I’ve never raised a hand toanything.
I’ve never even thrown a fist at another man’s face.
I am not, nor have I ever been, a violent person. But apparently, I am now.
And this is what she turned me into.
Isla pushes her hair away from her face with a violently shaking hand, revealing not only wide, spilling eyes, but also a fiery red handprint that covers nearly the entire left side of her face.
“Y-y-you d-didn’t t-tell,” she whimpers through hitched breaths and hiccups, “m-me any-anything.”
She doesn’t remember.
I swallow discreetly as bile threatens to creep up my throat. “I did.”
Her brown eyes are wider than I’ve ever seen, and all I can see in them is every moment that took placebefore.
Before that unspeakable day eleven years ago, when she ripped off the mask that was the woman I loved and then drove a knife straight through my back and my heart.
“Go back to your room and stay there,” I mumble, pivoting on the ball of my foot and striding away.
In the reflection of the glass in the doors that lead back inside, I see her lower her face into her hands before her shoulders convulse. From behind me, I hear the first sob that’s all too familiar from so many momentsbefore.
But I keep walking. I don’t even look back.
This is what she turned me into.
FOUR
ISLA
Present
I DID GO BACK to my room and stay there. I had every intention of never leaving my room again, but the following morning, I took one look in the mirror and changed my mind immediately.
My face looks horrifying.
It’s swollen, and purple, and tinged red in places. There are thick diagonal lines crossing my cheekbones that areso obviouslyfinger marks that all of it screams what a monster Malachi has become.
So, when I saw that, I decided I would make him stare at it until it heals.
This is now day five of me living here, and I’ve yet to join him for breakfast. But today, I’m going down to the dining room to sit right across from him just to see if he can, A) actually face what he did to me, and B) maintain his appetite.
Before I do that, I dress myself in order to play the part of a perfect duchess, complete with one of the fine Chanel suits issued to me upon arrival,conservative shoes and neutral hose—fuck you very much, Malachi, as if I don’t know how to dress myself appropriately—and my hair smoothed back into an elegant chignon. But no make-up. I’m boycotting make-up for a good,longwhile.
The skirt suit consists of a shell top with three-quarter-length sleeves, a scooped neckline that hits just below my clavicle, and a fitted-but-not-tight skirt that hits just above the knee. It’s also a lovely shade of lavender, and it’s just the right color to accentuate and highlight the bruising of my face.
Upon arriving downstairs, I find that Malachi doesn’t eat breakfast in the dining room, rather in an oval-shaped sunroom that flanks one of the smaller libraries near the front of the palace. It’s bright white with tall windows flanked by floor-to-ceiling drapes in a homey shade of sage green. The floor is the same ornate marble as the rest of the palace, but it’s mostly covered by a large, oval Oriental rug in greens, pinks, and yellows that complement the drapes. The furniture is deep, rich cherry wood in Queen Anne styling, with a moderately-sized rectangular table at the center, and six chairs.
Malachi is seated at the head of the table with a tablet balanced in his hand and coffee in a china cup on the table in front of him. He’s as put-together as he always is these days, with a white Oxford shirt and slate gray vest, sans tie, and sleeves rolled tidily to his elbows, putting his corded, rippling forearms on full display. All of his clothing is meticulously tailored to perfectly fit his large, well-sculpted, muscular frame. His dark hair is combed back exactly like he’s worn it since he was fourteen or fifteen, and that same strand hangs over his eyes like it always has. It appears that he shaved, but he did so in a way that he kept a faint amount of shadow on his sharp, square, aristocratic jaw.
Malachiishandsome. He always has been. He grew up into a reallybeautifulman, and it’s a goddamn tragedy that the beautiful heart he once had turned to cold, hard stone.
The bruising is on the left side of my face, so I take the seat perpendicular to him, directly to hisright,so he has a front row view.
“Good morning, Malachi,” I say pleasantly, sitting tall in the chair.
His jaw ticks, but he keeps his gaze trained on the tablet. “You will address me asDukeand thenSir.”
