Beauty in the Broken: A Diamond Magnate Novel

by Charmaine Pauls

  I make sure she eats enough and drinks lots of water, even if I have to force it on her. It’s close to three in the morning when the bitter-enders leave. The first thing Lina does when the front door closes on the last person’s back, is kick off her new shoes, right there in the entrance. It’s an act I find strangely endearing. It’s homely in a normal kind of way, as if we’re just another couple who’ve thrown a party. When she heads straight upstairs, I don’t stop her. I follow.

  All the tenseness is back in her body the minute we walk over the threshold. Crossing her arms over her chest, she walks to the window, staring out at the night.

  “Lina.”

  She doesn’t acknowledge me.

  I move until I stand close enough to feel the warmth radiating from her skin. I’m not going to pretend the scars aren’t there. Just like covering them up, ignoring them will only make the matter worse. “What happened?”

  She turns her head a fraction to the side, but doesn’t look at me.

  Sweeping her hair over her shoulder, I run my hand along the curve of her neck, repeating the question that has been tormenting me all night. “What happened, Lina?”

  A sigh pops like a fragile soap bubble from her lips. No comment. It’s the only answer she’s prepared to give me.

  How deep does her self-destructive tendencies go? I can’t afford to let her off the hook. “Did you cut yourself?”

  Her shoulders droop in a gesture that looks a lot like disappointment. “You heard what they said.”

  Tightening my hold on her shoulder, I turn her around. “I don’t give a fuck about what they said.”

  She blinks up at me. She’s pulled so deep into herself again not even the unexpected movement brought on by my outrage against everyone who’d judged her invites a response.

  Desperate for a reaction, any reaction, I give her a gentle shake. “It doesn’t define you.”

  Her chosen reaction is compassion. She looks at me with fucking pity, as if I’m the one who’s been done in. “It’s who I am.”

  “Damn right. You own those scars. Do you hear me?” Never mind how she earned them. I won’t allow her to hide them again. “You own them. There’s no need to be ashamed.”

  “Have you taken a good look?” She holds out her arm. “They make me sick. They make everyone sick.”

  “Not me.”

  She looks away, avoiding my words and any possible meaning they could carry. The power game of punishment I was playing with the red dress wasn’t supposed to turn out like this. “You should’ve told me, Lina.”

  “Would it have changed anything?”

  I don’t hesitate. “No.” But I would’ve known, and I would’ve mentally prepared her. I would’ve walked down those steps with her.

  She nods in understanding, but her smile is bitter.

  Gripping her chin, I force her to meet my eyes. “You’re beautiful.”

  She flinches. My words hurt her despite their truth. She tries to pull away, but I hold fast. “That dress.” I drag my gaze over her slender form. “You’re a goddamn sight to behold.”

  “Don’t.” It’s a whispered plea.

  “Don’t what?” I counter-challenge.

  A pained frown pinches her brows together. “Don’t do this.”

  Determination won’t let me ease up. “What are you accusing me of?”

  “Reverse psychology won’t work on me.”

  “You think I’m lying?” Turning her around, I march her to the dressing room and place her in front of the mirror. “Look.”

  Her gaze moves toward the glass, but it’s me she looks at.

  I brush my lips over the shell of her ear. “Look at you.”

  “Damian.” Her torment is a deep, keening pain that makes her eyelashes flutter.

  A shiver runs over me from the way she says my name, as if she’s on her knees, begging. If I don’t let go, I’m going to touch her, and she’s not ready for that, not after tonight. Setting her aside brusquely, I walk to her side of the closet and yank the dresses from their hangers.

  “What are you doing?” she asks in a small voice when I give her drawers the same treatment, throwing everything on the floor. She has her answer when I start tearing fabric apart.

  “Damian!”

  Her small fingers lock around my wrist, trying to pry my hand away, but she’s no match for my strength. The black garb groans and gives with a tear. One by one, I destroy her dresses, nightdresses, and underwear until the mangled clothing lie in a heap on the floor. No more long sleeves. No more black. No more hiding. No more mourning.

  Taking one of my T-shirts from a drawer, I throw it at her. She catches it mid-air, her lips parted in shock.

  “Put that on.” She doesn’t move. I arch a brow. “Unless you prefer to sleep naked?”

  Those are the magic words that make her hurry to the bathroom. A smile works its way over my face. Tonight might have been a disaster, but it worked out in a different way. I’m nowhere near understanding the complexity of the woman I claimed as my wife, but I’ve peeled back one more layer and took another part of her for myself. That makes me deliriously happy, because I want all of her. I won’t stop until she gives me everything.

  Lina

  Despite last night’s drama, I feel lighter when I wake up in Damian’s arms. The first sensation that crashes over me is the silky brush of the sheets against my bare arms. Shame heats the pit of my stomach, but there’s also something else, something that leaves a strange weightlessness in my chest. Relief. It’s out there now. People will think what they will about me, but I don’t have to hide it, any longer. I don’t have to sweat in long sleeves to protect what’s left of my pride. My reputation may be trampled, my craziness upped a notch in the public’s perception, but the potency of the poison can only diminish from today. The fear of having my scars discovered has been made redundant with one skimpy red dress. Harold can’t use it to blackmail me, any longer.

  Damian is breathing evenly next to me, his face turned toward mine. The sun is up. It’s light in the room. I study the stubble that darkens his jaw. How will that scruff feel on the tender skin of my inside thigh? When the lower half of my body clenches at the thought, I quickly reject the notion.

  Damian stirs. His arm is heavy on my full bladder. When he doesn’t open his eyes, I nudge him gently. He groans, pulling me tighter. His erection presses against my hip. I go stiff. Nothing but his boxer briefs prevent our skins from touching. He doesn’t act on the hard-on applying such persistent pressure on my flesh but draws lazy circles with his thumb on my side.

  “Damian?”

  His voice is sleep-rough and scratchy like his jaw scruff. “Lina?”

  Hearing him say my name like this, as if he’ll grant me any wish, makes me want to believe it’s true. It opens an ache in my chest for something I can’t have. This, right here, is the crux of our war. We want very different things. I want my freedom, and he wants to chain me to him forever. He wants to keep me where he’s free to punish me at his whim for the sins we committed against him. If there ever comes a day he could look me in the eye and say my name like he said it a few seconds ago, he’d tell me to ask him for anything. I’d ask for my freedom, and he’d say no. No matter how kindly he treated me last night, seeing my scars and reacting like they don’t matter, I can never forget he’s my enemy.

  I can never ask him for what I really want, so I say instead, “I need the bathroom.”

  “Mm.” A devilish smile tugs on his lips, and his touch becomes ticklish.

  “You’re crushing my bladder.”

  With another groan, he lets up, but not before he opens his eyes to stare at me with those pools of bitter chocolate.

  Skittering from the bed, I pretend I don’t see the questions or the lust as his gaze follows me to the bathroom. I rush through my morning grooming, glancing from time to time through the crack in the door toward the bed to make sure he stays there. It’s when I brush my teeth that my reflection in my mirror
catches me off-guard. Seeing the scars while I’m clothed is new. Grotesque and unsightly, they jar me so much I don’t notice Damian has left the bed until he walks into the bathroom. The toothbrush jerks in my hand. He comes up from behind, plants a kiss on my shoulder, and pulls off his boxers. I swallow a glob of toothpaste. His erection juts out from a nest of dark hair and heavy testicles, and Damian shows it off proudly. The sharp mint flavor stings my throat, making my eyes water. I cough around the toothbrush, looking anywhere but in the mirror.

  He brushes up against me, letting me feel his hardness through the T-shirt on my lower back.

  “Sleep well?” he murmurs against my neck.

  I blink the tears from my eyes, and mumble something incomprehensible through a gargle of bubbles.

  He has the audacity to slap my ass, making me jump, before he casually gets into the shower. The water comes on, and I can’t help myself. I dare another glance at the cubicle in the mirror, expecting him in the same pose from the night before, one hand braced on the wall and the other stroking himself, but he’s got his back turned to me, running his fingers through the thick, dark locks of his hair as water cascades down his broad back.

  Rinsing out my mouth only once, I dash through the door, but then stop as my new dilemma hits me. I have nothing to wear. Going through his cupboards, I pull on a pair of his exercise shorts before padding barefoot down the hallway to knock on Anne’s door.

  She opens it wide, wearing boy shorts and a crop top. I’m not sure who she expected, but the corners of her mouth drop when she sees me, and then it turns into a full-blown scowl when she takes in my attire.

  “I hope I didn’t wake you.”

  She opens the door wider. “Come in.”

  Stepping over the threshold, I take in the décor, and at the same time I realize I’ve never set foot in this room, the knowledge of who the room is intended for hits me between the eyes. It’s a mirror image of Damian’s room, but feminine in design. This is the bedroom meant for the lady of the house. Why did Damian put me in his room and not here? Was it because Anne’s clothes were already here, or because I’m not the woman of the house and will never be? More importantly, I haven’t searched this room because we have a guest staying in here. Could the evidence be hidden in here?

  Her gaze runs over me. “I see last night was an icebreaker.”

  I look down at Damian’s T-shirt, and when I catch her drift, my cheeks heat. “I came to ask if I may please borrow a dress.” I iron out the T-shirt with my palms. “I, um, ran out of clothes.”

  Her mouth puckers. “You’ll drown in my dresses.” She marches to the closet and returns with a pair of jeans and T-shirt. “Take these.” She motions at the T-shirt. “It has long sleeves.”

  “Oh. Thank you.” I’ll drown more in her jeans than her dresses. My ass will never be able to fill them out like hers, but I take the garments from her without pointing out my obvious flaws. “I’ll wash and return these tomorrow.”

  “No rush.” She holds the door open, my cue to leave, but speaks again when I’m crossing the threshold. “How was it?”

  I grip the clothes against my chest, hiding my naked breasts underneath. “How was what?”

  “You know.” She wags her eyebrows.

  The early morning sun that filters in from the windows catches the ruby highlights in her chestnut hair. Green eyes watch me with vivid interest. A sense of expectation expands in the air, and envy becomes a tangible thing. Does she notice she’s holding her breath? She’s trying to downplay it, keeping her tone light and disinterested, but it’s there in the hesitation, in the way she couldn’t stop herself from blurting the question out before I’d walked from the room. It’s there in the way her gaze keeps on flittering back to Damian’s T-shirt. She wants him. She wants him badly enough to hate me for wearing his clothes. I want to tell her that her hate is wasted, that she can have him on a silver platter with a pretty bow, and that I’ll even say thank you for diverting his attention, anything to turn his interest away from my body, but Russell’s voice sounds from below.

  “Mrs. Hart. Miss Anne.”

  My gaze is drawn to where he stands in the open front door. His stance is tense, as if he’s on the verge of breaking up a fight. Like Anne, he takes in my attire, but does a better job of keeping his face blank.

  “Thanks again for the clothes,” I say before hurrying away.

  Back in the room, Damian regards the bundle in my arms, but he doesn’t ask questions. When I step from the bathroom, dressed and my hair brushed, he’s waiting for me.

  “Oh,” I say, surprised. “I thought you’d be gone.”

  His lips twitch. “No such luck.” He picks up his car keys and jingles them on his way to the door as a gesture for me to follow. When I don’t move, he says, “Come on.”

  “Where to?”

  “We have an appointment.”

  He doesn’t pause to offer an explanation. He simply walks from the room, knowing I have no choice but to go along. I could throw a temper tantrum and refuse to budge until he tells me where we’re going, but he’ll only carry me to the car in full view of Anne, Zane, and the guards. I don’t mind them so much seeing, but I don’t want to disillusion sweet, normal, perfectly nice Jana. I don’t want to give the only person in this house who treats me normally a reason to start treating me otherwise.

  Hastily pulling on a pair of flats and grabbing my bag, I follow Damian outside to his car. He holds the door for me and fits my seatbelt as if he doesn’t trust me with the simple task.

  Once we clear the gates, I try again. “Where are we going?”

  He shifts gears and shoots me a glance. “Shopping.”

  His hand, big and masculine on the gearshift, is the same hand that brought down the axe on an alleged thief’s fingers. It’s the same hand that curls around my throat when he holds me with frightening tenderness and a promise of dominance. It’s the same hand that uses paddles and whips to make me come. I bite my lip hard, willing my thoughts away from the shameful images of me bent over his desk and with legs spread wide on his study floor.

  His gaze slips over my attire in another once-over. “You don’t like shopping?”

  “No.”

  His grin is unapologetic. “Too bad.”

  He parks in the Brooklyn Center and comes around to open my door. With his hand firmly on my arm, he steers me to a restaurant with a terrace.

  “I thought you were going shopping,” I say.

  He indulges my little verbal rebellion, pulling out my chair. “Breakfast first.”

  Like during our wedding dinner, he orders for both of us, a mushroom and sweet pepper omelet for me, and poached eggs for him. While we wait to be served, he works on his phone, and I’m secretively relieved for the reprieve of his attention, but the moment our food arrives, he pins me with a stare.

  Leaning back in his chair, he straightens his tie. “I bought out the shareholders of Dalton Diamonds. Ellis and I are the only ones left.”

  I cut into the omelet. It’s thick and fluffy with gooey cheese on the inside. “I’ve gathered.”

  “I’m suing Dalton for damages based on mismanagement and fraud.”

  Delicious. I fight not to close my eyes. “Mm.”

  “The plan wasn’t for you to find out like you did.”

  Oh, my God. This omelet is so good. “Are you offering me an apology?”

  “No.”

  I shrug. “Then it doesn’t matter.”

  “You know what’s going to happen to Dalton.” It’s both a statement and a question.

  “He’ll be sued for every last penny he owns and his reputation ruined.”

  “This doesn’t bother you?”

  I stop eating to look at him. “Do you want me to be bothered?”

  “It’s not the reaction I expected from daddy’s little girl.”

  “I’m not daddy’s little girl.”

  “Could’ve fooled me.”

  “I guess you’ve been fooled.�
�

  He stares at me as if he can’t make up his mind about whether I’m telling the truth, but finally picks up his fork and takes a bite of egg. We’re like war opponents, watching each other eat. He wanted to punish me through Harold. I could’ve pretended to be upset, but it’s simply too much energy, plus I doubt I can fake an ounce of care. I let him stew in his thoughts until he pushes his plate with half-eaten food away.

  I wave my fork at the eggs. “Aren’t you going to eat that?”

  “I’m saving space for the fruit salad.”

  It will be a sin to waste something looking so perfectly delicious. I pull the plate closer. “Do you mind?”

  He seems amused. “Knock yourself out.”

  I clean the food off his plate and then tackle the fruit salad.

  The rest of our meal takes place in silence, except for two telephone calls he answers while we’re sipping our coffee. While he speaks, I rearrange the sugar packets in the glass container. Then I spread them out like cards on the table, absorbed in the task and no longer aware of the man ignoring me. I look up when I realize he’s spoken my name twice.

  “Do you need to use the bathroom before we go?” he asks.

  If it’s so that he can stand in the door and watch me pee, “No, thanks.”

  His lips curve around a grin, as if he’s recalling a funny memory.

  I can’t help myself. With everything that’s happened since yesterday, this is the one, tiny straw that breaks me. “Fuck you.”

  He brushes a thumb over his bottom lip as if he’s trying to wipe away his smirk. “Is that all I get for breakfast?”

  “What did you expect?”

  “Thank you?”

  “Thank you,” I say like a bitch.

  He puts a wad of bills on the table. “Let’s go.”

  Gathering the sugar packets, I shove them in my back pocket.

  “What are you doing?”