, no room for cream, sugar, or hope. Just the way I like it. “Lemme guess—you caved?”

“Ten days.” I can barely bring myself to say it. Never before has an arbitrary length of time sounded so heinous and evil. “I have ten days to decide if I want to be Mrs. Bratva Barbie or sign your death warrant.”

“Mywarrant?” she balks. “What’d I do?”

“You chose to be my friend in third grade. Should’ve known that was an unforgivable sin.”

Gina snaps her fingers. “Dammit. Knew I should’ve picked Annie Clymer instead, even if she was an annoying horse girl.” She spins my chair around, forcing me to face her. “So what’s the play? Poison his borscht? Fake your death? Hop on a flight and parachute out the emergency exit over Darkest Peru?”

I stare at the article draft glowing accusingly on my screen—Local Bakery’s Cupcake Crusade Against Childhood Hunger.I’ll always remember this one, I think. My last byline before becoming a mob wife.

“The play is I do my goddamn job.”

For the next hour, I channel all my rage into typing. Every clack of the keyboard is a middle finger to Leander, to Sasha, to the universe. The column itself, however, is a little bit less heavy metal than that.

… The secret to owner Marisol Hernandez’s delicious lavender honey mascarpone cupcakes? It all comes down to one special ingredient, she says: “Love.”

I’m halfway through a paragraph on buttercream ratios when my phone buzzes.

Unknown Number.

An image loads—me and Sasha on the gala dance floor, his hand splayed possessively across my lower back. The caption reads:Looking forward to course two.

The screen cracks against the wall before I realize I’ve thrown it.

“Whoa!” Gina dives under her desk. “What the actual?—?”

“Wrong number,” I rasp, staring at the shattered glass spiderwebbing across Sasha’s smirking face when my phone finishes bouncing back toward me and settles at my feet. After a minute, the screen goes black.

But even when he’s gone, I’m sick.

Fifteen years of running.

Six months of fetching coffee.

Ten days left before it all goes up in flames.

“There’s gotta be a way out of this,” Gina says.

I can only shake my head. “You should’ve seen my dad’s face. He was… I don’t even know what he was, Gee. If it was just him, then maybe I could get out of this. But there’s Sasha, too. And Sasha is… well… If I don’t know what my dad was, then I sure as hell don’t know what Sasha may or may not be. And I’m terrified to find out.”

“So it’s roll over and die? Ask ‘how high’ when they tell you to jump? C’mon, Ari—you’re a fighter. You’ve got more fire in you than that.”

Angry tears stud my eyes as I shake my head once again. “I wish I did. But unless Sasha has a sudden change of heart, I’m stuck. He’d have to be the one to call things off. But even then?—”

“Wait. Wait.Hold the fucking phone,girl.” Gina’s eyes light up. “Do you remember what Lora said about her and Ethan? How he ghosted her after she proposed?”

I frown. “I’m already engaged. Proposing isn’t going to help.

“No, dummy. But think about it. She drove that guy away by beingtoo much.Shemadehimgo running for the hills. And that’s what you want, right?”

“… You’ve lost me.”

“What I’m saying is that you need to be so utterly unbearable that even the Russian mob prince can’t stomach you. Not for all the tea in China.”

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