Prestige, page 23
Waiting in the living room, her heart sped up when she heard the front door unlock and open. Marcus walked through with his suitcase and an umbrella. He looked around the foyer and saw Bonnie waiting for him.
Bonnie took a deep breath and stood.
“You’re home,” she said.
Marcus looked her up and down, assessing her. Bonnie wasn’t wearing the ring Artemis gave her—instead putting it on a long chain necklace and hiding it under her sweater—but she wasn’t wearing Marcus’s ring either. She noticed his eyes flickering down to her bare left hand.
“Is that a problem?” he asked.
“Of course not,” Bonnie said. She watched Marcus leave his suitcase and umbrella at the door in favor of walking further into the house. He stayed silent as he looked around like he was searching for something. Bonnie kept her shoulders relaxed. “How was the tour?”
“Fine. What have you been doing?” Marcus removed his coat and hung it up.
As bad as it was, Bonnie’s first instinct was to lie based on Marcus’s ominous posture and subdued tone. “Errands.”
“Oh, yeah? What errands were those?” Marcus came closer, his shoes creating a wet trail behind him. The hair on the back of Bonnie’s neck raised. She stepped back.
“You know… typical stuff.”
“Are you lying to me?”
Bonnie’s pulse jumped. Realizing there was no point in beating around the bush, she decided to have a real conversation with Marcus. The first and last one they would ever have.
“Marcus… we need to talk.”
“About what?” Marcus hadn’t stopped advancing. Bonnie continued to back away.
“Us,” she said.
“What about us?”
She jumped when her back hit the wall formerly on the opposite end of the room.
“I don’t think we should get married anymore,” she said quietly.
Marcus, eerily calm, stopped just a foot away from her.
“Oh, yeah? Why is that, Bonnie?”
Bonnie swallowed hard. She realized that being straightforward about Artemis would not be in her best interest and quickly pivoted.
“This… us… it isn’t real. Instead of being together, it feels like we never got to decide if that’s what we wanted.”
“And what do you want?”
Bonnie lifted her chin a little higher. “I want to own Wilson Bank.”
Marcus laughed. “Oh, really? And how exactly will you manage that with your limited knowledge and experience?”
His amusement stomped over Bonnie’s confidence and even made her question herself. But she had to remember that this was what Marcus always did. He doubted her until she doubted herself.
She cleared her throat. “As I’ve told you many times before, I’ve earned multiple degrees—”
“You mean the degrees Vivica paid for because she didn’t want you to make the family a laughingstock?”
Bonnie stilled, blinking several times. She shook her head. “No. That’s not true. I earned everything I worked for.”
“That’s not the story Vivica told me. She said that had she not stepped in when she did, you would’ve flunked out.”
Bonnie’s breathing picked up. “I don’t believe you.”
“On top of that,” Marcus continued, “what makes you think anyone would take you seriously? Not only as a woman but as a Wilson. Your father’s heart was a ticking time bomb. And your brother never even had the chance to inherit the company himself because he was too weak to handle it. Your entire family is a curse that ends with you.”
Tears brimmed at the corners of Bonnie’s eyes. “Don’t talk about them. You know nothing about my family.”
“Do you?”’ Marcus asked. “After all, you’ve been the black sheep for so long. You’re no one to anyone. Not even your mother. She even told me once how much she regretted having you—”
“Stop it,” Bonnie said, finding it hard to breathe.
“Face it, Bonnie. You need me a lot more than I need you.”
Bonnie shook her head. “You’re wrong.”
“You’d be surprised by how much I know that you’ve failed to tell me about.” Marcus put his fingers under Bonnie’s chin. Bonnie flinched and looked away. She felt Marcus’s breath against her face as he chuckled. “That’s all right. We can work on trust throughout this marriage.”
“I’m not marrying you,” Bonnie said. Because despite the shock and nausea coursing through her veins right now, she still had one goal.
When Marcus’s hand fell away, she turned to him again. His face didn’t change, but the air around him turned thick and impossible to breathe. He towered over her and became an intimidating wall she needed to climb if she wanted to be free.
“You don’t love me,” Marcus said. It wasn’t a question.
Straightening her back, Bonnie looked him dead in the eyes. “No, I don’t. And since you apparently know so much, maybe that is also something you’ve known all along.”
Marcus was quiet for a solid minute. When he finally moved, it was to rub his hand over his chin. Then he released a chuckle and turned away. Bonnie relaxed against the wall.
Marcus’s hand swung back and hit her in the face so hard that the strike resounded in the room. Bonnie shrieked, her head snapping to the side. She held her face in her hands. The stinging pain was immediate, but her shock absorbed most of it.
A strangled shout left her when Marcus grabbed her by the throat and pushed her into the wall. He started screaming into her ringing ear.
“…think I’m stupid? Like I wouldn’t know you fucked that bitch in my bed? You fucking whore!”
Another blow came to the other side of her face. She didn’t know if she cried out this time or not. All she could feel was the throbbing pain in her face and the panic at how one of her eardrums popped. She felt wetness on her cheeks and couldn’t determine if it was blood or tears. From her good ear, she heard herself crying and begging him to stop.
“Oh, now you want to cry? Now you want to be sorry?” Marcus said. He grabbed Bonnie by the arms and wrenched her toward him. “Fucking look at me!”
Bonnie obediently opened her eyes and wished she hadn’t. She stared into the face of a monster. This wasn’t the Marcus everyone else knew, and this was far from the cold Marcus she saw in private. This was something deeply sinister.
“You’re not going to ruin my career and everything I’ve worked for. Do you understand me?”
Bonnie clenched her jaw shut, refusing to say the words. She cried out when Marcus squeezed her arms harder. Her left shoulder popped and she screamed the word involuntarily.
“What was that?” His violent, vibrant eyes looked crazed and lacked any empathy.
“Yes!”
Marcus finally let her go.
“Good. Now that we’re on the same page, you’re never to see or speak to that woman again. Understand? You should know it would only take the snap of my fingers to make her go away.”
Swallowing the blood and bile in her mouth, Bonnie nodded. She kept her eyes on the floor.
“Good.”
Marcus left the room. After hearing the door to his office shut, Bonnie fell to the floor, dry-heaving and sick to her stomach.
She always said she felt trapped in this life. But this was the first time she felt how tightly those shackles kept her chained.
thirty-four
“You did what!”
Artemis winced. Mina’s voice had gone several octaves higher than normal. They were in her office with the door shut, but Artemis imagined that even the customers from the dining room heard her outburst.
It wasn’t the best timing, but Artemis had been sitting on this news all night and the entire morning. She thought she could hold off until after Bonnie officially ended things with Marcus, but she didn’t sleep at all, too full of excitement and anticipation. It didn’t matter that Mina was mad at her right now, Artemis had to tell her.
“I proposed,” Artemis said, hoping that saying it again would prompt a better response. “And she said yes.”
Mina blinked several times. “You’re kidding me, right?”
Artemis shook her head. “I wouldn’t joke about something as serious as her.”
“You proposed to an engaged woman,” Mina said.
“No, I proposed to a woman who was forcefully engaged to a man she never wanted to be with in the first place,” Artemis said matter-of-factly.
“Does Marcus know?”
“He will soon.”
“So, despite all my warnings and best efforts to convince you this was a bad idea, you went for it anyway?”
“I’ve never been a good listener. Especially when I’m right. And Bonnie is far from a bad idea.” Bonnie was the calm to her chaos, the rainbow behind every one of her storms.
Mina rubbed her temples. “I can’t believe you’re risking everything for this woman.”
“She’s not just a woman. She’s my person—the only one I have.”
Mina’s face transformed. Her brows pinched together, and she looked away.
“I can’t believe you just said that.”
Artemis sighed, feeling bad now. “I appreciate everything you have done for me—”
“But not enough to call me a friend.”
“You don’t know me,” Artemis said. “The real me.”
“That’s because you’ve never given me the chance to know the real you!” Mina argued. “I’ve tried not to take it personally because I knew how much you wanted to cut ties with everything from here—even me! But now this woman comes back into your life and all of a sudden she’s the only one who gets you or knows you?”
Mina’s voice quivered. She wiped away a tear. Artemis dropped her head in shame.
“I’m sorry, Mina,” she said lamely. She never imagined anyone outside of Bonnie caring about her, or rather, she never allowed herself to.
“Wait,” Mina said abruptly. “You’re not letting her tell him by herself, are you?”
“Bonnie said it would be better that way,” Artemis said. Mina worried her lip. “What is it?”
“Nothing.”
“Mina.”
Mina sighed. “I just… I worry about you both. I know you can take care of yourself, but the Spencer family is powerful. And Marcus… Well, let’s just say there’s a side to him that people haven’t seen. Especially when it comes to Bonnie.”
Artemis put her hands on Mina’s shoulders. “What do you mean by that?”
Mina lowered her gaze. “I saw them in the parking lot arguing a couple of weeks ago… Well, it was more him yelling at her. And I know couples fight, but it looked intense, and she seemed, I don’t know, scared, maybe?”
“Why didn’t you tell me?” Artemis asked. She was about ready to kill someone. Marcus, preferably.
“Because I was afraid of that.” Mina pointed at Artemis’s face—her furious expression. “You might be ready to throw your life away for her, but I wasn’t going to let that happen. I knew telling you meant the possibility of you doing something reckless. I’m sorry.”
Artemis removed her hands from Mina’s shoulders and forced herself to breathe. She wanted to be upset, but that anger would’ve been misplaced. And also because her current feelings proved Mina’s point.
She needed to be calm. Rational.
Maybe it wasn’t too late. Maybe Marcus hadn’t come home yet. She could go over there and be with Bonnie to tell him together.
Pulling out her phone, she called Bonnie. Instead of ringing, it went straight to voicemail.
“Something’s not right,” she said and looked at Mina. “I need to go.”
Mina nodded. “Go. But please just… don’t do anything stupid, okay?”
Artemis nodded and ran out the door. She couldn’t make any verbal promises.
It normally took thirty minutes to get from the city to Winnetka. Artemis arrived in fifteen.
After trying Bonnie’s phone several times on the way, her concern turned to dread. She arrived at the mansion and parked halfway up the hill. She remembered getting bad vibes the first time she'd seen the house. It sat there on its incline, large and glaring. But inside, there was no space—no room for anything but an overconfident man’s ego.
She tried peeking through the windowpanes on the front porch, but they were frosted.
Fuck it, she thought, and knocked hard on the door.
“Bonnie,” she called out and then waited. No one came to the door. Her knocking turned to pounding. When it finally opened, she saw the last person she ever wanted to see.
“This is a surprise,” Marcus said. He crossed his arms and tilted his head, searching Artemis’s face. “Artemis No-Last-Name, right? I didn’t know Mina’s assistant did house calls.”
Instead of the tension shrinking Artemis in size, she grew larger, her back straightening and shoulders widening. She glowered.
“Where’s Bonnie?”
“Exactly where she needs to be. With me.” Marcus crossed one leg over the other. His dark blue sweater clashed with the bright hues of his eyes. “What do you want with my fiancée?”
“That’s none of your business.”
“Right, well, as fun as this interaction has been, I’ve had a busy week and would like to have a quiet night in. Thanks for stopping by, and make sure you vote Spencer on election day.” He tried to close the door in Artemis’s face, but she stopped it with her hand.
“I’m not going anywhere,” she said. “You don’t deserve her, and I’m going to make sure everyone else knows that, too.”
Marcus’s lips thinned. He opened the door wider and stepped out onto the porch, forcing Artemis to move back.
“And are you in any position to say who’s good for anyone considering your criminal record?” He smiled nastily at the way Artemis’s eyes grew. “Yeah, that’s right. I know exactly who you are. Artemis Ford, birthplace unknown, raised in the system and under the surveillance of several dozen foster families, none of which wanted you.”
“You son of a bitch.” Artemis got in his face.
“They charged you in 2014 for drug possession and trafficking, as well as possession of an unregistered firearm. It amazes me how someone so young ruins their own life before they’ve ever truly lived.”
“I’m not that person anymore.”
“I’m sure that’s what you like to believe. But how long before you slip up and the mask comes off?”
“The only one here wearing a mask is you.”
Artemis saw movement behind Marcus’s shoulder and glanced to the right. She saw a flash of coils and bronze skin.
“Bonnie!” she called out and rushed forward. Marcus stretched his arm out and stopped her. “Let me go, motherfucker!”
She fought against him. They were equal in strength, but his body mass worked in his favor. He shoved her away, blond hair falling in his face to cover the intensity and darkness in his eyes.
“I don’t know what you think you know or what delusions you’ve put in my fiancée’s head, but she’s come to her senses now,” he said. “As for you, I’ll give you this only warning: stay away from us. Because no matter how good you think you are at anonymity, there’s always a way to dig up old skeletons.” He walked back into the house. “Oh, and since you stopped by, you can tell your friend her services will no longer be needed. We’ve decided to downscale.” He slammed the door as Artemis rushed to it. Her body collided with the closed door and she slid down it with a groan, leaning her forehead against it. She was shaking, not out of fear for herself, but fear for Bonnie.
What had that man said to her? Done to her? Running back to her car, she grabbed her phone and texted Bonnie.
B, come outside.
The second she hit send, she received a text saying her message wasn’t delivered. Cursing, she decided to call instead.
“We’re sorry, the number you are trying to reach has been disconnected.”
“Fuck!” Artemis screamed and slammed her hands against the dashboard. She looked up at the house on the hill. Its windows were covered, and no lights were on.
It wasn’t a house anymore. It was a penitentiary.
thirty-five
The whistling in Bonnie’s right ear pitched higher each day to the point where she could barely hear out of it. When it became unbearable, she finally went to the ER. Since coming home, Marcus had worked in his home office under the guise that he needed to rejuvenate himself after the long and stressful tour. Bonnie knew he wanted to monitor her so she wouldn’t run to the police. Her phone and laptop were confiscated, and she’d been cut off from speaking to anyone. Marcus hadn’t hit her since that day, but there was always the possibility of it now. Once he unleashed that part of himself, it was impossible to hide.
Every time she looked in the mirror and saw the bruising around both her eyes, the cut on her split lip, and the fingerprints around her neck from Marcus choking her, it sent her back to those terrifying moments.
The doctor walked into the patient room, where she waited.
“Good news, or bad news first?” she asked while putting Bonnie’s X-rays up against a screen.
Bonnie cleared her throat. “Bad news.” She couldn’t believe in anything good anymore.
“Well, one, you have a perforated eardrum,” said Dr. Shannon. She turned the screen light on. Bonnie saw the X-ray of her shoulder. “And two, you have a rotator cuff tear.” She pointed at the picture to show what she meant. “But the good news is that both these injuries are treatable. You can be fully healed within two months.”
Bonnie wanted to laugh. Healed? What a joke.
After Dr. Shannon put her arm in a sling, she explained that Bonnie could have it removed within four to six weeks. Bonnie planned on taking it off immediately. If Marcus knew she went to the ER, he would keep her under lock and key for the rest of his campaign. Maybe even longer.
“Can you tell me again how this happened?” Dr. Shannon asked.
