Chapter 356

The casino is pretty much the same story all over. Dated and worn but has so much potential for a buyer with enough cash to inject into the place. It’s busy the entire hour we are here, with never-ending pings and tinkling noises from the slot machines, and the croupiers on the casino floor have people at every table. The addiction is severe in Vegas and the shattered dreams and empty pockets of many a soul is to be had. It’s a sign though that it’s a money maker, with a ready-made customer base who won’t go anywhere, anytime soon.

The manager tells us that the owner is simply not interested in his casino anymore and injected his cash into his new nineteen-year-old bride and their mansion in the Bahamas. He’s not looking to pay out money to update the décor and wants a fast sale to the highest bidder to retire in peace and live out his days with his child bride. So, a perfect opportunity for a master of making cash like Alexi. He has the funds to pour into it and the drive to make it work.

I mentally high five the old man’s gold-digging wife though. Clearly set her eyes on a goal and will end up a very rich widow if she knows how to screw him into an early grave. I always thought it was the route I would one day take, but I guess I lucked out and found myself a billionaire whose money is the least important thing to me. The man himself, with none of it, would be enough. I would follow Alexi if he was broke and homeless.

Talking of which, he hasn’t let go of my hand the entire time we have been here, making me feel better somehow. My calming rock who seems to sense that it’s only his touch that is keeping me from rolling back into that fragile mess I was in the car. I think he might be right. I still feel a tad shaky in terms of mental stability on the whole waking up hitched thing, but I’m trying not to think about it at all.

Removing the shards of panic and hysteria a little at a time as he keeps me lassoed to him no matter where we go. The only time he did let me go was when I went to the ladies’ room to fix my god-awful reflection. Cursed at his lie, the one telling me I looked beautiful. Clearly, the shithead just wanted me to get out of the car and I looked like someone had poured the contents of my makeup bag down my face. Luckily, I always carry a patch up kit in my bag and he had the sense to bring it with him while abducting me from our hotel room. Not that looking normal once more changed baldy’s attitude towards me in any way.

It’s obvious that being labelled wife is a huge shift in how men of his world treat women like me though. They are staying respectful and wary of how to respond when I chirp in with my two cent’s worth. Listening when I talk and kissing my arse as much as they are kissing his. Seems they have a fear that annoying me will get them some sort of backhanded wallop in the face. Maybe a throat punch.

I’m now seeing what it is my clever man was trying to show me when we arrived. Putting me in the centre, bringing focus to my needs. He always was a man of action over words.

That by his side, bearing his name, I’m treated in a whole different manner by all those around me. It doesn’t just give me protection from wannabe Mafia whores with a penchant towards abductions and murder; it forces respect where I no longer have to take any shit from any man in his domain anymore. Well, from anyone. Alexi is literally the only man alive who won’t get shot in the head for pissing me off now that I’m deemed worthy of a title. It’s weird.

Alexi was pointing out that my importance just skyrocketed and suddenly made me a valuable figure in the room. I’m not a broken street rat or whore anymore. My past wiped clean with one little matrimonial ceremony.

I don’t need to take crap from anyone, as long as I’m his wife. Something new for my brain to pull apart and think about when I get back to the hotel and try to face my crippling fears once again. The benefits of being owned.

I had to see it for myself, and as I walk around amused with the complete change in how I’m being treated by mere men, I lose a little more of that internal tight, claustrophobic insanity that was spiralling around me in the car. Realising that I have a power I never expected.

I’m doing my best as Camilla. Sexy, purring kitty with long claws and my manner is once again becoming natural as we walk around surveying our new abode. Relaxing into the role that is second nature and forgetting that earlier I was a sobbing mess in his lap and he was my gentle consoler. She can exist when she is alone with him, I see that now. Out here we have roles to play.

He’s now all Mafia mode, tall, straight, cool. Silent mostly, but those eyes see everything. The best part is, he doesn’t have to pretend about us anymore, no matter who is here. I’m not a worthless mistress he has to hide like a shameful, dirty secret for fear of being used against him. I’m something worthy, for the first time in my life. If they touch me now, he will start world war three.

I’m walking around linked to him, basking in his attention even though it’s subtle. Alexi plays this as he always does. Deadpan with that face that doesn’t tell you a damn thing about what’s going on behind those eyes, although my gift in reading him is filtering back, now I’m calm. He asks very specific questions at random times and more than once gets our red-faced tour guide squirming with replies. Quick, smart and observant.

I can tell the so-called security men are also intimidated by him as they go above and beyond to run after his arse the entire walk around. They watch him like an eagle but keep their distance and practically recoil when he turns his gaze on any of them. It’s sad to watch, albeit amusing.

I kind of like that he has this insane gift of instilling fear in men without even trying. It’s definitely rekindling the horn factor in my underwear, even if my head is still a huge messy pile of poop. I feel like I’m walking around in a floaty dream and nothing is real anymore. An alternate universe and nothing is touching me emotionally.

Weirdly disconnected now. Maybe it’s emotional exhaustion combined with major booze recovery.

The penthouse floors are not overly inspiring when we get there. Not if it’s to be our future love nest, and I can see where we will rip down walls and have the floor plan rearranged. The whole place reeks of an owner on his last legs of life, and it hasn’t been updated in about twenty years or more.

Old dark wood, lots of seventies panelling and musty greens and golds in the décor. It has an air of a gentleman’s smoking club and not ‘us’ at all. I actually miss Alexi’s apartment and long to go back and curl up on the bed with him and Lync. That damn mutt. Craving to go home to something familiar and safe.

The longer we are in Vegas the more I miss New York, but I don’t think it’s the city. I think it’s all that has happened lately; I need a little quiet, normal, and time hiding away in his house to get my bearings.

We wander, we inspect, we both look bored before he drags me with him to the door and makes it clear we are done, and he wants to go. He has seen enough.

Alexi leaves them with a smile, a nod, and tells them his lawyers will contact Mr Addleson’s representative to proceed with an offer befitting what he has seen. He doesn’t hint either way what that will be or give any insight as to whether he was impressed by the place. Usual for him. Locked away behind those eyes that devour souls left in his wake. He could either loathe it or love it and they have no clue at all.

In the car, he pretty much says, ‘It will be ours’. And that little mischievous look tells me he probably already decided that long before he saw it. That clever mind knows down to the dime what he will pay, and I don’t doubt he will get it for what he wants to spend. He is very persuasive that way.

I mean, he convinced me in less than a week to trust, love and live with him; here we are, walking around hand in hand deciding on a future together when my first instinct was a refusal and to run. He has skills, this one. I always underestimate him.

It won’t be cheap, this little future ‘Camlexi’ home, and the revamp alone is sickening to think about. I don’t like to pry into Alexi’s financial business but even I know it will be a huge risk investing in the place if he offers too much. It worries me that he’s biting off more than he can chew.

I hate to admit though, that deep down the whole thing is exciting, doubts aside. The thought of one day getting to walk around the updated Casino and live upstairs when Lexi no longer has to play kingpin of New York. Something away from the crime world and debauchery of the sex club. Something moderately respectable where I won’t have to lie about what I do for a living.

It got my heart racing and my pulse rattling as I eyed up rooms and fittings galore on the way back downstairs; I tried to envision what my touch could do to the place. All other niggles and thoughts and fears locked down tight while looking beyond our current dilemma to a future where he still belongs with me.

To have a place like that as a retirement plan sounds like my idea of heaven.

Alexi doesn’t say much to me on the drive back to the hotel; I’m curled up against him with my head on his shoulder trying to nap. Still needing a connection to him. Afraid the overwhelming feelings and thoughts will strangle me half to death if I stop having bodily contact and allow my mind to wander. So, I stay close, remind myself of his touch, and focus on everything but how I felt when I woke up this morning. Pushing it aside with all my might.

He’s on his phone, anyway, talking through details with Mico while I try to block out how shitty I feel, physically. Nausea, headache, just generally yuck. Numb and bleurgh is the only way to sum it up. Eyes heavy and brain trying so hard to power down and zone out. I need to sleep.

My hangover hit its worst point of the day after I ate that club sandwich. Food made me feel ill, and I had to act my arse off for the rest of the hour to seem like I was on top form. Now I can lie here and just die, suffering like crazy. I all but held vomit in my throat the whole time and drank about three bottles of water to keep it down.

Back in the room, led by Alexi carrying the shoes I threw off in the car, he lets me go to pad to the bedroom, brushing his hand over my arse and giving me an adoring smile as we finally part ways. He throws my shoes down and immediately goes to the couch to retrieve his laptop bag. I watch him as I head to bed. Tired and eager to lie down. I know he’ll be focused on the casino and his brain will be brimming with everything he asked about, for a while. I leave him to do what he must do. Email, call, speak to his lawyers, and do Alexi things.

We need to talk, but for now, I need a bed, aspirin, and a dark room, more than I need to talk about where we go from here, in terms of marriage.

I have to get some of that under control on my own and really evaluate today.

I was scared that he had a possessive hold on me in the form of a legal document calling me his, but the entire morning he was exactly who I have come to love and depend on. No change, no lording over me. Instead, he tried to show me the positives this one simple thing can have on my existence beyond what it is between us. It offers me an opportunity to no longer be cast down and trampled on in his world while still surviving within its boundaries.

It’s a way to get that happy life and still be connected to the darkness he needs to thrive within. He is giving me the protection I never knew was possible. If I can come to terms with the reasons why I don’t want it, then maybe I can live with it.

I have a lot to think about in terms of what this actually means, beyond becoming a prisoner in my own hellish mind.