Page 113 of King of Ashes
He drags a hand down his face, looking tired. “Everything can wait, for all I care.”
It’s been one week since we buried his uncle, and I said we should wait to inform the other families that I am going to be the Underboss.
I would rather die than continue supporting him. My dream of a family, of being partners in every way, has been poisoned, and my insides churn in the acid of his betrayal.
Grief has made him sharper to outside threats but mellow with me, which works to my advantage.
We never think the one we love could be the one to betray us the worst.
Yet, I am staring at him.
And he’s staring at me.
Only one knows the truth, and it’s me for the first time.
Play this right, I urge myself. My jet is waiting for me. Everything is ready for my escape, and then war will ensue—one the underworld has never witnessed before, between wife andhusband. I don’t care about losing. I will either win or die. It’s that simple.
I can’t kill him because of that stupid blood oath, but I will dismantle him just like he did me.
I, who married to maintain neutrality, will send the underworld to the brink of war. But by then, it won’t matter.
I only care about taking everything he built apart, piece by piece, just like he does so expertly in his line of business.
He eats the distance between us, backing me into the wall, and kisses me with such ferocity that my knees go weak. I wonder if he tastes my hatred while I melt under his toxic touch, moan my poisoned pleasure, hoping it will infect his blood and turn it black—black like the heart in my chest, black like my sight.
I hate him.
Hate his wicked tongue.
Hate his passionate mouth.
Hate his addictive touch.
But most of all, I hate that my body still reacts, like a captive grateful to her captor for not killing her. He Stockholm-syndromed me so well that I never even dared to think him capable of such crass deceit. I let myself be fooled, believing in asinine coincidences, interpreting his words to make sense when they didn’t.
“So hot and fiery for me,” he groans, drunk with desire while I am drunk on vengeance.
It’s what makes me give in to the kiss, grind against him, and claw my fingers into his chest when all I wish is to rip his heart out and stomp on it, leaving it bruised and battered at my feet just like my spirit.
This is not lovemaking. It’s a declaration of war hidden beneath a torn white flag.
He caused me so much pain, even if he made me orgasm a million times, flooding my being with pleasure, it would not suffice to forget.
Forgive the man who butchered my soul and splintered my rationality?
This man I would have made a father.
This man, whose side I would have stood by as his loving wife and devoted partner.
Tears well in my eyes, thick with frustration, my heavy lids closing against excruciating heartache. If I don’t look at him, maybe the pain will become bearable.
He nibbles along my neck, fooling my body into feeling pleasure while his presence is the worst torment.
Three and a half months. I’ve spent fourteen weeks married to the enemy.
I might be free of the shackles of this fake love, but I won’t ever escape him. It’s irrelevant. He owes me for living in pain, for playing me.
My father raised me after my mother abandoned me. I never cared about finding her, believing him when he told me she cared more about drugs than me. I didn’t ask why.
