The Bodyguard: A BWWM Bad Body Romance(3)
“Oh, come now, Juliet. Call me Papa. I’m sure my son will make an honest woman of you soon enough.”
The young woman’s heart constricted in her chest at the nightmare the suggestion brought to the forefront of her mind. Married to Solomon? Forced to do his bidding, night and day, for the rest of her life?
She might kill herself first.
“Don’t look so enthusiastic.” Caesar’s smile widened and Juliet’s heart leapt into her throat. His grip on her hand tightened until she was breathless with the pain of it. “You would be privileged to take the Aguiler name.”
Juliet nodded frantically, her breath coming in between sharp huffs of discomfort. “Now, come. Solomon is waiting for you.” As if she could have resisted. Caesar all but dragged her to the dining room, where the entire family, plus Blackjack, had assembled for breakfast.
To any untrained eye, the Aguilers might appear to be a commonplace upper crust, aristocratic family. They lived in a multimillion-dollar mansion. They all dressed impeccably, they commanded a staff of over thirty people and they spent money like water. But that money, as well as the Aguilers’ hearts, were as black as coal.
Solomon and his father were the worst, but Sophia and her daughter America weren’t much better. They were cruel, calculating and loved to lord their power over anyone weaker than them. On some days, Juliet couldn’t decide whether they or Solomon tormented her more.
“I was just about to go get you.” Solomon yanked her down in the chair beside him, his expression, somehow, even more irate than before. “What took you so long?”
“I...fell. In the shower. It was the best excuse she could think of and, hopefully, one that wouldn’t result in punishment.
“Graceless,” Sophia’s reply was instant. Even at close to fifty, she was a beautiful woman, with glossy black hair and dark, exotic hazel eyes. It was too bad her mouth was screwed into a disfiguring sneer at least ninety percent of the time, “I still don’t understand what you see in this one, Solomon.”
“Don’t start, Madre,” Solomon rebutted instantly in warning. “She has a nice voice, and she’s cute. And she’s only mine.” Solomon’s pride was Juliet’s shame. He was the first and only man she’d ever been with - he obviously got off on the fact. Several times, she’d considered sleeping with other men in an attempt to get him to cast her out, but Juliet strongly suspected that Solomon would just kill her in his rage.
And, unfortunately, she wasn’t brave enough to face that.
“I would think you’d have gotten bored of her by now,” America piped up, sipping an espresso from an absurdly small cup, “Only so many times you can listen to someone sing.” She, unlike her mother, was no looker - but she had no problem luring men in like flies. Or, rather, like a spider. Boyfriends who crossed the twenty-year-old often ended up running for their lives.
“Well, I’ve been listening to your bullshit for twenty years without offing you yet,” Solomon’s smart retort earned a death glare from America. Before she could say a single word in rebuke, however, Caesar silenced them both.
“Callate. I refuse to start the day like this.” He shot both his children warning glares filled with such malice that they immediately fell silent. While America was cowed almost completely, Solomon glared hatefully at his father a moment before digging into his breakfast. The air was so thick with tension it could have been cut with their knives - it was an environment Juliet never found conducive to eating. There had been rumors circling for years that Solomon had it out for his father, and she had no issue at all believing it. She had never really seen them behave like father and son - more like two animals constantly hunting one another.
One of them was going to end up dead - and sooner rather than later.
“Solomon, have you completed the preparations for tonight?” Caesar finally spoke again after a moment of obedient silence.
“Everything should be fine,” the younger man replied sullenly, making Caesar’s eyes narrow.
“Look at me when I’m talking to you, chico.” If looks could kill, the Aguiler patriarch would have been dead on the spot.
“Everything is finished, Dad.”
Juliet took a steadying breath. Was it too much to hope that they’d murder one another over breakfast giving her an opening to escape?
“And you’re ready for the performance, Juliet?” When Caesar’s attention shifted to her, Juliet stiffened, nodding immediately. There was no possibility of not being ready. If the Aguilers depended on her to be the main event at their soiree of killers and drug kingpins, then that was what she would have to do. Anything else was suicide. “Everything will be perfect,” Caesar emphasized, looking to each member of his family in turn.
His demands were law - of that they were all quite aware.
Truth be told, Juliet had almost forgotten that tonight was the big party. Caesar threw the same event year after year, and the number of attendees grew annually. It was, in her opinion, a way to cement his power - both to show off his wealth and to warn those under him that he was always watching.
And she would be on stage for half the night.
Heaven help her.
Evening fell far too quickly for Juliet. Thankfully, Solomon was too busy with last minute preparations to be bothered with her, so she spent her day in their room, trying to calm her nerves. She was already under enough pressure when it came to spending time with the Aguiler family - being plunged into a world built up of the people that did their dirty work for them was a living nightmare.