Page 26 of The Brutal Arrangement (The Ivanov Syndicate #2)

LUCY

I couldn’t believe that I blurted that out.

Damon surprised me. No. He’d scared me, sneaking up behind me like that. I was so engrossed with that call from the nursing home facility that I’d zoned out. As I listened to the director as she explained that my mom would be sent to another place, everything in me froze.

I couldn’t think. I couldn’t. Locked down in utter panic, I tried to understand her when she said that my mom was about to be packed up and removed from her current place.

She wasn’t going to Dream Garden where she’d fare better with proper care tailored to her situation.

She was going to be moved to a crummy, low-quality, state-run facility that was probably more like an institution than a residential place where she could be even slightly comfortable.

With tunnel vision, I’d fallen into an instant pit of despair. Nothing cut through. I couldn’t react to anything. So when Damon growled behind me, speaking so menacingly, he’d caught me off-guard at the worst possible moment.

That was the only reason I’d break and blurt out anything at all about my mother.

“Tell the truth.”

He didn’t lighten up. His fingers stayed curled tight on the front of this robe he’d rip if he wanted to. On his face, I saw nothing but a deeply lined scowl that emphasized the scar above his eyebrow. He was venomous like this, full of nothing but fury.

And doubt.

He didn’t believe me.

“I did,” I insisted, feeling so stretched thin and raw with what I’d learned since the fluke decision to turn on my phone.

After Damon was so tender and sweet, saying he had trust issues but wanted to learn more about me, I took it as a sign that he didn’t only want me for sex.

So soon after seeing and envying Maxim and Sloane together as a couple in love, I was over-eager to make something more than unattached sex work between me and my husband. It felt wrong to want more with him when I had entered this sham of a marriage with the intention to divorce him.

But I was losing sight of when that would be. I’d been here almost a month now, and nothing had happened. No word of Anton Kozlov being furious. No correspondence from Katerina about her finding whatever she needed to search for.

I’d powered on my phone to check whether she’d tried to contact me. That was all I did. Every other day, I’d turn it on and see if there was anything from her.

There wasn’t.

But this morning, I saw that the facility had contacted me so I called back, only to receive the news that no bills had been paid at all.

“Don’t lie to me, Lucy,” Damon warned again, almost as if he couldn’t hear what I’d told him. Maybe he was so jaded and skeptical that he’d be selectively deaf to the truth and want to stick with assuming the worst of me, but I was telling him the truth.

“I’m not.” A spark of anger lit me, and I fought harder to get free from his grasp.

I didn’t need him getting in my face, not now.

I didn’t want to sit through his accusations that I had to be lying to him.

I was floundering and flailing, ungrounded and shocked about my mother losing her place and being shipped off to a lousy alternative.

Katerina had lied to me.

She was a liar.

I was honest, as honest as I could’ve been these weeks I had been waiting here for word to divorce.

Fury burned hotter and faster, making me understand the total experience of being consumed with rage.

“Stop,” Damon ordered.

I growled, clenching my teeth like an animal because that was what I felt like.

Trapped. Cornered. Caught. Abused. I did the opposite, straining to break free from him when I had no chance of escaping.

He was bigger. Stronger. And I’d never win against a brute like him.

He had more muscles, more height, hell, he had more knowledge of how to be in combat and hold someone still.

I was nothing and no one. Just an idiot who Katerina wanted to deceive and lie to so she could get what she wanted.

Tears spilled so scalding hot over my cheeks, but I couldn’t stem the flow. I couldn’t slow down or calm myself to know whether I was crying out of sadness for my mother or if these were angry tears I couldn’t hold back with how livid I was about this situation.

I hated that my mother had to suffer and lose her mind and memories. It was a cruel disease to watch and I hated it.

I loathed that Katerina had conned me into this marriage agreement so she could skip free and not even see to her end of the bargain of covering my mom’s bills.

And I scorned my husband for not letting me go so I could vent and absorb this shitty news. The last thing I needed was for him to accuse me of lying. I had no patience, no willpower, to handle him on that topic. Not now. Not ever.

He had other ideas, though. He wasn’t releasing me at all, his hands locked on my robe and his arms rigid as he kept me close. Scowling down at me, he clearly wanted to intimidate me and remind me that he was the boss, that he was in charge, and that I had no control here.

I was so worked up that I couldn’t give a damn.

I couldn’t begin to think about having any control.

I had none. I’d never had any damn power in anything, just stuck taking all the hits life would throw me.

I had zero control over the bad things happening in my life, and I wanted to break away from his hold to curl into a ball and wait for the shock of this to sink in.

“I know what I saw. What I heard. You were sneaking around, talking to someone. I warned you not to lie to me.”

“I’m not lying!” I screamed it in his face, feeling my skin so warm and flushed from the exertion of screaming.

I’d never raised my voice like that. Not to him. Not to anyone else. It wasn’t my style, but fuck style. Screw being good and obedient.

Maybe he’d kill me for talking back.

Fine. If that was the way I’d go, whatever.

That, too, wasn’t under my control.

My husband threatened to kill me the day after we were married.

Perhaps this was the final straw for him.

Even knowing that, I couldn’t hold back and suck in this spewing energy to explode in some way.

He glowered at me, sinister and dark as ever.

“I’m not lying!”

Again, he didn’t react. He kept his cold stare steady on me, and I couldn’t hold it back any longer.

“I’m telling the truth. Go get my phone and look at the number. I was talking to the director of a care facility. The nursing home my mother is living in.” Heaving hot, quick breaths, I waited for him to say something.

For too long of a moment, he didn’t. In this silent stare-down, I saw how little he was convinced. He had it so set in his mind that I had to be lying that he couldn’t bend at all and consider that I might be telling the truth.

It was another strike on my heart. Just when I wanted to think that he could be sweet and genuinely caring about me, seeing me as someone he wanted to learn to like rather than a cunt to fuck, he had to show his true colors like this.

He didn’t care.

He didn’t have a shred of a beating heart to have compassion or sympathy.

Damon was the “Demon”.

He was a killer. A Mafia man who didn’t do hearts and flowers and sweet stuff.

I’d never learn. I was so sick of being lonely and never fitting in anyplace or with anyone that I’d been dumb enough to think a Mafia man like my husband could care for me.

I couldn’t help a frustrated huff. Hysterical laughter would follow next. Without him releasing me, I lifted my hands to wipe the tears from my eyes and cheeks.

“I’m not lying, dammit.”

He moved now. Turning to shove me back onto the bed, he stood straight and crossed his arms. Like an overlord hawking over me, looming, he gave no hope for me to escape.

“This is the first time I’ve heard about your mother.”

I snorted a weak laugh as I settled on the bed. Sitting up seemed to require too much energy, but I didn’t want to slump. I had to face him and make sure he saw me with direct eye contact to know I was telling the truth—if he’d ever believe it.

“Sue me,” I retorted. “It’s not like we’ve had many meaningful conversations. You’ve made it clear from day one that I’m just here for you to fuck.”

“Don’t try to lie and complain.”

I shook my head, lacking the energy to fight on that point. “You never asked about my mother. You never asked me anything.”

“Because I was focused on getting you to heel. To understand who was in charge here.”

I wasn’t going there. I wouldn’t even know where to begin on deciphering that.

“It’s kind of hard to miss that dynamic.”

“Why were you calling this nursing home now?” he asked, not easing up at all.

“I didn’t. Well, I guess I did. But I was only calling them back.” I pointed at my phone. “I don’t even use it. It’s been powered off all this time. That’s how much I meant it when I said I’m not here to spy or lie or whatever else you Mafia people think I’ll do.”

“Then why the fuck are you here?”

I furrowed my brow, surprised that he wasn’t going to automatically accuse me of lying about using my phone.

“If you’re not here to spy or take secrets to others about anything in this building, why did you tell Katerina that you’d swap with her to be my bride?”

I rolled my eyes. “Secrets? What the hell would I even be able to tell anyone? You don’t tell me anything or let me see anyone or anything. I’m like a prisoner here.”

“Why did you swap with Katerina?” he asked again, clearly determined not to let me off the hook.

“For my mother.”

He smirked. “Oh. The mother in the nursing home, huh?”

I wanted to hate him for mocking me, but I knew he was just being defensive because he was so convinced I had to be lying.

“Yes. Katerina didn’t want to marry anyone because she felt that she had to search for something. She was convinced that she belonged with someone else.”

He frowned.

“She—”

“Hold on.” He raised his hand. “She didn’t know that it would be me she’d marry, though.”

I shrugged. “I don’t know? She only said that I’d marry an Ivanov brother.”

“Go on.”

I sighed, hating to have to explain it all.

But I was glad to not have to hold it on my chest anymore.

“She didn’t want to marry but knew that her uncle would force her.

She figured that I looked like her so much that I could pass for her.

Even the head of housekeeping thought we looked alike.

She was going to have me come here just to marry you so she’d be spared. ”

“And you’ve got nothing better to do than to marry a complete stranger?” he asked, almost taunting me.

“I agreed to take her place and marry into this arrangement so long as she did a ‘favor’ in return for me. She promised that if I took her spot and came here to marry one of the brothers, she’d pay off all my mother’s medical bills.

The outstanding ones I can’t keep up with.

She also said she’d pay to have my mother moved into a better facility. ”

He stared at me for such a long spell that my neck hurt to return the eye contact. Lowering my head, I exhaled a long breath. “I agreed to marry into this family because she swore she’d cover my mother’s expenses. I did it all for her. That was the only reason.”

His fingers touched under my chin and I didn’t fight him. I lifted my head under his touch.

“She told me I wouldn’t have to stay married.

That I’d just have to go through with marrying someone here until she found what she was looking for.

She’d give me the all-clear and she’d help me divorce.

It’s kind of like I was a placeholder for her or something.

But she’s never contacted me to say I could divorce.

She’s never reached out with any confirmation of paying for my mom’s care.

I blindly trusted her, but according to the director at that facility, she hasn’t paid up. She lied to me.”

Turning my head so I’d break the contact of his hand on my chin, I didn’t look away once.

“She lied to me. She hasn’t paid up or done her part while I have. I’ve been duped.” A wry laugh broke free from my lips. “I guess I know how you must feel now, realizing you’d married the wrong bride.”