Condemned to an unhappy marriage by her father Emerald Davidson finds herself in quite the shitty situation, only to find help from someone who's no better. She trades one deal for another, but is oblivious to what that other deal is exactly until i...
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Emerald Davidson's POV
Don't ruin a good today because of a bad yesterday.
It was what my grandmother had always told me when I woke up still upset about something that had happened earlier, and it was what I had been desperately trying to tell myself all morning. The quote usually worked for me, but somehow I had trouble remaining true to the words today. Probably because I wasn't angry at something, I was angry at someone - myself.
And at Riva. Admittedly I hadn't done great, but he hadn't exactly behaved either.
I still couldn't get over the fact that I had kissed Daniel Riva. Me, the engaged bitter woman that didn't want shit to do with men at the moment, especially the dangerous ones. I remembered a line from one of my favorite books when I had been younger. It is no bad thing to celebrate a simple life. Like Bilbo Baggins, I preferred my life easy, but unlike him I was the one that was making it hard at the moment. There was no old dude in a white dress with a fancy ass walking stick that I could blame, this one was completely on myself.
Pressing 'send' on my text to Cath to invite her over I sat back again on Dan's couch. My friend wasn't home yet, but I highly doubted him minding that I was crashing at his place. He had given me a spare key himself once after all. And Riva had left me a note that I shouldn't return to Ian before they were sure they had caught Hector, so it wasn't like I had much of a choice.
Fucking Hector. Out of all the men and women I had met that were employed by Chante and Ian I had liked Hector the least. There was just something about the guy that screamed shrewd, and his eyes had wandered off to the wrong parts of my body more times than I could count. I got it - he was a man with needs and I was a woman with curves, but he didn't need to be so obvious about it. It wasn't like he could have possibly harbored any hope. I was engaged to one of his bosses, for God's sake. That man seriously needed to keep himself in check.
My reflection was staring back at me on the black tv-screen with judging eyes. The bags under my eyes looked like they were permanently tattooed there, and I didn't like how my lips seemed to always be pulling down lately. A longing for the days before all this drama had started took over again - back when I had still been a semi-happy student. Sure, I had had worries back then too, but they were no where on the same level. Homework and tests versus murder and blackmail. And I really missed having a feeling of independence, an opportunity to do what you like when you like it.
Lately I'd been having trouble finding as much as a reason to get out of bed. For a short amount of time one reason had been added to that list, but that one had crossed itself out rather resolutely after last night. Riva. The man exited me as much as he worried me. On the one side I wanted to get this over with and get rid of him as soon as possible - he was another dangerous factor that had unwillingly been added to my life. Besides, If I wanted to get back to my old life he would have to go eventually anyway, right?
