Page 5 of Forced Marriage Vows
She pulls out the pair of white sneakers with wide eyes.
“What?”
“You heard me. Put on the shoes and hand me the heels. Or should I do it for you?” I question, my gaze moving down to her feet.
She continues to look at me in shock for a couple more seconds before huffing out a breath and doing as I asked. Once she’s done slipping into the sneakers, she rises and I grab the bag from her hand.
“I’ll get rid of them.”
“What? No,” she protests, taking the bag back. “They’re Leah’s. There’s no need to get rid of them.”
I shrug, and she observes me for a couple of seconds. Now that she’s no longer wearing the heels, she has to lean her head back further to look me in the eye, despite her already impressive height.
“They fit perfectly. How did you know what size I wear?” she asks.
“Does that matter?”
“I guess it doesn’t. But this is so weird.”
“Is it?” I question, glancing down at my watch. It’s getting pretty late.
“Are you going to keep answering a question with a question? Or are you going to actually reply?” she returns.
“You didn’t ask a question that last time.”
She makes a small frustrated noise. “You’re impossible to talk to.”
The ringing of my phone cuts through the quiet. I pull it out of my pocket to check the caller ID. It’s not a call I can ignore.
“Get back inside, Anastasia,” I tell her before turning around. “Mr.Malone,” I greet, my voice crisp. “I wasn’t expecting your call.”
“Thank you for the shoes,” Anastasia calls out from behind me as I walk away.
Instead of heading back into the club, I go to my car instead. Jerome opens the door, allowing me to climb into the back. I keep my eyes on the club entrance while listening to Malone. He’s a fellow businessman I’ve had dealings with in the past. He needs my help, something I expected as soon as I heard news of his failing business. But unfortunately for him, he won’t be getting any help from me.
Not because I can’t, but because I have no interest in helping him.
Anastasia looks around for a second before making her way into the club. Once she’s safely inside, I finally pay attention to what the other man is saying on the phone.
“You have to help me, Morozova,” he says pleadingly.
Pathetic, really.
“I don’t have to do anything,” I correct.
“The Iowa deal was something both our companies collaborated on. We’ve both cut corners in this business—you more than others.”
“And yet, I wasn’t the one who was exposed for tax evasion,” I drawl, already bored.
“You’re the only person with the connections to get me out of this. You think I don’t know your family’s in the goddamn Russian mafia? How do you think that’ll look to the board members of your company? What if I exposed that little secret?”
“Do whatever you’d like at your own peril,” I reply, unfazed.
He falls silent. I’m about to hang up when he speaks again.
“You’d really leave me out to dry like this?” he questions meekly. “This company’s all I’ve got.”
“You should have thought about that before you tried to blackmail me. Thanks to that, any shred of hope you ever had, I’ll personally make sure is destroyed. It’s over, Malone. Pack it up, find a fishing boat somewhere so you can put some food on the table for your family. Never call me again.”