I bid them all good night and hike up the stairs to the spare room I’m staying in.
Despite the mild chill in the air, I open the windows. I like to hear the birds, wildlife and ocean down below. The sounds out here are beautiful, unlike those in the city.
Sipping at my brandy, I open my laptop and turn it on. Time to check on Dasha.
My little ballerina is being spied on. By me.
Thanks to Damen, I’ve had top-notch spy equipment installed in the house she shares with her husband, the disgusting Jasper.
The man is weird as fuck. I knew the instant I saw him backstage with Dasha after the opera that something was wrong. Then I dug into their lives, or rather Damen did and gave me the information. It seems Jasper is a Svengali-type figure to singers and dancers in the Parisian arts scene. He’s molded many of their careers, but one dancer under his guidance died, which caused a scandal. It seemed to go away, though, the way so many of these things do.
Damen’s men fitted cameras and bugs when Dasha and Jasper were out, and I’ve been listening to their life and watching since.
I was shocked as shit when I witnessed Jasper drag Dasha over hard, cold stone by her hair and have been waiting to see if he does anything else, but so far, it’s been mundane these past few days. I’ve asked Damen to hurry along getting me out there, and he says he’s working on it. I imagine her face when she sees me. When she realizes that I’m going to be deep in her life. I smile, and it holds a vicious edge of satisfaction.
Leaving the laptop, I head into the bathroom to check my face.
My nose now has a slight bend to it. It’s also much thicker in the middle with swelling. If I don’t get it fixed, it will mar my appearance for good.
I lean in closer and look at myself. Blue eyes, wavy blond hair, lighter around my face from being in the sun, and full lips. My nose used to recede into the background, the least prominent feature on my face. Now, it is more prominent. I’m still handsome, but I look more masculine. I’m not so pretty. I ought to cut my hair too, take the lighter notes out and wear it shorter. It will fit the role I’ll be playing for Jasper and Dasha more than the wavy mess I have now.
I pull my hair from face and stare. That’s better. My face matches my insides more this way. I smile, a slow, satisfied smile.
Fuck it, I might leave my nose the way it is.
I’m still good looking, but now I’ve lost that angelic innocence my face held, which I always hated. Now I don’t look like the boy who had men grabbing at him. Instead, I look like a man who would fight anyone who dared to threaten him … which is exactly who I am.
I like the new me, I decide.
Maybe that clumsy oaf K did me a favor.
Chapter Two
Dasha
“So, you see, this endorsement will mean millions for you in the long run.” The man sitting opposite me is short, rotund, and sweating profusely. It’s hot today, and he clearly doesn’t handle the heat well.
We have air conditioning, but Jasper being the person he is, always turns it off for business meetings. He says it pays to make people sweat.
“I don’t want it to damage my image, though,” I reply.
Jasper shoots me an annoyed glance. He wants me to do this. Of course, he does. It’s more money for him.
“Darling, I don’t see how endorsing running shoes will harm your image.” He shakes his head at our guest as if I’m a silly little thing.
“Most people who endorse running shoes are star athletes or singers. They don’t come from the classical world.” I shrug. “It might be too fashion forward, don’t you think? A bit too street style for a supposed doyenne of the arts scene.”
“Oh no,” Monsieur Bernard, our guest, says. He leans forward with a sparkle in his faded blue gaze. “The campaign we have planned will be all about you as a dancer. It won’t only be the running shoes you’ll endorse, but our bags too. They’re practical but stylish. Comfortable, but fashionable. The running shoes we are going to advertise as like clouds for your feet. Who better to wear them than a ballerina? Your feet are your livelihood; damage them and you lose it all. You are entrusting your precious assets to our shoes; it’s a great endorsement.”
His words make me flinch.
A memory floods back, unbidden and unwelcome.
Last year, on the hopes of getting out of this hellish marriage, I’d dared to defy Jasper. He tied me up in the kitchen and took a hammer to the pinkie on my left hand. Told me if I dared do the same thing ever again, it would be my feet he’d smash to bits. I believed him. I still do. My bent finger serves as a constant reminder.
“The campaign will feature you wearing our shoes en pointe and then in other poses with the shoes and bags. It’s saying, they’re so comfortable and stylish even a ballerina can wear them to dance in.”
I hate it. I hate the idea of me posing with bags hanging off my arm like a coat stand, but I can see Jasper loves it, and if he loves it, I’m doing it.
“It sounds wonderful,” I lie. “Gentlemen, would you excuse me? I have a headache and need to lie down. Jasper sorts my financial affairs out anyway; don’t you, darling?” I send him a sugary sweet smile and wish it was poisoned darts instead.
He smiles back at me, all sincere and warm. If he wasn’t my manager, my husband, and my abuser, he’d have made a great actor.
Leaving the men talking, I head upstairs. I hate him, I think to myself. Hate. Hate. Hate.
I spend hours wishing him dead. I’ve even thought about killing him with poisoned mushrooms or something else as farfetched. Of course, I could simply leave with only the clothes on my back. Steal away like a thief in the night. I tried that once though too, and when he found me, he made me pay twice over. Plus, Mother lives a few doors down, and what would happen to her?
All I live for now is dance. It’s my life. Dancing on the stage, with the music coursing through me, I feel free. I couldn’t bear to lose that. It’s all I’ve cared about for years.
I used to care for a boy. A boy with blue eyes, full lips, and a face that made me want to cry because it was so sad and so beautiful at the same time. I saw that boy again. Only weeks ago, and ever since my equilibrium has been shattered. It’s funny what we can deal with. What we can grow used to.
My abuse is something I put up with these days like most people weather the normal trials of life. Seeing Bohdan, though, threw me for a loop. I’ve been anxious and jittery ever since.
What was he doing there? And the look he gave me as he stared at me, mere feet away in the narrow backstage corridor. That look said a lot. Trouble is, I don’t know what it said.
I don’t speak Bohdan anymore.
I used to know all his looks, all his expressions and nuances.
No more. He tore all that apart when he betrayed me. The day I saw him at a party, some older woman sucking his cock like her life depended on it, destroyed me. I’d loved him so much. So purely. And he went and dirtied it all up.
He’d lied to me. Told me he wanted us to wait until I was eighteen, and he was happy to do so, but he’d been sleeping around behind my back.
Worse, he’d made a laughingstock of me. I never had the chance to talk to him about it because two days later I was sent away when my mother heard the gossip about the whole affair and realized I was “sleeping with a Bratva thug” as she put it.