Annabelle's POV 

“You better not be playing a deadly game, Edward,” Antonioni warned Father before he stepped outside, with the other guard following him closely behind.

I saw Father freeze in fear, with beads of sweat dripping down his face.

They had returned in the shortest minutes, Antonioni's face looking fulfilled as if he had settled whatever the issue was outside. 

He fixed a piercing gaze on Father and me as he kept on adjusting the wristwatch on his left wrist. 

I just knew his patience was thinning and it was about time—the time I dreaded.

I was right. 

His fierceness cut across my anxiety. “We'll be on our way now, Edward. Word will continually be sent to you as to how the marriage is going. Good bye man.”

He took his leave after saying those last words. Walking majestically through the exit.

Shockingly enough, father still couldn't utter a word. It's only that this time, he was able to lift his face from his hands, only gazing at Antonioni like a lost sheep. His eye bags were heavily sagging down on his upper cheekbones.

“Father, please say something.” I cried further, looking at him and expecting him to save me. 

Instead of getting the protection I expected, I saw him still looking transfixed at the exit where Antonioni had taken out, defeated. He stayed in the posture for a few minutes. 

The next feeling that came was a feeling I had never felt in my entire life.

I was shattered and disappointed.

Before I could say another word, the two men in suits who had been with us, stepped forward and made to put their hands on me. 

I jerked back, my heart hammering in my chest. 

I couldn't believe Father could do such a thing to me. 

“Father, please say something! Don't allow them to take me away, please,” I cried uncontrollably.

We bolted for the door.

I was being pulled like a criminal who wanted to run away. 

As I was about to be pulled through the last step, I fell face down, but thankfully, I didn't get to the ground—a firm grip closed around my waist and held me up.

Antonioni.

With him coming close to me, the two men stepped back for their boss.

I gasped. His touch was like ice and fire all at once. 

He licked his lips seductively. 

This time, he leaned in on me as he spoke, searching my eyes provocatively. “You don’t get to run because I will find you. Do you understand?”

His voice came across as both a whisper of warning and protection. His breath brushed against mine. “You are coming with me tonight. You dig? You are all mine from henceforth.”

With that warning, he let me go.

For some strange reason, I was supposed to be anxious since I was in danger, but I suddenly felt my adrenaline rushing with tingling pleasure at his touch, his deep voice, and his piercing gaze from up close.

I had heard my heart pound heavily. I could hear myself whispering to my inner mind, “Annabelle! Wake up from that crazy feeling! You're in danger after all.”

I just wished that what was happening was a nightmare and that I’d get to wake up later.

As the two men continued to drag me closer to the car, I turned to look behind, wishing my father were following. 

I saw him standing far off, closer to the house’s door, while gazing at us with bitterness on his face. 

This was the man I spent my adult life paying some of his debts and feeding from my late Mama's business, which I managed.

“Where are you taking me to?” I managed to ask amidst the ragged, hiccuping breath that followed after a long, hard crying.

“My hom—! Now you just come with me and stop asking brainless questions, little girl.”

“Then I'm not com—” 

He cut me short. “Stop resisting. I don't like repetition, and if you don't take time, you won't like what may follow if my fellas get impatient.” 

Antonioni's voice kept coming off, startling me like a deadly sound from a horror movie.

Then, without further warning, the men pushed me into the car, into the back seat. 

It was the latest model Rolls-Royce, black, clean and expensive-looking. 

Then they sat side by side with me. 

Antonioni sat in the front with the driver.

I observed they had come with two other black cars, filled with guards. 

The two cars quickly followed behind us like a convoy.

As soon as we drove off my compound, I felt my world shatter, and I realized this was real.

We drove to his apartment. The route to his place was rather far and complex.

I was looking outside the car window throughout the journey, refusing to look at any of the three men with me in the car—not Antonioni, not the two men who yanked me through like a rogue while taking me to the car.

I was devastated by what was happening to me.

At some point, I noticed Antonioni’s phone ring. He brought it out from his inner tuxedo and took the call.

He put it on loudspeaker and their discussions echoed through.

“Hello, Dee. Oh yes, the plan hasn't changed. We're already on our way to the Park. Please get the other boys ready, really ready, and we shall be heading out once I step in.” He said.

“Okay, boss, noted.” His caller answered from the other end of the line.

I blurred my ears from their discussion. I was too sad to listen to anything. My heart was aching.

I thought about my family—Father. 

I thought about how alive going to the flower shop every day made me feel.

I felt rather peaceful to be lost in thoughts, in trance, in fantasizing about my father's house, anything but Antonioni.

Soon, all those would be memories. Nothing but memories.

Henceforth,

I was going to live with a criminal as his wife.

How much worse can I expect?

There was no escape, no turning back.

Antonioni’s POV

When I returned, I noticed she was sobbing hard, and unlike me, I felt pity for her for the first time. 

There's something her fragility does to me that I just can't explain.

But then, feeling pity is not my style. It's a dickhead weakness for all I care about! 

I had to snap back to being a real man. No one has ever made headway in life by being pitiful.

I checked the time for the umpteenth time.

“We'll be on our way now, Edward. Word will continually be sent to you as to how the marriage is going. Goodbye, man.”

I left, while my men took Annabelle, following behind.

She sobbed even more, pulling backward and making all of us stop. 

For a reason I couldn't explain, I hated to see her sob—I hated the fact that she was being dragged unfairly. 

But the problem was that the little stronghead would try to run if we had left her. That's the kind of show women like to put up, and I had little or no time for that drama. My boys and I had an important business to take care of, and then after that.

We were made to leave, and my eyes caught and locked with Edward's eyes, but that, too, has got nothing on me. 

The bloody old fool might now learn to stop gambling when he has no substance.

Daddy's girl cried further, looking at her father to save her. 

There's something about this girl that I'm yet to place. 

I am ruthless and have no feelings for the folks I hurt, not to mention being moved by tears. But here I am, feeling some sort of thing that I can't even explain, for this girl. 

I held myself and refused to be guilt-tripped by her tears. That's what women know to do best after all.

I looked at my men, and they understood the assignment. Side by side, they moved her forward. 

At first, she resisted and continued to seek rescue from her father, her cry this time, loud and uncontrollable.

“Father, please say something! Don't allow them to take me away, please!”

This time, we truly left without looking back.

As soon as we stepped outside, the outer guards who had lined up, strategically positioned in different corners, started coming out one by one. Each of them bowed in respect to me as I walked past them. 

I nodded charismatically in return.

Annabelle’s cry was becoming louder and was almost beginning to attract the passersby. 

She didn't seem to care about the people who were watching.

Maybe it was because she was lost in a cry and tears blinded her eyes. 

She was being pulled along, as she stumbled forward. That was the only way she could walk. 

I started going backward as I had walked many kilometers past them. 

As I got to them, I made an effort to shut her up, but as I went closer to pinning her lips, she fell, not to the ground yet, because I had caught her by the waist and tried to pull her up.

At first, I thought it was a deliberate move for her to run.

My men had given way since the time I had come closer. Then the rest had gone closer to their different rightful cars to take, still waiting for me.

I held her in my hands, like a prince in shining armor. She felt so soft and vulnerable in my hands. 

Then came those maddening feelings again! 

I won't lie. Holding her in my hands and the feel of her face close enough to mine aroused me, and it was crazy! 

I took her scent in, slowly licking my lips.

“Who's this girl?!” I thought to myself. 

Unlike me, I never feel a genuine yearning for a woman, but this particular one makes me feel it. But then, and I'm not about to lose my guard for a chic! Never! All of them are betrayers!

“You don’t get to run because I will find you. Do you understand? You are coming with me tonight. You dig? You are all mine from henceforth…” I informed her in case he had forgotten, abruptly letting go of her.

I was also going to inform her that in my world, I make all the rules, and nobody dared to challenge me when I saw a look on her face. I was trying to read that look.

Surprisingly, she seemed a little lost, gaping at me. 

Uh, uh, maybe I was wrong. She spoke up stubbornly.

“Where are you taking me to?” I heard her ask. Her breathing was glitching from the cry.

“My hom…! Now you just come with me and stop asking brainless questions, little girl.”

Where did she find the confidence to question a Mafia lord like me? Nobody else talks to me the way this girl does. 

What nonsense! 

What followed after that from her words made me crave her blood, literally.

“Then I'm not com… ”  

“...stop resisting. I don't like repetition, and you won't like what may follow if my fellas get impatient.” I had interrupted her because she was stepping on my patience.

Again, I looked at my men, and they understood what the look meant. 

Over the years, I had taught them how to communicate with me just by taking note of my gestures.

I also observed that they craved to discipline her for talking to me disrespectfully, but were laid back because I hadn't given the order.

The men pushed her into the car, into the back seat. Then they sat side by side with her. 

I wanted to order one of them to sit rather at the front so I could stay with her at the back, but I didn’t want her to think too highly of herself. Instead, I sat in the front with the driver.

The two other cars we had come with also started almost at the same time and eventually took off behind us.

En route, I pulled down the rear mirror in front of me just to observe her and know what she was up to. 

She was looking outside through her left-side window. Unbothered. 

How can she dare to ignore me like my presence meant nothing to her? I fumed secretly. 

If she dared to disrespect me in the presence of my homies, I swear, I will skin her alive.

The city blurred past the car window beside her. “Must be a twisted reminder of how fast her life has been ripped away from her little comfort trenches.” I scorned her in my thoughts.

The car ride continued like a funeral procession.

I couldn't help but continue looking back like someone was suddenly going to open the back door and run away.

There she was. Annabelle. Sitting stiffly in the backseat of my sleek black Rolls-Royce, her hands clenched together in her lap.

I decided to distract her a little. 

Across from her, I lounged like a king, fingers lazily drumming against the leather dashboard in front of me.

I paused and listened to her heartbeat. 

I could feel it from where I was. Her pulse hasn’t slowed since we left her father’s house.

“Daddy's girl,” I cursed under my breath. I thought she heard me, but it appeared she didn't.

Without a warning, my phone rang out loud…

It was Diego, one of my right-hand men—the one in charge of training, weapons, and ammunition.

“Hello, Dee. Oh yes, the plan hasn't changed. We're already on our way to the Park. Please get the other boys ready, really ready, and we shall be heading out once I step in.”

“Okay, boss, noted.” Diego had answered from his end of the line.

I just knew that by the end of that operation, we would all be either dead or alive, luckily.

Either way, I wasn't going to let that baboon Lorenzo put his fingers in my eyes.

My phone kept on beeping with calls throughout the journey.

 Annabelle’s POV

A few miles after we entered the coastal town, our car pulled through a park, and the massive iron gates that guarded the buildings opened ahead. 

The environment seemed like an upscale estate. 

My heart clenched with each opening, at the sight of the mansions we drove past. Exotic, a fortress, looming ahead. 

Armed guards. Security dogs. Security cameras. And… no way out.

The car came to a halt in front of a big mansion, which appeared to be in the innermost part of the upscale estate.

Still being treated like a criminal, the two men hauled me out of the car, and we headed into the exotic mansion. 

Our car was parked in front of it.

On entering the mansion, which I had heard Antonioni call his “domain” on the phone, a few male guards lined up, all dressed well and bowing their heads low once Antonioni walked past them.

We stepped into the elevator and came to the last floor, where it seemed like he had his penthouse. 

We walked through a hallway with different rooms bordering it side by side. 

And then we came to the longest hallway I had ever seen in my life. That one, no rooms bordered it at all, except for a room by its extreme left side.

Finally, we walked past the last guard who stood by the door of the entrance of the room I suspected was Antonioni’s—the room at the extreme.

He bowed his head low to Antonioni in respect.

“Okay… Apart from the fact that he is wealthy, it seemed they feared him so much, why's that?” I tried to ruminate within myself, my arms still bound like a bandit by the two able-bodied men as we walked.

Once we entered Antonioni's room, the two mysterious guards released me, bowed to him, and left. 

My arms ached so badly.

The room was pretty luxurious, but that didn't affect the pain I was going through in my soul and body.

For a few minutes, he left me standing in his room. 

What a man!

He would rather go change his shirt into another simpler shirt. 

I looked at him from the corner of my eye, refusing to look directly at a man changing in front of me.

Silence had enveloped the atmosphere for a few minutes before Antonioni finally spoke up.

“If you like, you can sit.” I looked around to be sure I was the one he spoke to, since he didn't look at me. His voice was really cold and unemotional.

There was a seemingly comfortable sofa just in front of where I stood.

Without uttering a word, I sat anyway. After all, I had been pulled and stressed all through, and my body ached badly.

I was shyly looking into an unfocused space, close to my hands, which I had clenched together in fear.

From the corner of my eye, I saw him take a glance at me, as if trying to read my thoughts and emotions.

What happened next was what I didn't expect in my wildest imagination.

I lost my breath while it lasted.

Antonioni pulled out a pistol from one of his swell closets, walked fast paced to me, and placed it on my head, saying, “If you dare to run, I'll send your corpse back to your father, feel me?”

I won't lie, I was scared stiff. So I nodded slowly, my head tossed to my right-hand side. I was panicking and trembling but I still tried to hide it.

He lifted the gun from my head and said something lighter.

“If you need to use the restroom, there are soaps, shampoo, toiletries, scents, towels, and every other thing you'd need in the bathroom. I'll see you when I return.” 

I just watched in amazement, wondering how crazy and spontaneous a person can be.

He quickly walked back to the closet, loaded some guns with bullets, and left for the hallway. 

“C’mon, guys, we have an op. Where's everyone? Where's Bukky? Man, get your ass off that muffin, we've got work to tidy up!”

His voice faded into thin air.

There, in Antonioni's room, I sank into the soft sofa—into my reality. 

My pulse hadn't stopped stuttering. 

I looked around the room, carefully taking in the environment. 

There was a silent auction around the room. The room, dark but lavishly decorated in an exotic style, had a big bed close to one of the expensive-looking window sets

I sighed loudly.

“So this is going to be my reality now. A sudden marriage to a dangerous stranger, far away from my peaceful life.”

I hissed.

“But why would Father ever do this to me? Am I that unimportant to him?” 

I voiced out quietly, my voice still shaking from all I had been through.

Feeling tired, I sighed for the umpteenth time, and I decided to lift my legs off the ground to lie down comfortably on the sofa instead.

In an instant, I fell into a trance. 

I was happily bouncing down our street, heading to Mama's flower shop. 

The street is always filled with happy people, different colors, angry people, traders, buyers, playing children, chattering women, engaging passersby, indifferent passersby, fun activities, local gamblers, fighters, money changers, advertisers, and much more. 

It was a few minutes past seven in the morning. 

The morning sun slipped gently through the narrow gaps in the shop windows, casting soft beams across the floors of the streets.

I greeted almost ten people before even getting closer to my shop. 

As usual, Ma Soledad was the last to be greeted as she sold decorative materials just next to my shop. 

Her imperfect dentition always shone through whenever she responded to a greeting. 

Very happy woman.

I arrived just in time, my steps light and full of life.

After Mama’s death, I have learned to brace up and embrace weighty family responsibilities like Mama was doing when she was still alive. 

Father has never been able to provide for his family, and according to Mama, that was one of the major reasons why his first wife left him. He was always gambling and getting them into debt.

“Hi, Ma Sole!” I greeted her, smiling heartily.

“Hi, Belle!” Ma Soledad responded, her voice carrying the kind of warmth that could soften even a weary heart. 

There was something about her that always lifted my spirit, perhaps because she’s always optimistic and speaks positively. 

She spoke further. “Today must be a lucky one since the sun has appeared earlier.”

“Yeah…Looks like it,” I responded, at the same time, looking for my shop keys from inside my bag.

I got inside my shop, rattled my keys, and found the right one for the door. 

The key clinked harshly as it touched the metal lock. It clicked open. 

As I pushed the door backward, the familiar sound of crickets that had lodged there overnight greeted me like an old friend…

The day was bright and beautiful. 

I swept the shop and removed the spider webs from all angles of the room.

I moved to the flower baskets and unpacked the different kinds of flowers. 

And as usual, I decided to display some outside the shop, where it'll be easy for passersby to see them and buy.

After setting up the flowers, roses, hibiscus, orchids, garlands, greenery, petals, lilacs, and lilies, I began to unpack my drawing equipment- portrait boards, drawing sheets, pens, and colors.

Placing some of my beautiful drawings outside the shop, at the balusters, I returned to the shop and started painting.

I loved painting so much. I could paint for a whole day and forget about food. This was part of the reason I couldn't wait to be in the flower shop daily. 

I looked forward to painting there every day, as I didn't have much time to do that at home.

What do I do with the paintings? Of course, I sell them off to buyers. In short, people love my paintings and mostly book them even before I finish a portrait. 

They hang them on their interiors, walls, consoles, etc

When I was all set and had set up the shop, I brought out my painting tools, lay down on my belly, and began to use the tools to do justice to the drawing sheet.

I smiled as I painted. I was seeing myself in the civilized world I painted, and my life was all shades of “peaceful.”

Suddenly, a hand tickled me gently on the left shoulder, and I spun around to see who it was.

Mama!

As she usually did, she had brought food for me in the shop and had decided to first startle me.

But I wasn't ticklish. She had caused me to become immune to the ticklish effect because of how often she tickled me.

“My yummy food is here! Welcome, Mama,” I had declared happily, while collecting the food flask from her hand.

I tried returning my gaze to her face after I had collected the flask from her hand, but she had vanished immediately when she released the flask from her hand.

In a flash, I slipped into a deep sleep from the trance.

****

After many hours, I sensed the soft ray of blue light kissing the chilled room I had fallen asleep in. 

I was shivering in the cold too.

I became awake, although gradually. My eyes had blinked several times, and I had woken up very hungry.

I looked around my environment and realized I still had a bloody new reality no matter how long I tranced and slept it off.

I lifted my face and searched around the wall for a clock. I wanted to know what time it was. I found one.

It was 9:08pm.

“Antonioni isn't yet back.” I guessed.

I wanted to continue processing my reality when I was interrupted by several angry, loud, and scary knocks on the door.

The knocks kept on intensifying suspensefully.

I became very scared.

Who could that be?