An Arranged Marriage To The Mafia...?

"What were you thinking? You could have been killed!" Ethan's eye burned with pure rage, his hand gripped my upper arm and he dragged me backward down the hallway.

"Ethan let go." I pushed him off of me and stepped a metre away from him, my voice scathing. "I don't need you looking after me."

"Really? you seemed to be doing a great job on your own."

"I'm not a child!" I ignored the sarcasim in his comment, "I don't need to be protected and locked away at the first signs of danger."

"Your father asked me to do it. I did as he said, he was a nervous wreck knowing you were here."

"Let me guess it was his idea to turn the monitors off as well? What was I meant to do if you all died?" I flinched at the sound of another round of gun fire. "I don't need a saviour Ethan."

"I never wanted to be your saviour Amelia. I never wanted to be your anything."

"Then don't!" My eyes were burning, rimming with a concoction of rage and fury, "I never wanted you in my life any more than you already were, but I'm stuck with you. Only difference is I'm not the one being a jerk about it."

My now socked feet flew across the carpet floors in a fit of aggression, my arms stuck by my sides, my breath heavy and eyes enraged. I knew Ethan had made no attempt to follow me at all and a part of me in some sense wished he had.

The voice of my father filled the room the second I stepped in, his body moving in front of mine, blocking my line of vision into the office. It hid the secret affair of my father's business yet I could already picture what the scene at his back looked like, It would be no different to any other time. Blood would line the walls and floor in splattered patterns, bodies would lie in perculiar angles, the colour long gone from their cheeks. Victims would wheeze in corners fearful of what the wrath of their surviving enemy might consist of.

"You shouldn't be in here." His expression was one of deep concern, but I didn't care. I simply rolled my eyes and huffed in frustration. "Go Amelia. Go home with Ethaniel, I'll be by later"

I took a step away from him, my eyes narrowing, "I'm not leaving."

"Amelia..."

"Dad." I watched his face, anger once again flowing in my veins. I heard Ethan's light steps in the doorway and spun quickly on my heel to face him, before my eyes were once again on my calming father. "This is ridiculous. I don't need protectors, I can manage to look after myself just fine."

"Amelia, now is not the time to be stubborn. Go home."

I huffed, my proud shoulders fell as did the expression on my face, Ethan's figure grew a little nearer and I could already see the winning grin spread over his features, it only enraged me more. I cleared my throat and watched my father's expression of disappointment at my behaviour as I stormed away down the hall, Ethan hot on my heels. At that moment I didn't care what he thought of me, if they were going to treat me as if I were a child, then I was going to act like one. At least for the next four and a half hours.

"You know, this whole act you think you've got down, you aren't fooling anybody."

"What act?" I rolled my eyes but didn't give him the satisfaction of turning around to give him my undivided attention.

"This act where you're superior to everyone, where you can look after yourself and nothing can get you."

"Let me guess, you're just like him. You think I need someone watching me at all times."

"Amelia, seriously I've seen you trying to defend yourself." I could hear the amusement in his voice, it only drove me further.

"You know nothing about me Ethan-"

"I'm pretty sure I do Amelia." His voice held that egotistical tone, "We were friends for a good majority of growing up."

"Yeah," I paused in the middle of the hall to look at him, "until you decided I wasn't good enough." I shifted uncomfortably under his shocked stance and move away again, "Like I said, you don't know me."

"Whatever Amelia, keep telling yourself that."

The enterance doors loomed closer, sirens wailed and emergency service lights flickered over the brick building once more; déjà vu quickly set in. I could hear a murmur of media pesonalitites and the flashes of blinding camera lenses the second I stepped out of the casino foyer, my fiancé no more than a pace and a half behind, his hand slid quietly into my own, our fingers knitting together comfortably. I pushed a smile over my face, I laughed lightly at small jokes and flirted over Ethan like they expected, completely unaware of the hatred I could feel boiling underneath my rib cage for him.

The media hadn't heard a single detail of what had happend only moment ago in the tallest wing, they were completely unaware of the warfare played out inside.In a way I was greatful, without their realisation I could slip away and speed toward home without a swarm of journalists forcing accusations down my throat, but without it, it still meant I had to act as if I were happily in love with my future fiancé, heir of the Radev fortune, extraordinare of the mafia blood line.