The Guardian (2 page)

I'm so scared right now, as I sit here in the room at the hotel, waiting to go down to my fate.

Why had I ever started this? I didn't love this boy; sometimes I didn't even like him. But he served one purpose, from the time he came on the scene Zared had taken notice.

Not the kind of notice I would've preferred, but it was notice all the same. It was more than I had been getting in the past that's for sure.

I don't know what his beef with the Amici family was about, and he refused to share. All he would say is that he forbid me to have anything to do with Paulo. So of course I ignored him. I was eighteen years old now after all, and though he was my guardian, I was pretty sure I no longer needed one, even if my dad had said until twenty-one.

I heard someone in the outer room. Maybe it was the maid, I didn't put the do not disturb sign out. I got up to investigate, anything to break up the monotony of my own thoughts.

***

"Get your shit and let's go."

"Za…Zared?" It was Zared alright, but not like I'd ever seen him. I backed away from the door as he stalked me.

"Get...your...shit."

"I can't. I'm getting married today, remember."

"Do not fuck with me today, my give a shit meter is extremely low."

He walked towards me and grabbed my arm bringing me up short.

"Hey..."

He looked the room over before dragging me back towards the door. "I guess there's nothing here you will miss, let's go."

"You can't do this." I tried pulling my arm away from his tight grip but he only pulled me harder before stopping and staring down at me in anger.

"Did you really think I would let you marry that boy, or anyone else for that matter, do you not fucking know me at all?"

Oh shit, I made Zared Costakis curse; he must be really pissed. In all the years we've lived together, I've never heard him use a bad word.

My body was trembling with a mix of fear and anticipation. This is what I’d wanted after all, what I’d hoped for all the while I’d been planning this farce? His anger though was something new. I expected him to be displeased; that was his favorite emotion where I was concerned wasn’t it? But this was more than simple annoyance as I’d seen in the past.

This was no time to dwell on that now though. He dragged me back into the room, collecting my sparse belongings. Thankfully I hadn't brought much. My futile attempts to get him to release me went unnoticed as he threw my bag over his shoulder and without a word pulled me from the room.

We were out of the room and the hotel in less than ten minutes; I didn't even look back.

He had us driven directly to the airstrip where he kept his plane.

"Where are we going?"

"If you knew what was good for you, you wouldn't talk to me right now Isabella. Of all the stunts you've pulled to get my attention, this has gone too fucking far."

So he knows I was just trying to get his attention, how embarrassing.

I felt my cheeks heat up and my temper sparked.

"You don't have to worry about that anymore, since I'm such a chore, Paulo’s will be the only attention I want from now on."

"Make that the last time you throw that little fucker up to me."

Wow, he was really steamed, but what now? Would we go back to the same old same old? I couldn't live like that anymore, wanting him all the time and knowing I can never have him.

"Where's your precious Sonja?" Just saying her name hurt my heart.

"Sonja doesn't have anything to do with us, fasten your seatbelt."

The engine of the jet purred to life, and I still didn't know where we were going.

"I have to call Paulo and let him know I'm not coming."

"That's the least of his worries, and I'll thank you never to mention his name in my presence again."

"What do you mean the least of his worries?"

"Did he touch you?"

"No, what?" my face must have shown my distaste.

"You know Isabella, I find it strange that you were about to marry this man and yet the thought of him touching you seems to repulse you."

He got me there; I couldn't even stand for Paulo to kiss me. I'm such a fool. I felt the first wave of a panic attack coming on, what was I thinking? I was about to marry someone just to upset Zared, I had become truly out of control. I felt cold and empty at the thought.

"Head between your knees."

I did as he said and then I felt his hand in my hair, soothing. I don't think he had touched me in anyway since I was fifteen and had stopped having nightmares. Not even the brush of a hand in passing. I was almost tempted to stay as I was just for the touch of his hand.

After it passed I was back in fighting form, there he sat, so stoic, so removed. I would be damned if I was going back to the way things were between us, so distant, and him flaunting that wildebeest in my face.

"What does it matter to you anyway, you don't want me you made that obviously clear the last time I stupidly threw myself at you. So why don't you go back to your blonde bitch and leave me alone?"

"Isabella, I'm warning you; don't push me. I suggest you keep your mouth shut until we reach where we're going."

And where was that I wondered? Maybe I’d finally pushed him too far and he was going to pack me off to boarding school. But no, I was too old for that now surely.

I’d talked him into letting me apply to the local university so that I wouldn’t have to go move from him. Would he still keep his word or had I fudged that up as well? There was no telling what form his anger would take, I have seen him angry before usually at others though and never me. Not even when I’d gone as far as I could on that tight leash he had around my neck.

He opened his ever-present briefcase and pulled out some papers to read. I guess that meant there would be no more conversation until we reached wherever it was he was dragging me off to.

“If you take me away I’ll just run away and you’ll never see me again.” I don’t know where I got the gumption. His only answer was to pick his head up and glare at me before returning to what he was doing.

I settled back in my seat and fought back the tears that were my constant companion lately, whenever I had any dealings with the infuriating jackass. My body finally relaxed from the tension of the last few days and I was soon fast asleep. Subconsciously knowing that I was safe, as always with my Zared.

***

We landed...somewhere, I don't know, it looked like an island or something, but not one I’d been to before.

There were palm trees and I could see a beach in the distance.

"Where are we?"

"Praslin." He didn’t seem so angry anymore though there was still a bit of a bite in his voice.

"What are we doing here?" I knew it was some island in Seychelles where he owned property, but that’s about as much as I knew about the place. When we still took trips together it was usually on his yacht, and the farthest we’d gone was the Greek Isles.

"You'll see."

Cryptic much?

We headed to the waiting limo that took us to a villa on the beach. There was a very official looking man waiting there as soon as we got out, with a book in his hand.

"Good afternoon Mr. Costakis, Miss." He nodded to me.

"Are we ready?" Zared walked us over to stand in front of him.

Ready, ready for what? I looked at Zared, waiting for him to explain but he didn't say a word, just told the man to begin.

I'm...married, let me say that again, I'M MARRIED TO FUCKING ZARED COSTAKIS.

Okay, so the guy who did the deed just left and I'm all alone with my new husband. I’m still not sure what just happened, did I just get my every wish? Could it really have been that easy? I turned to him expectantly as he closed the door behind us and…

"Okay Isabella, let me introduce you to the man you married."

What, what was he talking about? He took off his jacket and threw it across a chair while kicking off his shoes. My eyes followed his every move. Were we about to have sex? We hadn’t even kissed yet, shouldn’t we…?

I didn't have long to think about it before he pulled me over to the couch and over his knees.

I was too shocked to utter a sound at first, but when he lifted my dress and brought his hand down across my ass I screamed.

"Don't, you, ever, defy, me, again."

These were not love taps people, these were ass reddening, you will not sit down for a week slaps.

I felt the tears rolling down my cheeks as I finally got enough sense to try to get away.

“Hold still or it will be worse for you.”

Worse, how could it be worse? This was humiliating and degrading and everything other ‘ing’ I couldn’t think of at the moment.

“Let me up Zared, you can’t do this. I hate you.” My screaming did nothing to stop the rain of blows that fell on my poor abused ass. I was too embarrassed to look up at him when he was through, all that could be heard in the room were my sniffles and his loud breathing.

I guess the asshole felt guilty after abusing my ass because the next thing I felt was his hand rubbing the spot he’d just heated up. My brain was trying to play catch up, while my traitorous body was all but purring beneath the soothing warmth of his hand.

“Do you promise to be a good girl if I let you up?”

“Yes.” Was that my voice that sounded so pitiful? He sat me on the seat next to him and I scotched onto one butt cheek, since the sting was still very much there where he’d wailed me.

“What did you do that for?” I rubbed my ass and scowled at him. Even now, as I wanted to scratch his eyes out for treating me like a child, he still made my heart sing. He sat there looking like the world’s foremost leading man. His dark hair cut short, those spellbinding eyes, that I swore saw through to my very core, and that face that had been haunting my dreams almost since the first moment I’d met him.

His pristine white shirt under a black jacket and his Hermes tie made him look like what he was, a suave and debonair businessman.  No one would ever believe he’d just got through spanking my ass.

“I’m not staying here with you if this is the way you’re going to treat me.”

“Isabella, I see I’ve let you get away with too much for too long, it’s given you a false sense of your own independence. Get this through your head.” He grabbed my chin with one of his manly hands and turned my face towards him.

“I own you. That’s right.” My eyes had widened at his proclamation. “I let you run wild to give you a taste of freedom, but make no mistake, you’ve always been mine. Now that rock on your finger makes it official, that means from now on you do as I say without question, or every time you disobey me I’ll turn your little ass over me knee. Do you understand me?”

“You…” this was too much, the damn tyrant thought he was going to be the boss of me. It was just more of the same; he’d only married me to control me, not because he loved me, but to keep me from running wild, and blemishing his precious name by association. I took a swing at him but he was prepared, the bastard.

“Uh-uh-uh, none of that now, unless you want me to tan your little ass again. Now sit there like the young lady I raised you to be and behave while I make a few calls.”

I didn’t like the sound of that and it stopped me in my tracks. I didn’t know exactly what it meant, but I know Zared, and that tone meant trouble for someone. Since he’d already got me in his clutches, it didn’t take a rocket scientist to know who the calls were going to be about.

I watched him as he crossed the room and headed out to the patio. I was about to get up and follow him but he turned just outside the door and caught me with his eyes, trapping me there with the heat in them.

“This is Costakis, I want his legs and his arms broken.”

I jumped up off the couch and ran towards him. Okay Paulo was a prick, but it was because of me that he was in this fix. I’m the one that went after him, well that wasn’t entirely true, but I’d used him to make Zared jealous.

“You can’t…” he pointed his finger back towards the couch but I wasn’t about to be stopped. It was one thing for him to punish me, but to punish someone else for my stupidity was wrong, I couldn’t let him do it.

“Please Zared it was my fault, you have to call them back and…”

“Don’t you ever defend that filth to me again.” He seemed to have a fondness for grabbing my chin one handed as he was doing it again now.

“I told you didn’t I? Now go sit down until I’m done here then we’ll talk.”

I slinked back to the couch, but the damnedest thing happened on the way there. In the mirror across the way, I happened to catch the way he was looking at me as I walked away and, oh my.

My knees grew weak and I dropped, more than sat, on the couch. What did it mean, that look? What does it mean when a man looks at your ass and bites into his lip with that hot gaze that could melt steel, or in this case the panties off my ass?

My heart was racing again and I forgot all about my stinging ass as my mind raced with the possibilities. I’ve never seen that look on his face before. In the last few years, we’d hardly been alone together long enough for anything more than him to lay down the law or me to scream something at his head for the last asshole jerk thing he’d done to make my life miserable.

I still didn’t know how he always knew when I’d fucked up, but he always did. There had been times when I’d been glad for it though, like today when I’d been about to make the biggest mistake of my life.

I missed whatever else was going on with him because I was so preoccupied with this new turn of events. That look had to mean something, didn’t it?

“As for you…”

“Huh, what?” I looked up at him as he towered over me. Did he have to be so beautifully perfect all the time? I don’t remember ever seeing him looking anything but hot. It didn’t matter what he was wearing, whether jeans and a polo or a suit like he wore now. Even at home in the mornings, when I would pass him in the hallway and he was coming out of his room fresh from his bed, his hair wild and face sleep soft, he was always the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen.