“So happy, that you’re never going back.”
It’s that spark flickering under the deepest layers of gray ash that makes me lean back. It’s the story he told, the one he stole from my books that parts my lips on a soundless gasp. It punches a hole straight through my heart, because this will be the most terrible lie I’ve ever told, and I’ve never lied to my brother, not even once.
My nostrils stir in the stare-off between us, faint tremors running over my body and accumulating in my fingers where he pushed the pen.
I was holding out for that story, for that love. That man. He has no right to steal that place, to take my fantasy and twist it into a hopeless lie. I can’t write it. If I do, I’ll lose a piece of myself, and I swore I wouldn’t.
The pen drops from my fingers. It rolls to the edge of the desk where he catches it.
I shake my head. “I can’t.”
He puts the pen back in my hand, folding my fingers around it. “You will.”
“I’ll come up with something.” My voice is hoarse. “Something Damian will believe.”
“He’ll believe this.” He pushes a strand of hair behind my ear. “Nothing else.”
How does this stranger know so much about me from going through my belongings? There’s more to this than cooking up a believable story. Maxime wants to make my fantasy his own. He wants to feature in it. That’s what those cold flames signify—excitement.
“I’ve never lied to my brother,” I say in a feeble attempt to appeal to his compassion, even if I’m starting to believe he has none.
“I wouldn’t corrupt you if I had a choice.” His gaze moves to my lips, then to the neckline of the dress. “In this, there is no choice.”
He says it with so much conviction, regret almost, that I’m silent for a moment. The statement is false. Of course, he has a choice, but he believes he doesn’t. I want to beg him not to make me do it, but he tightens his fingers over mine where I’m clutching the pen and brings my hand to his mouth. I’m shocked to an immobile state as he kisses every knuckle, five times of reverence. It’s only when the warmth of his lips fades that I get the function of my body back, enough to pull away my hand, enough to put pen to paper, and start the destruction of a part of my dream.
This is important to me. Was important to me. My hand shakes as I spin the tale, so much that he stills me, tears off the page, and makes me start over.
He kisses my head tenderly, whispering in a soothing tone, “It’s all right, little flower. You’re doing well.”
The untruth burns into my heart as I write it. It’s more than lying to my brother. It’s admitting that my dream is over, destroyed. That I held out for nothing. That it’s never going to happen. No knight is going to charge in on a white horse and save me, just like Damian had said.
So, I do. I write it. I say Maxime’s words. At the end, I sign off with, I love you, always. It’s the only piece of truth in the letter, the part that will tell Damian the rest is false. I never say I love him. I don’t have to. He knows. Damian and I don’t use that kind of language with each other. Maybe it’s because our parents couldn’t tell us they loved us, and we’ve always felt awkward admitting the words.
I turn my face to look up at Maxime. He’s shaking his head, giving me a disapproving tsk of his tongue. “That’s one of the things I find so endearing about you. It’s your will to survive.” He strokes a hand over my head. “Just like a little wildflower.”
Feigning innocence, I ask, “What do you mean?”
He straightens, takes his phone out of his pocket, swipes over the screen, and turns it to me.
I suck in a breath. On the screen is a copy of a letter, the last one I wrote to Damian. He flicks his finger again. Another letter. Again and again. All my letters.
“Where did you get these?” I cry out.
He tilts his head, giving me time to figure it out for myself.
“Zane da Costa.” I say the name like a curse.
“You’ll sign it Zoe with two x’s and two o’s like you always do.” He tears off the page, crumples it in his fist, and indicates the blank sheet.
With no choice, I start again, writing Maxime’s words but signing as myself.
“That’s better,” he says, folding the page exactly in the middle and sliding it into one of the matching envelopes with the hotel logo, proof that I’ve truly left the country, and proof that I’m in a luxurious hotel on my dream vacation.
Oh, my God. That’s why Maxime did it. That’s why the sly bastard brought me here. It’s for appearances sake. If Damian had any doubts after reading my letter, this would convince him I met a wealthy stranger who treats me like a princess. It will smooth over any concerns Damian may have, because princesses are loved and adored.
I twist in the chair to face the man who made me a hostage. Hostages aren’t loved and adored. They’re used and manipulated. “You’re a bastard.”
“Shh.” He plants a kiss on my head, looking smug as he slips the envelope into the inside pocket of his jacket. “You’ve been a good girl. Get your coat. It’s time for your reward.”
I stand on wooden legs. When I don’t move for several seconds, Maxime fetches the pink coat and throws it over my shoulders. He hands me a fur-trimmed wool hat and matching scarf. I feel frozen, my fingers too stiff to obey the signals from my brain as he helps me into the coat and buttons it up. He fits the scarf and hat, and finally the gloves, dressing me like a child.
He seems like a happy tourist looking forward to exploring a new city when he pulls on his own coat, scarf, and gloves.
“Have you been here before?” I blurt out, because the guard I should be keeping on my tongue seemed to have shut down with my mental and physical functions.
“Many times,” he says.
My tone is biting. “Then this should be very boring for you.”
“But it makes me the perfect tour guide.” He offers his arm.
I let him hook his arm through mine. I’ve already fought too many battles with him that I can’t win. I need to save my energy for the ones that matter.
Outside the room, Gautier and Benoit stand guard, just like Maxime had said. They nod at Maxime in greeting but ignore me. We go down a hallway with beautiful paintings and mirrors and descend a staircase with a carved wooden rail. The lobby is extravagantly furbished with tones of burgundy and gold. We cross a marble foyer, and then we’re in a cobblestone street.
A blast of cold air hits me, making my eyes water. Of course. It’s winter here. I didn’t think about it, not even when Maxime dressed me up in warm clothes. Abstractly, the knowledge registered, but my brain was on shutdown. The sudden chill makes me shiver.
Maxime pulls me closer. “Warm enough?”
I stiffen. I’m not, but I nod. I walk next to him, deflated, while Gautier and Benoit follow. I absently take in the sights Maxime points out, not to spite him or myself, but because I simply can’t gather any enthusiasm, let alone excitement. My mind takes in the beautiful city, but my heart doesn’t process the sensory experiences as joy.
We visit Saint Mark’s Basilica, Dodge’s Palace, and the Rialto Bridge. At each one, we pose for photos Benoit takes with Maxime’s phone. I smile when Maxime tells me to, the gesture stiff and unnatural, but when he shows me the photos we look like every other couple in a pose—happy and carefree. It’s the trickery of the scenery, of the wind that blows wisps of hair across my face, hiding my expression and making us look breathlessly windblown instead of cruel and trapped. I suppose the photos are more evidence in case my friends back home ask questions. Maybe Maxime will even include one in the letter to Damian.
In the afternoon, we stop for pizza at Pizzeria Megaone. Maxime says it’s famous throughout the world and that I’ll spot some of the Italian families dining there. I don’t care about spotting infamous mafia members. I eat the pizza and drink the wine, noticing in the back of my mind that the bill is the price of buying a pizza franchise back home. Maxime does all the talking, k
eeping a steady conversation, but the words float into one ear and out of the other. I’m in a strange kind of limbo. It feels as if I’m not present but staring down at myself from somewhere else, somewhere safer.
“Coffee?” Maxime asks, pulling my attention to him after the waiter has cleared our dessert plates. “Or maybe tea?”
“No, thank you.”
“Did you like the tiramisu?”
I look at him. I don’t answer, because I really don’t know.
His mouth tightens. “Zoe.”
“Yes.”
He smiles. “Good.” Getting up, he holds out a hand. “Come.”
Outside, he stops at the flower market to buy a huge bouquet of pink roses. They really are pretty and smell divine. I expect him to take more photos with the flowers as another one of his props, but he seems to be done with the photos. Benoit carries the flowers while Maxime helps me into a gondola. The oarsman speaks to Maxime in Italian. I’m not sure what they say, but Maxime is fluent in the language.
The oarsman steers us down the canal, under bridges and archways, singing passionate songs of love while I sit next to Maxime with a blanket draped over our legs. He’s holding my hand as if we are lovers and not as if he has a gun tucked in his waistband under his jacket and his two guards aren’t following in their own gondola a short distance behind.
Around the bend, the oarsman stops for us to admire the sunset. It’s chilly, and I’m grateful when we finally get off and start making our way back to the hotel. My legs are tired, and I want to crawl into bed and curl into a ball, hiding from him, from myself, and most of all from the next four years.
We stop on the square. It’s not until Maxime frames my face between his broad palms that I notice Gautier and Benoit have fallen slightly behind, giving us space.
“Zoe.” Just from the way my name is a sigh on his lips I know what’s to follow is going to be heavy. “Did you have fun today?”
I return from whatever spell I’d been in, my consciousness being thrown back into the moment. Like when he grabbed me in the lobby of my apartment block, my senses become heightened and my awareness sharp. Instinctively, I sense this is important, that the moment has detrimental effects on my wellbeing.
I nod, because I don’t want to displease him.
“Good.” He smiles, rubbing his thumbs over my cheeks. “Now use your words.”
“Yes.” Belatedly, I add, “Thank you.”
“I want you to listen very carefully to me,” he continues. “Remember what I said about choices?”
I nod again, my anxiety mounting.
“I’m going to give you one, maybe the most important one you’ll ever make, and I want you to think carefully. I want you to make it wisely. Understand?” He shakes me a little when I don’t answer. “Do you understand?”
I don’t, but the word he expects slips from my lips. “Yes.”
Letting me go, he takes a step back. For a moment, he hesitates, but then he takes my hand and leads me toward an alley. He’s walking so fast I have to run to keep up, and by the time we enter a dark, narrow, passageway, he’s almost dragging me behind him.
“Maxime.” I pull on his hand, trying to get him to slow down, but he won’t look at me.
We follow another passageway, this one even narrower, that cuts toward the canal. Under a bridge, we take a staircase that descends to a level below the buildings. The staircase is cold and moldy, the stone walls wet. It leads to a room that seems to be under the water level, maybe an old part of a house before the foundations of the city sank below the sea.
“What is this?” I ask, blinking for my eyes to adjust.
The only light comes from a ventilation hole with an iron grid high up on the wall, just below the ceiling.
Maxime turns to look at me, his eyes flat and emotionless in the dusky interior. He pulls me closer, flush against his body, and folds my arms behind my back. Something clips around my wrists.
“Maxime,” I cry out on a whisper.
He slams my back against the wall and takes something from his pocket. I watch in horror as he peels away the backing of a piece of duct tape.
“Maxime! What are you—?”
He seals my lips with the tape, pressing so hard my head knocks against one of the stone bricks. Stars explode behind my eyelids. I shake my head, trying to clear my vision, and when I open my eyes again, I’m just in time to see him fling an iron gate shut, and then a heavy wooden door.
Chapter 5
Zoe
* * *
Semi-darkness folds around me with the turn of the key. Running to the door, I slam a shoulder against it. The only noises I can get out are panicked mm’s. All I get in return is Maxime’s retreating footsteps. His heels clack on the stairs, then farther overhead, and finally nothing.
Silence.
I sag against the wall, shaking from head to toe. I can’t believe he did this. I can’t believe he left me here. Alone. But why is that so hard to believe? He’s cruel, not kind.
The shadows are creeping up on me fast. Soon, it will be completely dark. I look around while I can still make out shapes in the dusk. A bench is pushed up against the wall. Other than that, there’s nothing.
A sense of abandonment washes over me. I feel lost and alone, but that’s nothing compared to the betrayal that burns in my stomach.
Panic.
I have to get out of here. The only hole in this godforsaken place is the ventilation gap, and that’s not big enough for a cat to squeeze through, not that I’ll ever reach that high, not even standing on the bench.
I go still, taking in the quiet.
Think, Zoe. Think.
It’s not completely quiet. The silence I registered after the absence of human voices—Maxime’s and my own—is in fact, now that I listen, permeated with the lap of water and the distant hum of a motorboat.
Maybe if I make enough noise someone will hear me. I grab the idea like a life buoy, kicking the walls with the heels and toes of my boots until my feet hurt. When that doesn’t work, I kick over the bench and drive it repeatedly into the wall with my feet, but I’m under the water level, and the stone walls must be thick. No one will hear me through the massive door.
The hopelessness of the situation drives me to my knees. I hit the wet, cold, hard floor with my hands handcuffed behind my back, staring up at the hole that goes black as the night sets in.
Despite my coat, hat, scarf, and gloves, I’m cold. I force myself back onto my feet, struggling to do so with my hands tied, but I eventually manage by using the wall as a support. I trace the diameter of the room, turning in circles to create heat and stay warm, but the space is too small for the exercise to work effectively. I jump up and down for as long as I can, but eventually I tire too much.
I turn the bench back over with a foot and sit down. The only way I’m getting out of here is if someone lets me. Maybe nobody will. Maybe that’s why Maxime left me here.
To die.
I start crying shamefully as the notion takes form like a living, breathing monster in my chest. A squeaky noise stills me. Something scurries over my hands. Screaming behind the duct tape, I jump up. More squeaking sounds.
Rats.
My teeth start to chatter. I huddle in a corner just like I used to when I was a child. Only, my fairytales can’t save me any longer. This is a nightmare, and it’s real.
Is Maxime coming back?
He has my letter and the photos. He has my phone. He can send the photos to Damian and my friends, showing them what a great time I’m having. Everyone who knows me even a little knows I’ve always wanted to come to Venice. Everyone knows I’ve stupidly been waiting for love to find me, for the right man to save me. Eloping with a stranger is such a me thing to do. No one is going to come looking for me. I’ll vanish off the face of the earth. My bones will rot in this burial chamber under the canals of Venice, the city of my dreams.
I can’t help but laugh hysterically through my tears. What a stupid i
diot I’ve been. So naïve.
Sniffing, I wipe my cheek on my shoulder. Feeling sorry for myself isn’t going to help. It’s not the fear of dying that hits me hardest in the gut. It’s the regret. It’s not paying closer attention when Maxime said it wouldn’t always be like this. His meaning was obvious, yet my mind rejected it, choosing not to see it. It’s not heeding Maxime’s words when he told me to make the best of the day, most probably the last day of my life.
Chapter 6
Maxime
* * *
Back at the hotel, I dismiss my guards and have a long, warm shower. Then I order room service, put on a classical music collection, and arrange the roses in the vase while I wait for my food to be delivered.
It arrives promptly, a steak the way I like—rare—with garlic and parsley potatoes on the side and a bottle of their best red. The cutlery is silver and the glass crystal. The candle on the table is scented. It smells of lavender. Tomorrow, I’ll ask them to get some rose-scented ones.
I eat everything, enjoying the warmth of my suite and the view over the square. When I’m done, I pour four fingers of cognac from the wet bar and walk to the window to stare at the canal. It’s pretty at night with lanterns hanging over the bridges. So romantic. Such an illusion. Under the beautiful streets where tourists eat, laugh, and shop, lies my buried treasure. Somewhere down there under the dirty water is a little flower, a yellow daisy that will wilt and die without sunlight or water.
I stopped smoking years ago, but I wrap my coat around my body and take the packet I nicked from Gautier out onto the balcony. Lighting one up, I drag the smoke into my lungs. If she’s suffering, so will I. It’s the least I can give her. Stripping naked, I bare my body to the cold. As always, the freezing pain settling in my toes and fingers grounds me.
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