The Agreement (Darkest Lies Trilogy Book 1) by Bethany-Kris (motivational books for men .TXT) 📕

how she didn’t recognize the person who stared back at her.

Masha’s hands flitted over her face tenderly while she stood there for her, unmoving. Despite her care with the makeup brushes blending color and life into Karine’s cheeks, she was hurrying. It was apparent that Masha had received her orders, and was trying to get her ready to go as quickly as possible.

Karine wouldn’t make her job harder.

“There, all done, and now we'll put some color to your pretty lips,” Masha muttered.

This time when the older lady moved, Karine couldn’t look away fast enough. Her eyes fell on the reflection staring back. She held her face as still as possible while the pale coral lipstick was being applied to the small bow-shaped mouth that matched the rest of a face full of equally delicate features.

The dark circles she had inevitably woken up with were gone now—hidden away under the magic touch of Masha’s concealer. Her face looked bright and fresh in the mirror, alive again. But Karine knew as well as Masha—it was all a facade.

A mask.

The emptiness she felt inside was clearly reflected in her eyes. Those same ones that Masha called incomparable to the sky and ocean—they were empty.

Big, and blue ...

And empty.

Masha had moved on to her hair now, brushing it gently and over and over again till her limp dark tresses radiated with a bit of natural shine. She pinned it back out of Karine’s face neatly, and then, hooked a finger under Karine’s chin. Turning her head slowly, side to side to admire her work, she said with another smile, “Beautiful, yes? You look beautiful, child.”

Then it was time to go.

She was accustomed to this by now—coming and going when and how she was told. For as far back as she could remember, Karine was transported from one location to the next, herded along like cattle without an explanation. The reason, she was told, being that her place wasn’t to know things, but to do them.

Things she was told, of course.

Not things she wanted to do.

She had always simply accepted it as part of her life. What it meant to be a Yazov girl—the forgotten daughter of a mere man made into a king.

A very cold king.

Besides, there was nobody she could pose a question to. Masha certainly wouldn’t have the answers.

They stepped out of her bedroom together into what was an attached living area to her section of rooms. This wing of the Yazov mansion was just hers, an ecosystem for Masha and Karine to live in together, surrounded by a handful of housekeepers and the men who kept watch from a respectable distance as to not intrude more than they needed to.

It wasn’t like they worried about her running.

Who would she run to?

On the table near the kitchen counter, where Karine usually had her meals, she spotted some drawings strewn everywhere. She didn’t recognize them and stopped to look. At first they appeared to be violent scribbles, like something a child would draw if given some crayons and color pencils to go wild with.

“Where did these come from?” Karine asked, her hand trembling from the after-effects of too much alcohol and mixed medications, as she held the drawings closer. “Isn’t that ...”

Vaguely, she recognized the hastily drawn faces of the people on the page—the rage twisting expressions dark between the men made her blink to take in the image again. On one of the drawings, the name Katee had been written on the top-right corner like a signature—the signature of a child if the loopy writing could be trusted.

Katee.

Masha was at her side before she could ask again, already plucking the drawings from her hand and pulling her away from the table toward the door. “Your father is waiting—today isn’t the day to be late, Karine.”

She spoke sweetly.

The words said it all, though.

Masha acted like nothing was amiss.

Nothing new to see.

Karine glanced back at the trashcan where Masha stuffed the drawings as they passed. “But—”

“Your eyes look a little cloudy,” Masha interjected, bringing her attention right back in an instant.

Weren’t eyes supposed to be the windows to the soul? Did the emptiness in hers mean she didn’t have one of those left, either?

“Maybe I can help with that—something to perk you up before you start your day?”

Even though there was a part of Karine that wondered what the rest of her day would look like if she didn’t take the pill—the present, more prevalent part of her instinctively brightened at the possibility of Prozac. One of her caretaker’s favorite medications to keep on hand because Karine preferred it in the daytime.

Masha made one appear seemingly out of nowhere, offering it without a second thought. Karine popped one in her mouth and gulped it back dry, enjoying the chalky bitterness it brought to the back of her tongue.

It really shouldn’t be mixed with liquor.

Or a hangover.

And yet ...

Karine had never once questioned where the medication came from or how it was available in such great quantity seeing as how Masha never ran out.

Why did it have to matter?

Life was better this way.

Easier.

The world owed her it.

At the very least.

By the time Masha led Karine out of the mansion’s wing and down the long corridor leading to the doors that separated into her father’s living quarters, her mind was already lighter; breathing wasn’t such a burden.

Prozac was good for that.

• • •

Standing in her father’s massive kitchen—a space she was sure he had never once put to use to make a meal—Karine understood why Masha had gone to such an effort to dress and try to make her look presentable. She tried not to be bitter about said reason.

That was easier said than done.

Dima’s voice droned on, too loud—and way too close—in her ears while he spoke on the phone. He hadn’t got off the call even when she walked in with Masha, acknowledging her with merely a grunt under his breath and a nod of his square chin.

She stood in the middle of the