Chapter 9

Sofia’s POV “Matilda, Mrs Ricci has been waiting on you for a while now.” Sarah, the housekeeper admonished the young woman who just walked into the kitchen. The said woman footsteps slowed down as soon as she spotted me sitting by the counter. “Oh it’s fine, Sarah. I don’t mind.” I quickly added once Sarah was done admonishing the Chef, Matilda. And also because I didn’t mind waiting here in the kitchen for the chef to arrive since for one, I didn’t have any else to do and forcing down a cup of coffee while exchanging a few, polite words with Sarah was way better than me sitting on my own, doing nothing. “Hello, Mrs Ricci. I’m so sorry I took so long, the laundry wasn’t dried off yet so I thought I could wait there until it dries off finish, because I thought you’d still be in bed, tired from all the stress from the wedding ceremony, and your wedding night–” Matilda choose the moment to mention my wedding night when I was about to force down another mouthful of coffee, which made the coffee go down the wrong pipe that finally resulted in me choking and coughing on the counter while Sarah and Matilda watched wide eyed. “Matilda!” Sarah smacked Matilda’s arm and I watched as Matilda’s eyes widened in horror for a second before she started apologizing immediately. “Oh my gosh, I’m so sorry, ma’am. I didn’t mean to come off as rude or nosy, the part about your wedding night which was none of my business and it just slipped out of nowhere, I really am sorry, ma’am.” Matilda started to apologize and each time she mentioned my ‘wedding night’, my stomach was always tightening up nervously and guiltily. Sarah offered me a glass of warm water and I accepted it gratefully and quickly swallowed a little down, to wash the rest of the coffee away from the wrong part of my lungs. “It’s fine, Matilda. It really is.” I finally answered Matilda on a small sigh and she thankfully stopped apologizing. At last. “I really am sorry, ma’am.” She said again after a few seconds, a guilty expression on her matured but flawless looking face. Whelps, spoke up too soon. “Please refer to me as Sofia, and like I said, it really is fine.” “Oh, no, I can’t do that, ma’am. Can I do that?” Matilda mumbled the last part to Sarah who was currently mopping the few drops of coffee that had spilled during my coughing and choking fits. “I guess, it’s what the mistress wants, we have to do as she pleases.” Sarah replied with a small shrug of her shoulders without glancing up. “Oh, if that’s what you really want then, ma’am Sofia.” I shook my head with a tiny twitch of my lips, “No ‘ma’am’, just ‘Sofia’.” “Noted, Sofia.” “So what would you like for breakfast, m- Sofia?” She paused and glanced at me before proceeding to list a variety of a thousand dishes that she could perfectly prepare, and all I had to do to get one of those dishes for breakfast was to request it. “How about waffles?” I asked and she hesitated before continuing. “Are you sure that’s what you want? You can request for something that isn’t as basic as waffles if you really want it, you don’t have to think about putting me to any trouble seeing as this is my job, and it is my job to go to any ‘trouble’ just to prepare you what you want.” She tried reassuring me while probably thinking I had only requested something as simple as waffles because I didn’t want to put her through unnecessary stress. She had no idea I had requested for waffles because that was something I was used to eating, and probably the only food I could stomach now without throwing up. “Yes, Matilda. Not to worry, I’ll keep in mind what you’ve said and would most definitely request for whatever I want, whenever I want it since you’re here to prepare it.” I started to say and watched as she nodded her head immediately before confirming again. “So, waffles? Just waffles?” “Yes, thank you.” I answered and stretched out my arms on the counter. “It will be ready in a few minutes.” And she proceeded to prepare the said waffles, the familiar, soothing smell clouding the whole kitchen some time later. ****** Sarah ended up taking me on a tour of the whole house once I was done forcing down the food. Matilda had unreasonably heaped my plate very high, making me wonder where she wanted me to store that huge amount of food in. I only ended up stomaching a few of the waffles before giving up forcing it down when I started to feel nauseous. Matilda had not looked happy when she saw the amount of leftover food on my plate, it looked like I had barely eaten a piece of the food, the crestfallen look making me feel guilty for a fleeting moment. I’d have eaten more if I could, but I couldn’t because my stomach said ‘nope’. Sarah and I, along with Matilda who looked like a woman in her early thirties, started the tour right from the kitchen. We stopped at the dining room first and I noticed how sophisticated and sparkling, clean and beautifully expensive everything looked. The dining room was widely spaced and there was a huge television on the wall directly facing the long table which was surrounded by lots of identical chairs. We left the dining room and went into the food store, a door which adjoined the kitchen. The store contained lots and lots of food, and more ovens. There was small sized transparent glass jars which contained different kinds of seasonings and preservatives. There were some bigger cupboards in the store as well, in which lots of grain food was safely stored. We left that place and headed into the second and last adjoining door which led into the kitchen and I wondered why there was any need for another whole different room here in this kitchen. The door led into… a freezer. No, A frozen room. A frozen room which housed a lot of frozen food like different kinds of meats, vegetables, beverages, lots of frozen, liquid seasonings, and a lot more things which I didn’t bother checking out in there. Matilda and Sarah had looked at me like I had suddenly grown two heads when I asked them If I could come into the frozen room anytime. “This is your house, Mrs Ricci. Of course you can go into every part of the house whenever you like.” Matilda exclaimed like she thought I’d have figured that part out on my own since I was now married to Luca. “Oh,” I stated, not knowing what else to say. Matilda and Sarah had thankfully only smiled softly at me before turning back around and showing me different angles and corners in the frozen room. We finally left the frozen room and went from the first sitting room, to the second– and third sitting room. I had no idea people had more than one or two sitting rooms. We toured the whole house and ended the tour beside a tall black door which had tiny designs in gold and silver lining the four corners of the door. There was also a small note in a language that looked so much like Spanish, carved into the middle of the door. “I know I said you’re free to go to anywhere in this house, but this office is limited to my Ricci only. I’m sorry, ma’am.” Matilda suddenly blurted out, rephrasing the words she said to me in the frozen room. “It’s fine, Matilda. I have no interest in going in there anyway. Also, it’s ‘Sofia’ and not ‘Ma’am’.” I reassured Matilda, which was totally true. I was going completely stay out of this particular room each time Luca stay home to avoid mistakenly running into him. ****** The car gradually slowed down then came to a stop and Ethan, the guard that wasn’t behind the wheels quickly walked around the car to pull my door open for me, but not before thoroughly glancing around the surroundings to ensure there wasn’t any lurking danger. “Thank you, Ethan.” I thanked him as I alighted the car and clutched my small purse against my gown, feeling a bit uneasy. I’d have appreciated the fact that this was my first time being here, and that the whole scenery surrounding here looked really welcoming, had my stomach not been in an uncomfortable knot. I was already used to this kind of routine all through my life while growing up. Although I was already used to the guard and my dad and my brother’s driver, I most definitely wasn’t being treated like this back then. These guards were treating me like I was as fragile as an egg. Which I definitely wasn’t. Ok, maybe I am fragile. But not fragile, fragile. The dress I had changed into when the guards had announced that it was time to go get me a phone, was a warm summer dress. It went high a few inches above my knees and was a stunning black and white color. I had added a light coat of lip gloss, eyeliner and mascara to the attire. I had been wearing makeup since when I was fifteen, the age in which I had started getting treated as a part of society. Ethan led the way into the huge building we pulled up in while Ryan slowly followed closely behind. We all got into an elevator together and they kept a respective distance between our bodies while standing on both sides of my body. The elevator started it’s journey upwards and I scowled at our reflection in the elevator walls. The fact that I was in a three inches heeled sandals could only bring my head to both men’s shoulders, they were also so broad and wide looking like I appeared really petite between them. We stepped out the elevator once it stopped and made our way into an office tagged ‘High class’ and everyone in there immediately turned around to stare at us as we made our way deeper through the racks and walls of different kinds of phones, before finally arriving at the counter. “Good afternoon, Mrs Ricci.” The man standing behind the counter quickly rushed around it to stand a few feet before us and greet me. I flushed in embarrassment as the mention of the word ‘Mrs Ricci’ made more people throw more curious glances our way before everyone started murmuring all at once. Just how many people knew about my marriage that occurred yesterday? The man quickly ushered us into a smaller but very classy looking office, but not before a few people started taking pictures and videos of me. I had turned into a celebrity overnight. We were offered seats but I was the only one who ended up taking a seat, while the guards had remained standing out of respect. I declined all offers of refreshments and asked if we could quickly start checking out some of the phones. I fell in love with the new iPhone, but shrink back away from it on hearing how much it was. I hesitated some more before shrugging off the small feeling of guilt that I was spending that much of Luca’s money, a day into the marriage when I remembered that he was a freaking billionaire and wouldn’t even feel a thing at this amount of money being debited from his bank. I ended up getting the iPhone 14 pro max, and made sure I could understand all the important basics of the phone before finally exiting the office with my two guards flanking my front and back protectively. The price of the phone was directly mailed to Luca’s direct inbox, on his request. We headed straight to the bank and on alighting the car, a few paparazzis were on us immediately, trying to get me to tell them how I honestly felt about my new marriage and whatnot. Ethan dealt with them immediately, shoving them harshly to the side since they themselves never cared whether they were invading a person’s privacy or not, while Ryan led me into the bank. We made it to the last floor of the bank which was exclusively for VIPs only, and after spending about thirty minutes on signing and reviewing lots of documents and information, I finally exited the exclusive office with a sparkling black card. I headed back home that evening, with a new phone, and a black card that has no limit.