Taken

Chapter 34

I stared at him with my mouth open, just as the words left his mouth I heard him. Almost as if he had summoned him.
"Anna! My beautiful baby girl!" He boomed. I stared at Nico, unmoving, panic surged through me, was Nico getting rid of me? Was he giving me back to my father? I was frozen, even when Nico and Kevin stood up as a sign of respect.
I felt rough hands on my shoulders and I flinched at the slight pain.
"It's so good to see you safe baby!" He said, bending down and kissing my cheek. This was all for show.

"Mr Taylor, welcome aboard. Would you like a drink?" Nico said stepping forward and shaking my fathers hand.
They engaged in some conversation, I continued staring at the table. Dread filling every corner of my body. I could feel Kevin's eyes occasionally land on me. I could see he wanted to reach out and touch me to reassure me, but he couldn't.

The noise of a chair scraping alerted me to Nico moving his chair closer to me. My eyes flicked to him and he smiled, gently placing his hand on my leg and giving it a brief squeeze.

"The reason I got in touch with you Nico was to see how you went with getting Anna. That agreement was quite old and I thought your parents would have got rid of it by now!" He laughed, leaning forward and grabbing some of the grapes that were on the table and messily eating them.
I knew what he was meaning. Unfortunately being able to understand his manipulation had imbedded itself in my mind. I closed my eyes and bit my cheeks, anger growing in my stomach.

I heard Nico breathe in, ready to answer what my father had said.

"Please Nico, allow me to decider. What he means to say, is that he'd hoped your parents had forgotten about the agreement so that you wouldn't follow it up. Therefore enabling him to do whatever the hell else he wanted." I snapped. Nico looked to me from the side, I was staring at my father as he grabbed more handfuls of nuts and berries that were on the table, shoving the handful in his mouth.

My father scoffed, "so much like your mother, I wish she was here to see how you've grown. I'm sorry for her outburst, you see when Anna sees me she is reminded of her... our dear Elissa, who passed too soon. She harbours some frustration at me for her mothers death."

I closed my eyes and bit the inside of my cheeks again.
"Nico, may I please be excused?" I whispered to him. He looked to me, his eyes showing some level of sadness, and I knew what his answer was. I lent back in my chair and looked out to the water. Wanting nothing more than to run over to the railing and leap off and have the water consume me.

"So yeah as I was saying, I wanted to see how my baby is going and ask for some support regarding an issue I've run into. You see, I'd run into a little trouble and had made some alternative arrangements. I was hoping to have Anna leave with me today in order to apply that, ya know, feminine approach." My father said. I looked to him, letting my disgust show through. He was referring to his deal with the Murdock family, the selling point, me, wasn't even his to sell. I knew the Murdock's would be following up what they could to get me back.

"Is this your attempt at trying to fix your fuck up? Arrange a marriage for me, hoping the Sallach's would forget about it so you could bargain me off to someone else for your benefit?!" I said standing up with my hands gripping the table, anger flowing through me and making my body shake.

"Baby, the marriage was an alliance." He started. I raised my hand, closing my eyes and turning my head to the side. I was done listening to his poison.

"Stop fucking around. You're the one who fucked up. You're here now, knowing the Murdock's are coming after you. You're hoping Nico can protect you coz you offered me to them and you're hoping that means something." I could feel everyone watching me. I stood up straighter, my hands firmly planted on the table. I locked eyes with my father.
"If you try to drag the Sallach family and the Murdock's into your bullshit again. I'll kill you myself." I could feel Nico stand up next to me, as did Kevin and Ford.