Stuck on You (Steamy Enemies To Lovers Rom Com)

“I still can’t give you the ring.”

“Why? Because you’re afraid of being stuck with me forever? If it’s a real marriage, and you want it to look real, wouldn’t your granny be suspicious if you didn’t give me the ring?”

“We have a week before we announce we’re engaged. I’m going to take the ring to a jeweler who does custom work and get them to make a duplicate.”

“That’s crazy.”

“It might be crazy,” Ash bites out, “But I’m not taking the chance.”

“Says the man who says he’s too grown up for curses and nonsense like this, who says he won’t let his life be ruled by his granny’s crazy theories, who inherited that ring years ago and just kept it sitting in a box in his house. Were you maybe waiting for it to guide you like a freaking magic compass to the love of your life? Well, it’s laughable because you made a pact with your brother and cousins to never fall in love. Because love is nonsense, and everyone knows monogamy and old-fashioned notions of two people being together for life don’t work in modern society. Your parents, aunt and uncle were fine examples for you guys I’m sure.”

Ba-zing! Dang. I give serious props to Meryl right now. I didn’t like her at first sight because she was blonde and too pretty, and she looked like a ditz, but she’s honestly pretty smart. She does need to lady-up and use real swears, though. Freaking doesn’t exactly cut it in my books. Not that I go around dropping cuss words anywhere except in my head because I know how childish it makes a person look. Maybe she’s the same in that she says it in her brain but filters it with her mouth.

But also, seriously??? A fake marriage? How great does it get? This is going to make for the best story ever if I play my cards right. I have it recorded too, so they can’t even deny it. Good gravy—ha, now who’s using non-swearing euphemisms—I wonder if this could land me some serious cash. I could sell this story to some rag who wants to be the first to break it. Asherly Cromwell and Meryl Burbank are rich, so it makes them fair game. People like reading about the rich being sneaky, scammy, and bad more than they like to read about happy marriages and philanthropy.

“Do you really have it here?” Meryl suddenly asks. “The ring?”

“Yes…” Ash trails off, belatedly realizing his mistake. “I have it.”

“Can you get it? I want to see it. I want to just…I don’t know. I want to look at it. I want to see if it really is cursed.”

“Neither of us believe that.”

“But still, you clearly kind of do because you’ve made pacts related to it. One, don’t fall in love because love isn’t real. And two, don’t let your life be ruled by crazy cursed heirlooms that your granny hands out willy nilly.”

“Meryl…”

“Please? Just let me see it, and I’ll go. I have to catch a flight in a few hours back to New York anyway. Let me just look at it, and I promise I’ll never bring it up again—not the ring, not the curse, nothing. I’ll be back next week, and you’ll have the new ring ready. Then, we can announce our engagement and get ready to live the next few years with radio silence and zero interference in our personal lives from overbearing family members.”

I guess it doesn’t matter how much money a guy has. There are things guys don’t like, and one of those is being nagged. Ash can tell he’s not going to win this one, so maybe that makes him smarter than I thought.

“Alright. Just wait here.”

Oh shit! For real? I have to see this. I have my phone in my other pocket, and I quickly dig it out because, uh, who the heck wouldn’t want to get this recorded? The audio might not be as good as my recorder, still!

Meryl has her back to the top of the stairs, and Ash has walked off. I make a fast break for it, scrambling from the couch over to the side of the stairs where they curve. That should hide me from view, but I can still get a pretty good shot of this going down. I get out my rag to make it look like I’m dusting something, though what, I don’t know because all that’s around the impressive staircase with the dark iron banister and metal scrollwork is a bunch of air.

I very nearly lose my courage when I hear Ash’s heavy steps coming back, but nope. That’s not going to happen. This one is for my dad.

V meets engeance.

Yup, it’s time for vengeance.

Ash comes back, a little black velvet box held out in front of him like it really does have some terrible voodoo curse stuff going on with it. Meryl actually gasps, and not a good sound either, while I find myself sucking in a silent breath. All of a sudden, my hand does something silly. It wavers, or maybe it’s a giant tremor going through my arm, and Ash cracks the box.