The Highest Bidder

❊ Cʜᴀᴘᴛᴇʀ Fɪғᴛᴇᴇɴ ❊

The next weekend came quicker than I would have liked. I was supposed to stay an entire weekend with Enzo in a hotel. The whole thing still seemed so cliché. The only oddity was the fact that I was with him because I was sold to him through a human auction.

I slid into his limo and stiffened. The memory of the auction slid back into my mind. The fear of not being able to see what was going on around me. The feel of cold metal being pressed into my temple, and knowing just a twitch of a finger would end my life. The five shots that killed five unsuspecting women. Through my fear, I kept a stoic expression. Empty on the outside, even though terror was eating away at my insides.

Enzo's hand rested on my knee and I snapped out of it. The look in his eye told me that he knew what I was thinking about. His long fingers caressed my knee once before he pulled away.

"So, I'm supposed to act like your girlfriend," I asked.

He nodded. "Yes. And I'm expecting you to not speak about what brought you to me. We met for work. You work on the accounting details of my job."

"Shouldn't I know what you do?" My eyebrows furrowed in confusion.

"No." He tilted his head speculatively. "You don't need to know what I do to be my accountant."

I wondered what he did for a living to make millions - if not billions - of dollars. I wondered why I wasn't allowed to know. If his family knew, would they slip and tell me? But if he kept it a secret, then his family wouldn't know either. He didn't look like the type to do anything illegal, but some felons didn't look the part either.

I made it my mission to find out what it was that he did before my year was up. If that meant sneaking into his office when he wasn't there, so be it. I wanted to know who I was working for. He knew all there was to know about me and more. It was only fair.

I wasn't about to tell him that though. He would either end up telling me what he did for a living or I would find out on my own.

We rode in silence for what seemed like hours before we arrived at a Marriott. We exited a limo to an array of people with their phones out, ready to take a photo of whoever exited.

I looked at the hotel, then back at the people surrounding the limo. When I opened my mouth to say something, one look from Enzo caused me to shut it. I wanted to give myself a pat on the back for keeping my thoughts to myself, even though he was the one who stopped me from speaking. And even though it pained me to not say something about how people didn't have anything better to do, I kept it inside. The small smile that rewarded me was enough to push it further back into my brain.

We walked into the hotel hand in hand - keeping up with the facade of being a couple. Apparently some of his family members were also residing in the same building and were already made aware of his new relationship with his accountant.

His hand was warm and his grip was strong and reassuring. I wasn't sure if he was trying to reassure me or himself, but it calmed me only slightly. Especially when a beautiful older woman walked straight to him, her high heels clicking obnoxiously on the tile. She wore a black dress that reached past her knees and an elegant diamond necklace hung from her slender neck. Her dark brown hair was pulled up into a curled half updo, and the rest cascaded down past her shoulders.

She pulled Enzo into her arms and his grip on my hand tightened before he let it go to hug her back. I stood back with my hands in front of me, unsure of what else to do.

The woman pulled away and her hazel eyes locked on me. I smiled and she smiled back, and like mine, it was slightly forced. It was probably for different reasons. She was wearing this elegant dress while I wore ripped jeans and a faded t-shirt. I probably looked like street trash compared to her.

I held my hand out. "Hi. I'm Eva."

"The girlfriend." The woman's voice was higher pitched than I thought it would be, but it somehow still seemed to fit. "I've only just heard about you recently. I can't believe he's kept you a secret for three months! I'm Annalisa, Enzo's mother. You can call me Anna."

"It's a pleasure to meet you." I couldn't help but look at Enzo for clarification. Three months? He nodded slightly and turned to look at a man who was exiting the elevators, fixing his black tie. If I thought that Anna looked like Enzo, then that man could have been a twin.

The man, whom I presumed was his father, had the exact color hair, exact color eyes, and the same straight nose that curved upwards ever so slightly at the tip. Both of their lips were full. But while Enzo kept his face shaved, his father had a goatee.

"We were just about to go up to get changed for the rehearsal dinner." Enzo didn't even glance in his father's direction. "We'll meet you there."

"What room are you two in?" Anna finally took her scrutinizing gaze off of me and turned them back over to her son.

His father stepped next to his mother and didn't look at him once. Instead, he eyed me up and down with a scowl on his face that reminded me so much of Enzo that I almost choked out a laugh. His family certainly liked to scowl. But the tension between father and son was palpable. They wouldn't look at each other. Hell, they didn't even acknowledge each other's presence with a nod.

"We're on the top floor in one of the suites," Enzo answered casually. "We'd rather not be bothered, you know?"

His father scoffed and walked away, never once looking back.

"Your father is in a mood today." Anna sighed, looking after her husband. "I'll talk to him. He needs to meet your girlfriend. I can't wait to get to know you better, Eva. I'll see you at the rehearsal."

"I'll see you then." I gave her another smile and a nod goodbye before she kissed her son on the cheek and followed after her husband.

Enzo walked over to the elevators and pushed a button, his lips pursed in annoyance. His father and him weren't on good terms, that much was obvious. But I wondered what happened between the two of them to make it so they barely even spared each other a glance. It was almost as if they couldn't stand each other.

The elevator doors opened and we walked to the end of the hall where he pulled out a keycard and unlocked the door.

I didn't have time to search the room, trying to take in my new surroundings. All I got was one bed, one bathroom, a leather couch, and a huge flat-screen television.

He handed me a bag with a dress in it that he wouldn't allow me to see until we got ready for the rehearsal. He had purchased me a dress for both the rehearsal and the actual wedding, but he said that he didn't want me to see either of them because he knew I'd complain. Apparently he believed that I wouldn't complain if it was last minute, but oh how wrong he was.

When I got into the bathroom and pulled out the dress, my eyes immediately found the price tag and I ground my teeth together. I didn't have time to complain yet, but I surely would by the end of the night.

I slid on the beautiful red dress and looked at myself in the mirror. Dark red sparkles lined around the midsection and traced the sweetheart neckline all the way around to the back, where the dress dipped to my lower back. I pursed my lips and plugged in the curling iron that sat on top of the sink.

I curled my hair into loose waves and scoured through the bag Sophia packed for me to find some makeup. I couldn't go in front of people like his parents without looking relatively nice. I quickly did my makeup, my winged eyeliner finally doing what I wanted it to after the third try. I ran red lipstick over my lips, putting lighter lipstick in the middle and rubbing my lips together to create an ombre of pink to red.

I slid on red heels and turned, searching myself in the floor-length mirror. I didn't have time to be surprised about how I looked, but I couldn't help but stare at myself, seeing if what I was looking at was really me. After a few seconds of being dumbstruck, I stepped out of the bathroom to meet Enzo.