CHAPTER FIVE.
"I have said enough, now it's your turn Perlah. Why were you running and who was chasing you that night I saved you?" Rodrigo asked.
I knew he was trying to divert my attention, but I also knew I should give answers to his questions if I needed him to say more.
"My name is Perlah Andrew, I am the only surviving child of my family, that night..." I choked on my words as the memory of that night came rushing into my head.
Tears flowed like a river fall, I silently bit my lower lips to subdue the tears and continued talking.
"that night, some unknown men badged into our house, threatened my dad with my mom while asking for a secret code and while he was contemplating it, they shot my mum. They did the same thing with my two sisters and shot them. When it was my turn, he slapped my head, kissed me, and pointed the gun through my jaw. At that moment, my father dragged the gun asking me to run. While running, I heard a gunshot and those men were running after me. Those ass wipes wiped my entire family that night and as if that wasn't enough, my first kiss was stolen away from me." I yelled out weeping loudly.
"Hey, do you care more about your first kiss or I'm just misinterpreting it?" Rodrigo asked staring at me with his eyes and mouth open.
"not really but I had everything perfectly planned out in my head," I said in deep pain still sobbing and Rodrigo didn't care to stop me from crying, adding to my pain.
"I need your help," Rodrigo suddenly blunted out.
I stared at him in shock before replying to him.
"you need my help? With what? My help is helpless." I said folding my hands beneath my breast.
"Look, I need you to believe in yourself, I can't get anyone else to do this," Rodrigo stated with a serious face.
"Okay, it depends on what it is," I said in consideration, the same thing my daddy did that killed them all; nigga was contemplating on if he should give the killers the secret code or not! I said to myself pouting.
"I'm serious Perlah," Rodrigo suddenly yelled, bringing me back to life.
"Alright I'm all ears," I yelled back.
"I need us to get married." Rodrigo bluntly said.
"Huh, us? Don't you think you need to explain better?" I asked moving backwards.
"I am not getting married to you in real sis," Rodrigo said, scoffing.
I felt my ego burning, did he just call me his sister? I was too hurt to talk to, so I kept mute and let him continue.
"We are going into a contract marriage plan to be able to obtain a fake identity and escape for a while," Rodrigo answered.
I thought about it for a while before I finally replied.
"Is this the benefit you stated for saving me?"
"not, this is a plan to keep both of us safe from our enemies for a little period.
"so, what then is the benefit?" I asked myself.
"I will leave you to give it a thought, you don't have a choice. But you could still think about it, you want to live, right?" Rodrigo asked and walked out.
I watched him leave, I could swear I was confused and the only thing I grabbed was getting married to him.
After thinking about nothing reasonable, I found no reason to not marry Rodrigo, he told me to believe in myself, and I would do just that and marry him.
After thinking about how annoying and sweet our marriage would be, I dashed to Rodrigo's room.
"Yes, I will marry you!" I blurted out from the entrance to his room.
"I'm not proposing to you Perlah, it's a contract marriage" Rodrigo replied with a raised eyebrow.
"well, it's still a marriage, isn't it?" I asked
"go get ready, dresses will be delivered soon; we are getting married in a few hours," Rodrigo replied.
My eyes widened in surprise; I didn't expect to be a married woman by law in a few hours.
"why so soon?" I asked confused.
"our enemies are at our doorstep Perlah, this is not a joke, do you want to die?" Rodrigo replied in a scolding tone.
I shivered at the mention of death and fled to my room to be ready. When I arrived, the maid stretched the dresses to me, so I quickly collected them and dashed away to wear them.
When I got ready, I went out to meet Rodrigo, he stood there looking dashing in his gray tuxedo suit.
I stood there lustfully staring at his just too-cute face until he caught me staring and signaled me to come over, I went over with my mouth open.
I went to him and he didn't even glance at me, he was talking to his chief information security officer, he seemed to be saying something to Rodrigo, and from the expression on his face, I knew something was wrong but I didn't dare to intervene in their serious talk.
They finished talking and Rodrigo called his men to give them orders, his face had never been that serious except for the time we first met, which gave me a feeling that there was fire on the mountain.
After giving them orders, his men began running around to execute their boss's order while some went in the direction of the car.
I panicked in confused fear, I couldn't get what was going on but I knew it was trouble so I gathered the courage to question Rodrigo about it.
"what's going on?" I asked trembling.
"get into the car now! Perlah," he commanded staring at me with concern written boldly on his face.
I froze in place and felt Rodrigo holding my hand and looking at me warmly.
"I need you to listen to me and get in the car, my men are there to protect you." He said and held my face.
"protect me? What about you?" I asked with concern my face becoming red and scrunched up.
"I'm behind you," Antonio replied then commanded his men to take me away.