Page 48 of Unrequited
God, I only hope he doesn't marry me off to some fat, ugly relic with hairy ears and sausage fingers.
I’m only twenty.
“Yes,” I say. My voice cracks. I try to hideit. “I know.”
I blink hard, swipe at my eyes before he sees. The tears aren’t because I’m afraid of marriage. It’s because I know deep down it won’t be to the man I want.
“We did the best we could,” Rafail says quietly, shoving his hands in his pockets. “But Morozov’s brother Pavel… he’ll be a good match for you.”
I steel myself. “What can you tell me about him?”
“He’s Bratva, like us,” Rafail says. “His family’s got businesses that’ll blend well with ours. Strategic. Profitable. He’s… a little older, widowed.”
“Pavel?” I repeat, eyes narrowing. “I thought you hated him.”
He shakes his head. “I don’t hate him.” But the way he says it—the shrug, the tension in his shoulders—tells me all I need to know.
There’s something about this arrangement he’s not telling me.
They've all been watching me lately, and not in the usual way. Not with suspicion, not with curiosity. With concern.
I’ve lost weight, I know it. My clothes hang differently, looser around my waist and collarbone. My appetite’s disappeared, like someone snatched it away in the night and replaced it with this constant, hollow ache in my chest. I don’t sleep. I can’t. The nights blur into mornings, and no one dares ask me why.
How do you explain the kind of grief that can’t be named?
That’s what happens when you fall in love with someone you were never meant to have. Someone you can’t keep.
Seamus.
Just thinking his name is enough to send my chest spiraling into a tight knot. Mourning something that was never mine in the first place feels even more impossible. But I’ve done it. I’m doing it.
Because I have no choice. This is the only way.
“We tried to make dinner plans, tried to put it off,” Rafail says, shaking his head, a hint of regret in his voice. “But it didn’t work. He wants you now, Zoya. We barely talked him into the end of the month.”
I nod, trying to absorb it, but it feels like I’m underwater, his words distorted and muffled, reality pressing in around my ears. The kind of cognitive dissonance that settles into your bones when you hear life-altering news and your mind refuses to fully register it. Like it’s protecting you. Like it knows if it sinks in all at once, it’ll shatter you.
Still, I nod. Go along with it and ask the only question that matters. “Will this help our family?”
That guilt, always simmering in the background, flares up, hot and nauseating. Every secret I’ve kept, every stolen night with Seamus, every lie I told, every cover I spun—it all boils to the surface.
I hate lying to them, I whisper inside my own head.But I’d do anything for them.
“Yes, Zoya,” Rafail says, meeting my eyes, his tone serious. “More than I can even tell you.” He pauses, shakes his head as if the weight of it all is too much.
I nod again, slower this time, absorbing his words like they’re some kind of absolution. Like if I just believe them hard enough, the rest will be easier.
“What happens if Idon’tmarry him?” I ask quietly.
He exhales, his shoulders slumping just a little. “Then I find you someone else. Someone who still brings benefit. But if it’s not him… then I’m afraid it might be someone older. Maybe meaner. Maybe not so understanding. And I don’t want that for you.”
He sighs. “You deserve someone who’s going to take care of you.”
“That’s what this is?” I ask, forcing myself to stay steady despite the storm swirling in my chest—curious, suspicious.
“Yeah. Pavel was just a kid before. Young and full of himself. Pompous, too full of his own goddamn hubris.” Rafail sighs, blowing out a breath, his eyes flicking up like he’s asking the heavens for patience. “But he’s grown up. That was a couple years ago. He’s had a hard life, Zoya. He’s ready to settle down now.”
I arch a brow. “Is that your opinion, or do you actually believe that? So I’m engaged to a player?”
