Get You Back [Completed]

Chapter 12

"Your skin looks like silk," the make-up artist Hannah, who was hired to glam Katerina up, said. "And I haven't seen you around here for years. I've always done hair and make up for Natasha, but not you."

"Oh," she sighed. "Well I wasn't around the last four years." 

"You're his stepsister, right? You studied abroad?"

"Yes," she lied.

"Your stepbrother has always been... very secretive of his family. I never even knew he had a stepsister."

Katerina looked at Hannah. She is pretty, no doubt. But she has this air around her like she's been in this place for so many times which is how she knew that Katerina wasn't around the last few years or so. 

"What about you? How do you know him?" Katerina asked.

Hannah just smiled a knowing smile. "You know..." 

"I don't."

"Well, we used to..." 

But before Hannah could spill, Pavel entered the room and motioned for Hannah to leave. 

"That was interesting," she commented once Hannah has left.

"What is?" Pavel asked, standing beside Katerina now and looking at both of them in front of the mirror.

"My make up artist used to be your old lover."

"One of the girls I probably fucked but forgot about," he admitted.

That stung. The thought of him fucking someone else while she was gone. But she tried to show no emotions because she knew he would feel victorious to know that his actions still affected her. "What a pity," she said and stood up to walk far from him. She now tried to admire the array of dresses before her flown in from Paris just for this banquet.

"Wear this," Pavel ordered.

She turned around to see a velvet black jewelry box on the table. And in it was a beautiful ring.

"It's our engagement ring. Diamond from the 1800s worn by famous European royals in the past. It's part of the family heirlooms and it's yours now."

"I don't know what to say..." She moved closer to the ring to admire it, unsure of what to feel. She loved him in the past and her old self would be so happy to receive such an engagement ring from him. But knowing that he was just doing it now to legitimize their son made her feel... unwanted still. Is this really the life she wanted to live?

"Say you'll wear it and that you will smile at all our guests tonight," he ordered.

"I... I will," she lied. She lied because she knew she had other things planned for tonight. "I think you should leave. I need to prepare and dress up. I see that guests have been arriving the last hour or so."

"I'll see you downstairs."

She nodded and waited for him to leave.

Katerina has taught about this endlessly last night. She took this banquet as an opportunity to plot her and her son's escape.

As soon as Pavel has left, she got Paulo from his nurse. It only took a few minutes to have him all to herself. And once she was alone with her son, she changed her dress to that of a maid's and Paulo's to that of a random  boy. It helped that they were both still new to the household so the other maids didn't even recognize them.

She knew the way out because she still remembered the place like it was the back of her hand. It was like nothing has changed. There was a secret dungeon that was reserved as an escape route for emergency cases when the estate was under siege. She decided to pass through there.