The Kiss Thief

I stormed out of my room, stalking my way to the east wing. Sterling jumped in my way down the hall just as she exited her own room. She flung her arms in the air, cackling like a happy hen.

“Your fiancée is looking ravishing, Senator Keaton! I cannot wait for you to see how beaut…” She did not complete the sentence. I bulldozed past her wordlessly, straight to Francesca’s room. Sterling stumbled after me before I barked, “Don’t you even dream about it, you old hag.”

I threw the door to Nemesis’s room open without knocking. This time, she really did it. The clothes and ties were just money, and meaningless in the grand scheme of things. The picture, however, was priceless.

I found my bride sitting in front of her vanity mirror, wearing a tight black velvet dress—it looked like we coordinated something other than trying to stab each other—a lit cigarette dangling from the corner of her luscious lips. She was shoving mud into a pot, gardening in the middle of her bedroom, in a Chanel evening dress.

She was crazy.

And she was my crazy.

What in the fresh hell did I get myself into?

I waltzed to her briskly, plucking the cigarette from her mouth and snapping it in half in one hand. She looked up, batting her eyelashes. She was a smoker. Another thing I loathed about her, and people, in general. At this rate, I was seriously contemplating getting to know this girl just so I could destroy her more thoroughly. Even though I decided upon requesting her hand that I didn’t want to be privy to anything about her—other than, maybe, how her warm, sleek cunt felt as I pummeled into it.

“Do not smoke inside my house,” I growled. My voice leaked fury, and that pissed me off even more. I was never angry, never affected, and above all—never one to give one single fuck about anything other than myself.

She rose to her feet, slanting her head slightly with an amused smile.

“You mean our house.”

“Don’t play games with me, Nemesis.”

“Then don’t act like a toy, Narcissus.”

She was in rare form today. That was what I got for sitting at the negotiation table. Served me right. I pushed her against the wall with one, swift movement, snarling in her face.

“Where is the picture?”

Her expression switched from glee to dread, the smirk falling from her puffy lips. I looked down at her curly black eyelashes. Her eyes were marbles. Too brutally blue to look real, and I wanted her skin to match them in color as I choked her for being so stubborn. If only I’d known how much of a headache she’d be, I’d have probably resisted the temptation to take her away from her old man. But she was my problem now, and I wasn’t one to admit defeat, let alone be dominated by a teenybopper.

I thought she was going to play dumb—any other weak woman would—but Francesca was in a mood to reinforce the fact she was not a pushover. Since our deal, I’d almost been lured to believe she was contained. She went horseback riding every day and toured Northwestern, accompanied by Smithy, my driver, her pain-in-the-ass housekeeper, Clara, and her cousin, Andrea. They all arrived at my mansion as though they were about to take a tour of the White House. Cousin Andrea looked like a lost member of the Kardashians with her hair extensions, fake tan, and tight clothes. She was in the habit of snapping her gum as a method of completing a sentence. I swore, she used it as a period.

“Nice vase.” Pop.

“Are you guys legit in a relationship? Because he’s a little old.” Pop.

“Do you think you should have a bachelorette party in Cabo? I’ve never been.” Pop.

Sterling told me Francesca practiced the piano in the mornings, ate three meals a day, and gardened in her spare time.

I thought she was coming around.

I thought wrong.

“I broke it,” she said, raising her chin defiantly. She was full of surprises, this one, and today, I was particularly in the mood for an eventless evening. “By accident,” she added. “I’m not one for mindless vandalism.”

“But I am?” I took the bait, grinning. I was more concerned about the fact that the cleaners had probably tossed away the picture in the broken frame than anything else. It was the last picture I’d had of us together. It was my entire world encased in cheap glass. My bride was lucky I wasn’t above the law just yet. I could mar her beautiful neck in that moment.

She offered me a polite, cold smile. “But, of course, you are.”

“Tell me, Nemesis, what did I break of yours?” I challenged her through gritted teeth, getting farther in her face and crushing her small body with my large one.

“Why, my dear fiancé, you broke my heart and then my spirit.”