The Oracle's Revenge: My Purchased Marriage

Sunlight didn't filter into the room; it assaulted it. The harsh morning rays cut through the floor-to-ceiling windows of the Tribeca penthouse, landing directly on Heda Roman's face.

She woke with a gasp, her body a map of dull aches. Her lower back throbbed, a rhythmic reminder of the cold transaction disguised as intimacy that had taken place hours ago. She didn't move immediately. It was a rare and calculated command performance; at the Hamptons estate, they slept in separate wings. Here, in this glass box in the sky, she was entirely his property. Instead, her hand slid under the pillow, fingers trembling slightly until they brushed the cold, hard plastic of the invisible earpiece.

It was still there. Good.

The sound of the bathroom door handle turning made her flinch. Instantly, her breathing shallowed, her posture collapsing inward. The door swung open, slamming against the marble wall. A cloud of steam billowed out, followed by Gustavus English.

He wore only a towel low on his hips. Water droplets clung to the dark hair on his chest, trailing down to the defined ridges of his abdomen. He looked like a statue carved from resentment. On his shoulder, a fresh red scratch mark stood out against the pale skin-her mark.

He didn't look at her like a husband. He looked at her like a stain on his Egyptian cotton sheets.

Heda instinctively grabbed the duvet, pulling it up to her chin. She scrambled backward, pressing herself into the corner of the headboard, widening her eyes. It was a practiced motion. The frightened doe. The girl from the trailer park who had never seen sheets with a thread count higher than two hundred.

Gustavus walked to the bedside table. He didn't speak. The silence in the room was heavy, suffocating, filled with the unspoken toxicity of the night before.

He pulled a checkbook from his discarded suit jacket.

Scritch. Scratch.

The sound of the fountain pen tearing across the paper was louder than a scream in the quiet room. He ripped the check out with a sharp snap.

He didn't hand it to her. He let it go in the air above her.

The slip of paper fluttered down, the sharp edge grazing her cheek before landing on the duvet. Heda didn't flinch. She let a single tear slide down her nose. It was perfect timing.

Her hand shook as she picked it up.

$2,000,000.

Two million dollars.

Inside her chest, Heda Roman felt nothing but cold amusement. The English Group's stock fluctuated more than this in a single second of bad trading. She could burn this check and not feel the heat. But Heda, the girl from Appalachia, stared at the zeros as if they were a lifeline.

"Service fee," Gustavus said. His voice was gravel, rough from disuse and the meds. "Last night was a mistake."

Heda bit her lip, forcing her voice to pitch higher, layering on the thick twang of the mountains. "I thought we were... husband and wife."

Gustavus let out a short, cruel laugh. He reached out, his fingers digging into her jaw, forcing her face up. His eyes were empty.

"Don't method act with me, hillbilly. You aren't my wife. You are a shield I bought to keep the vultures on the board away from my carcass."

He shoved her face away, disgust radiating off him in waves. He turned his back to her, dropping the towel to dress. The muscles in his back bunched tight, a roadmap of tension and repressed rage.

Heda moved.

In the split second he was turned, her "frightened" demeanor vanished. Her eyes went sharp. Her hand darted out, plucking the tiny black listening device from the edge of the nightstand where it had been placed. With a practiced, silent motion, she pressed it firmly into the sticky underside of the collar on his discarded suit jacket, tucking it deep into the seam.

Gustavus pulled on his shirt, fastening the cufflinks with aggressive precision. The wall of ice was back up. The Wall Street shark had returned.

He grabbed a hanger from the chair and threw a garment bag at her. It hit the bed with a thud.

"Put it on. We go back to the Hamptons in an hour."

Heda pulled the fabric out. It was a Chanel suit. Pink. Tweed. Expensive, but on her, it would look like a costume. Like a child playing dress-up.

"I have class," she whispered, clutching the suit. "I'm in college."

Gustavus paused, his hand on his tie. He looked at her reflection in the mirror, his lip curling.

"That etiquette class at whatever community college you go to? Don't make me laugh."

Heda lowered her head, hiding the flash of ice in her eyes. It was Columbia University. Finance. Top of her class. But he didn't need to know that. Not yet.

"Yes, Gustavus," she mumbled.

He stormed out, slamming the door hard enough to rattle the window panes.

The moment his footsteps faded down the hall, Heda's tears stopped. Instantly. It was as if someone had turned off a faucet.

She threw the duvet off and sprinted to the bathroom, turning the shower on full blast to create a wall of white noise. She reached behind the toilet tank, her fingers finding the waterproof bag taped to the porcelain.

She pulled out an old Blackberry. It looked like a relic, but the software inside was military-grade.

Her thumbs flew over the keypad. Green code cascaded down the screen.

English Group Short Position: 15% Established.

She looked at herself in the mirror. The bruise on her neck was darkening.

"I'll take the interest on last night out of your stock price, Gustavus," she whispered.

The phone buzzed. A text from Roxy.

'Oracle', massive buy order coming in from the Cayman Islands is sweeping English stock. Looks like a counter-move.

Heda frowned. Her reflection looked back, sharp and dangerous.

Negative. It's not us. Trace it.

A horn honked from the street below. The summons.

Heda shoved the phone back into its hiding spot. She pulled on the pink Chanel suit. It was tight in the shoulders. She looked in the mirror and practiced a smile-timid, greedy, pathetic.

She opened the door. The Oracle was gone. The hillbilly was back.

The interior of the Maybach smelled like leather and old money. The partition was up, sealing them in a soundproof capsule of tension.

Heda slid onto the seat, clutching her cheap canvas tote bag against her chest. Inside, buried under a change of clothes, was a burner phone.

Gustavus was already on a video call. He didn't look up when she entered. He just held up a hand, silencing her before she could even breathe. His eyes flicked over her pink suit, a smirk touching his lips. He enjoyed seeing her look ridiculous. It confirmed his superiority.

He closed the laptop with a snap. The silence that followed was heavier than the air outside.

"Caspian is back," Gustavus said.

He didn't look at her. He looked out the window at the blurring cityscape.

Heda's heart slammed against her ribs. Her fingers tightened on the canvas strap until her knuckles turned white. The name was a physical blow.

Caspian.

The memory flashed-the roar of a bulldozer, the dust choking the air, a young man in a designer suit standing in front of the orphanage, laughing as the walls came down.

Gustavus turned, his gaze narrowing. He was a predator sensing a change in heart rate. "You know him?"

Heda forced her lungs to expand. She blinked, widening her eyes in feigned confusion.

"Who? That movie star brother of yours? I seen him in the magazines at the grocery store."

Gustavus studied her for three long seconds. He was looking for a crack.

"Don't get any ideas," he sneered. "He may play the celebrity, but he has a Wharton degree he loves to wave around. Thinks it makes him legitimate. He eats little things like you for breakfast. And he doesn't leave crumbs."

"I only listen to you, Mr. Gustavus," Heda said, dropping her gaze to her lap.

"Gustavus," he corrected sharply. "Drop the 'Mister'. We are playing the happy couple today."

The car slowed, turning through the massive iron gates of the English estate in the Hamptons. The house loomed against the gray sky, a stone monstrosity that looked more like a fortress than a home.

Gustavus reached out. His hand clamped around her wrist, yanking her across the leather seat.

Heda gasped as she collided with his chest. It was hard, unyielding.

His fingers went to her collar, roughly undoing the top button. He pulled the fabric aside, exposing the purple mark on her collarbone.

"Why are you hiding it?" His voice was cold, clinical. "That is my receipt. I need the board to see it."

Heda felt bile rise in her throat. She was property. An asset with a depreciation schedule.

"Yes, Gustavus."

The car stopped. The door opened.

Gustavus's face transformed. The scowl vanished, replaced by a soft, possessive smile. He wrapped an arm around her waist, pulling her flush against him.

"Ready, darling?" he asked, loud enough for the staff to hear.

They walked into the foyer. The air smelled of expensive lilies and rotting ambition.

Celsa Knowles stood at the bottom of the grand staircase. She wore silk that cost more than Heda's childhood home. Her smile was a razor blade.

"Gustavus," she purred. Her eyes slid to Heda, looking at her like she was something the cat dragged in. "And this must be the... investment. Two million, was it?"

Heda shrank back, making herself small.

Gustavus's grip on her waist tightened to the point of pain.

"Watch your tone, Celsa. This is Mrs. English."

Celsa laughed, a tinkling, hollow sound. "Of course. Oh, by the way, Caspian is in the study. He brought a gift for his new... sister-in-law."

Heda's right eye twitched. A gift.

"Go change," Gustavus muttered into her ear, his breath hot. "Put on something that doesn't make you look like a strawberry milkshake. Don't embarrass me."

He released her and strode toward the study, leaving her standing alone in the cavernous hall.

Heda watched him go. She was trapped in a castle with dragons, and her only weapon was a burner phone and a lie.

The guest room was cold. It was decorated in muted beiges and creams, impersonal and stiff.

The moment the maid closed the door, Heda locked it.

She ripped the burner phone from her bag. A red alert flashed on the screen.

WARNING: Counter-attack on short position. Source IP masked.

Roxy's text followed: They are squeezing us, Heda. I can't hold the line from here. I need the server access.

Heda cursed. She needed an untraceable connection. The Wi-Fi here was monitored; Gustavus would see every keystroke.

She stripped off the pink suit, kicking it into the corner. She pulled on her faded jeans and a grey hoodie. She opened the french doors to the balcony.

She knew the layout. She had studied the blueprints of this house for three years before she ever met Gustavus.

She swung her legs over the railing, finding the sturdy trellis hidden by the ivy. She climbed down, silent as a shadow.

She avoided the main drive, slipping through the blind spot of the perimeter cameras near the rose garden. She headed for the old, dilapidated boathouse at the edge of the property, a place no one had visited in years.

Inside, hidden beneath a loose floorboard, was a Pelican case. She opened it, revealing a satellite modem and a ruggedized laptop. This was her real office.

Her fingers were a blur. She routed her connection through three different countries. She saw the buy orders-clumsy, aggressive. Someone was trying to artificially inflate the stock.

Not today.

She executed a complex algorithm, a "ladder attack" that made it look like the market was losing faith. The stock dipped. Then it dived.

She locked in the profit.

Heda exhaled, leaning back against the damp wood. She checked the trace. The counter-attack IP... it ended in .eng.grp. It was coming from inside the house.

She packed up, her heart rate finally slowing. She was hungry. A sandwich. She needed a sandwich.

She slipped out of the estate through a break in the fence she'd created months ago and walked into the small, exclusive village of East Hampton.

She walked out of a small deli, blinking in the afternoon sun, a sandwich wrapper crinkling in her hand.

A black Bentley rolled up to the curb, silent and menacing. It cut off her path.

The back window rolled down.

Gustavus sat in the shadows. His face was a mask of fury.

Heda froze.

Gustavus got out. He didn't care about the tourists watching. He marched up to her, backing her against the quaint, shingled wall of the deli.

"Who gave you permission to leave the estate?" he hissed.

"I... I have an online class," Heda stammered, hugging her tote bag which now held her laptop. "It's required. If I miss the submission deadline, I get expelled."

Gustavus snatched the bag from her. He ripped the zipper open.

He pulled out a textbook. Principles of Macroeconomics. It was dog-eared and used.

He laughed, tossing it back at her. "Macroeconomics? You? What's the point? You think you're going to work on Wall Street?"

"I just want to get a good job," Heda whispered, looking at her shoes. "To pay you back."

The anger in Gustavus's eyes faltered. It was replaced by a smug satisfaction. She was trying to pay him back. She was pathetic.

"You are my wife. My asset. You go where I say you go."

He grabbed her arm, dragging her toward the car. "Get in. We have a charity gala tonight."

"But I don't have a dress..."

"I'll have one sent. Now."

He shoved her into the backseat.

As the car pulled away, Heda looked out the rear window.

Standing across the street, exiting a boutique with a shopping bag in hand, was a man in a casual suit.

Caspian.

He was smiling. A knowing, shark-like smile. He lifted his hand in a small, mocking wave.

Heda felt the blood drain from her face. He had seen her. He had seen her being manhandled into Gustavus's car.

Gustavus saw her shiver. "Save the tears," he said coldly. "You have a performance tonight."