Bought Love

Chapter 2

Peeta

I hate my family for doing this. Just because I didn't want to look for a wife, they bought some poor girl from outside town to be my wife. She must despise me. She won't even look at me and has said less than ten words to me. Instead, she just stares out the window as we pass by the woods and every once in a while fidgets in the seat next to me. When we get to our new home, she walks past me and goes inside.

"Katniss," I call out as I walk in. "Can we talk please?" She hurries over to me with her head still down.

"Yes?" she asks shakily.

"Can you look up at me?" I ask. She very slowly raises her head and blinks up at me with really pretty grey eyes that are filled with tears and a bit of fear. The tears that ran down her cheeks earlier leave dark streaks through the thick makeup the prep team caked on her face. I reach my hand out and she flinches slightly as I wipe some of it away to reveal a dark completion underneath. Her eyes flicker down as I realize her secret.

"I'm sorry," she whispers and for the first time, I realize the slight accent in her voice. I deeper sound that tells me her origins.

"Cherokee," I say and she looks back up at me, nodding slightly.

"My father," she says. "My mother was the daughter of white healers. I am a halfbreed." She hangs her head and turns away from me. Before I can say more, she disappears into the bedroom, shutting the door after her. I think about following her, but decide that it would be best to leave her alone. She's terrified of everything that has happened to her in the last week and seeing the person she was just sold to will not make her feel any better. Which is why I'm surprised when she comes back out moments later in a dark blue dress, her dark hair braided down her back. The makeup is still caked to her face and her eyes are still filled with sorrow. She walks over to me and sighs.

"I should start dinner," she says. "I'm sorry sir, but I'm afraid I'm not a very good cook though." I shake my head.

"That's okay," I say. "My father is a baker and I've been helping him for years. I can do it." She looks as though she were going to argue but just dips her head.

"Then what do you want me to do?" she asks confused. I gently cup her face so she looks at me.

"I want you to wash that junk they put on your face off so I can see what you really look like," I say.

"I'll only disappoint you," she says.

"Please Katniss," I say. "I want to see what you look like." She just looks down and I go over to the water bucket sitting on the counter and dip my handkerchief in it before gently wiping the blotchy makeup off her face. She looks at me and I feel my heart melt. She's beautiful with long black eyelashes framing her storm cloud grey eyes and her hair frames her striking facial features making her look like a Cherokee angel. She turns her face away from me.

"I told you you'd be disappointed," she says. She tries to walk away from me and I take her arm gently in my hand.

"But I'm not," I say. "You're beautiful, Katniss." She looks up at me with tears in her eyes.

"Don't lie to me," she says. "Just because I'm your property now doesn't mean you have to lie to me."

"You aren't my prop..." I start but she cuts me off.

"I'm no more than a slave!" she cries. "My mother sold me to your father to be your obedient little wife, to follow your every command under the threat of punishment. All I am is a toy for you to show off in town and use to have your children."

"Who told you that?" I ask her. "Because that's not what I think at all." She turns from me and I see a pale bruise on her cheek, probably from this morning. "Katniss, who hurt you?"

"It doesn't matter," she says. "I'm most likely going to have more of them before long."

"Katniss, I will never hurt you," I say.

"How do I know that?" she asks. "Your people have shown me nothing but cruelty." Before I can say anything, she begins to unbutton her dress and slides the sleeves off her shoulders to reveal raw red lashes on her shoulders. My jaw drops and she just stares at me with cold eyes as she pulls them back up.

"There are more on my back and stomach. I got them for trying to escape last night. So maybe I'm a little hesitant to believe you wouldn't hurt me Mr. Mellark." She buttons her dress back up and goes to the door before turning to me. "I'm going to take a look at the barn."

She shuts the door behind her and I go to the fireplace and light it before starting on a stew. I leave it to cook and head out to the barn to find Katniss leaning over a stall door and feeding a big black draft horse. He nudges her hair as she does and I hear her laugh, which is music to my ears.

"Stop being so greedy big guy," she says. "It isn't going anywhere." She gently strokes his nose and he flicks his mane. Katniss must have heard me by then because she looks over at me.

"Hi," I say.

"Hi," she replies.

"We have a horse?" I ask. She nods and points to the stall next to it.

"And a cow, a goat, and five chickens," she says.

"That's nice," I say.

"Yes," she says. "Now I have something else to occupy my time."

"Katniss, it was not my idea for any of this to happen," I say.

"Maybe not," she says. "But that doesn't mean I trust you."

"I wish I could prove that too you," I say as I stand beside her.

"Well, I guess we have the rest of our lives to figure that out," she says.

"I really am sorry about all this," I say.

"I know Peeta," she says. "But that doesn't make up for it."