CHAPTER 2

The reception had taken place in the great ballroom of the Blackwood estate, a lavish affair of crystal chandeliers casting shimmering light across polished marble floors. Leya swam through the crowd, accepting well-wishes from the guests she didn't know, nodding politely at their empty compliments. But all the while, she had the feeling that she was a ghost wafting through a life that wasn't hers.

She caught a glimpse of Harrison across the room, similarly flanked by his family and his business associates, wearing the same detached expression, his smile never quite reaching his eyes. A prisoner in this arrangement too, though his prison was one of power and expectation, not desperation.

As the evening wore on, she found herself standing beside the big bay window, looking down into the sprawling gardens below. Laughter and clinking glasses faded through the background as she allowed herself for a moment to breathe in the weight of everything that happened.

She felt her mother coming up to her, the softness in her eyes holding both pride and sadness. "You did well today, Leya," she says softly, laying a hand on her daughter's arm. "I know this isn't what you wanted, but. You've secured our future."

She turned to her mother, her throat tight as emotion forced its way up. "What future?" she asked, barely in a whisper. "All I feel is trapped.

Her mother's smile had faltered then, and in that split second, there was something beyond the veneer, the weight of guilt in her mother's heart. "I am so sorry darling," she whispered as her voice finally broke. "If your father were alive this wouldn’t have happened.

Her father's mention made Leya's heart clenched. 

She had tried being strong, tried doing what needed to be done for the sake of her and her family, but at that moment, she felt like a prisoner in a cage, wondering if the price she had to pay was too high. Somewhere right now, she had lost herself along the way and she wasn't sure that one day she would find her way back.

Harrison stood across the room, his back to the crowd, his mind as far away from festivity as possible. He heard congratulations, he heard toasts, but none of it mattered. He had done as his father had wished for, to be married to Leya; now he was consumed by bitterness, a disease he would have to suffer.

Then there was his sister, Eleanor, beside him, her face as keen-edged as ever. "I must say brother, you did well to conceal your repulsion," she said with heavy sarcasm.

Harrison had nothing to say; his jaw was clenched, his eyes fixed on his half-emptied glass of whiskey. How he detested this charade, this show, the whole sham of everything being right when it was not.

"You are better at this game than you think," Eleanor teased further. "Father must be proud."

Harrison's gaze met his father, who stood across the room, surrounded by guests, looking every inch the powerful patriarch. His father had orchestrated this whole thing—had him hog-tied, he was being forced into a union he did not want, bound to a woman he had already made his mind up to detest.

I ain't playing any games, Harrison growled low, his resentment lacing his words.

Eleanor queried a brow, the smirk deepening. "Oh, but you are, dear brother, whether you like it or not. You're in this neck deep now, and so is she.

His gaze strayed to Leya, who stood by the window, her back to him bathed in soft, silvery light from the chandelier. For a moment, a strange sense of guilt washed over him, a guilt he hadn't wanted to feel, and yet he felt guilty because he had not asked for this marriage, nor had she. They were both mere pawns in his father's game, both trapped in a life they had never chosen.

That didn't change the fact that he resented her, hated her for a part in this.

Harrison tossed back the remaining whiskey, the fire churning in his stomach doing little for the storm brewing inside. From the minute his father had announced this arrangement, a silent vow was made that he would never let Leya Anderson in. She was no more than a means to his end, a tool to lock in his father's empire. And he would make sure she knew that.

He watched her from across the room, standing alone, her shoulders tense with the weight of it all, a flicker of doubt crept onto his mind. Was she really the enemy he had convinced himself she was? Or was she just as much a victim in this as he was?

Harrison shook the thought away, refusing to let it take root. It didn't matter. None of it mattered.

Finally, when the reception finally started to die down, Leya excused herself from the crowd, retreating to the quiet sanctuary of her new bedroom in the Blackwood mansion. It was a grand room, luxurious everything anyone could ever wish for. Still, to Leya, it felt cold and empty.

She sat on the edge of her queen-sized bed, her fingers trailing into the edges of her gown as she stared into the magnificent wallpaper opposite her. 

This was her life now, married to a man who despises her more than anything, being trapped in a house that wasn't hers, bound to a family that would never accept her as their own.

It pricked at the edges of her eyes, but she blinked them away. She had promised herself she wasn't going to cry. Not here, Not in this house.

The creak of the door opening behind her made her stiffen. She knew who it was without having to turn around.

A sharp, cold Harrison's voice cut through the silence. "Don't get too comfortable," he said.

Leya swallowed hard while letting her racing heart face him. He stood framed in the doorway, his face unreadable, but his eyes gleamed with something dark. Something dangerous.

"This isn't your home," he went on, low and menacing. "And don't think for one second that I'll ever treat you like my wife."

His words fell onto her chest one by one, each heavier than the last. She opened her mouth to speak, but words would not come.

"I don't care why you agreed to this," Harrison said, taking a step closer so that he could stand directly in front of her, never once breaking his stare. "But let one thing be clear: you are nothing to me. Less than nothing."

And with that, he turned and left, slamming the door shut behind him.

She sat in the room, her breath under the silent desperation of the room choking her. It was no longer a matter of denial, it was the truth that had hit home, and the reality of her situation really sunken in. This wasn't a marriage of convenience; this was war. A war she isn't so sure she has the strength to win.

But as she let her tears finally break through her defenses, escaping down her cheek, the action of wiping it away seemed to steal a resolve in her chest. She had survived the loss of her father. She had survived the collapse of her family's world.

She would survive this too.

But as it got quieter, a figure shadowed stood into the night. Mr. Samuel Blackwood sat in his personal study with a glass of brandy on the rocks, his mind as far away from the plush wedding celebration as his thought could get.

He pulled open a drawer in his desk retrieving a file marked with one single name: Anderson.