My Fiancé Married Me To His Brother

The rhythmic thud of the windshield wipers was the only sound inside the cabin of the Rolls-Royce. Outside, the sky over the southern city had torn open, dumping sheets of gray water onto the pavement.

Delia sat in the back seat, her spine not touching the leather. She watched her reflection in the darkened glass. The woman staring back at her looked bored. Her eyelids were heavy, her posture slack. She looked like Delia Fitzgerald, the youngest daughter of a dynasty, a medical school dropout who spent more time shopping than studying.

She adjusted the corners of her mouth. A little lower. More petulant. Perfect.

"We have arrived, Miss Fitzgerald," the driver said.

Delia didn't answer immediately. She let a beat of silence pass, the way a spoiled child would. Then she pushed the door open before the valet could reach it.

Her red-bottomed heel hit the soaked red carpet. Water splashed her ankle. She didn't flinch. She let out an exaggerated sigh, checking her phone as if the weather were a personal affront to her existence.

She walked through the metal detector. Her eyes flicked up. To the left. To the right. Cameras. Blind spots. Exit routes. The analysis took less than a second. Her brain cataloged the security grid of The Zenith Club while her face registered only mild annoyance at the humidity affecting her hair.

Ansel Gibson was waiting at the end of the long corridor.

He stood with his back to her, his shoulders tight. He was looking at a painting on the wall as if it held the secrets to the universe, but his foot was tapping a frantic rhythm against the floorboards.

"Ansel," she said.

He spun around.

The reaction was immediate. He took three sharp steps back, his hand flying up to cover his nose and mouth. His eyes widened, not with attraction, but with a visceral, biological panic.

"Stay there," he muffled through his hand.

Delia stopped, cocking her head. "Ansel, honey, are you okay?"

"Delia, we're done," he said. The words were rushed, muffled by his palm. "I can't do this anymore. I don't want you harassing my family about this."

A cold, sharp laugh bubbled in her chest, but she strangled it. On the surface, she raised her eyebrows.

"Harassing?" she asked, her voice dripping with confusion. "Ansel, are you under some sort of misconception about how this works?"

He blinked. He hadn't expected the pushback. He expected tears. He expected her to beg.

"I..." He stammered, taking another step back as she shifted her weight. "I just mean, don't make a scene."

"Okay," she said.

He froze. "Okay?"

"Yes. As you wish. The engagement is off."

She turned on her heel. The movement was precise. Surgical. She didn't wait for his response. She walked away, her heels clicking a steady, unbothered rhythm on the marble floor.

She could feel his confusion radiating against her back. He was the one dumping her, yet he stood there looking like he was the one who had been discarded.

She didn't head for the exit.

She turned a corner, slipping past the velvet rope that marked the VIP section. She passed a door marked Private: Authorized Personnel Only.

A sound stopped her.

It was faint, buried under the drumming of the rain on the roof, but her ears picked it out. A muffled cry. A wet, gargling sound.

Her stomach tightened. The sensation wasn't fear; it was memory. The smell of copper and dust filled her nose, a phantom scent from a desert halfway across the world where she had stitched soldiers back together under fire.

A waiter pushed a cart of dirty dishes past the intersection. In the split second the cart blocked the security camera's line of sight, she moved.

She slipped through the door and into the rain.

The private garden was a maze of high hedges and stone statues. The rain soaked her silk dress instantly, plastering the fabric to her skin. She didn't shiver. She lowered her center of gravity, her steps becoming silent rolling motions, heel-to-toe, absorbing the sound.

She moved toward the gazebo in the center of the garden.

She crouched behind a statue of a weeping Greek goddess. Through the curtain of rain, she saw them.

A man sat on a high-backed velvet chair that had no business being outdoors. He wore a black suit that absorbed the light. One leg was crossed over the other. In his hand, a silver lighter flipped open. Click. Clack.

Two massive bodyguards were pinning a man to the wet stone floor. The man on the ground was bleeding from the mouth. His pleas were desperate, broken things.

"Please... Mr. Gibson... I didn't know..."

The man in the chair didn't blink. He flicked the lighter. A small flame danced against the storm, defying the wind.

"You didn't know," the man repeated. His voice was low, a baritone that vibrated in the humid air. It wasn't a question. It was a verdict.

Delia stopped breathing.

Killian Gibson.

The Godfather of the South. The man her brother Foster had told her to run from if she ever saw him. He sat there with the casual elegance of a king deciding an execution.

He raised a hand. The bodyguards tightened their grip.

She needed to leave. Now.

She shifted her weight to retreat. Her heel found a dry twig beneath the mud.

Snap.

The sound was microscopic. In this storm, it should have been invisible.

Killian's hand stopped mid-air.

He didn't turn around. He didn't jump. He just tilted his head slightly to the side, like a predator picking up a scent on the wind.

"Come out," he said.

The voice cut through the rain.

The two bodyguards drew their weapons instantly. Two black muzzles pointed directly at the statue she was hiding behind.

Her mind ran the calculations. Distance: fifteen meters. Hostiles: three. Weapons: two visible firearms. Cover: minimal. Probability of neutralizing all three without sustaining fatal injury: 12%.

She exhaled. She released the tension in her shoulders. She let her jaw go slack. She widened her eyes.

She stepped out from behind the statue.

She stumbled slightly, letting her wet hair fall into her face. She wrapped her arms around herself, shivering violently.

"I'm sorry..." Her voice trembled. "I... I think I'm lost. I was looking for the ladies' room."

Killian Gibson stood up. He turned slowly.

His eyes were black. Not dark brown. Black. They locked onto her, sweeping from her wet hair down to her ruined shoes, then back up to her face. He wasn't looking at a lost girl. He was dissecting a specimen.

Killian raised two fingers. The bodyguards lowered their guns, though their muscles remained coiled.

He didn't speak immediately. He took a step toward her. The rain hammered against his suit, but he seemed impervious to it. His gaze lingered on the way the wet silk of her dress clung to her waist, to the curve of her hip.

It wasn't a look of lust. It was an assessment. He was checking for weapons.

On the ground, the bleeding man seized the opportunity. He lunged forward, grasping at Killian's polished shoe. "Mr. Gibson, please! It was a mistake!"

Delia let out a sharp, high-pitched scream. She threw her hands up to cover her eyes, pressing her palms against her face.

Through the gap between her ring and middle finger, she watched.

Killian looked down at the man clutching his shoe with an expression of mild distaste. He didn't kick him. He just looked at the blood staining his leather oxford.

"Deal with it," Killian said.

The bodyguards hauled the man up. They dragged him into the darkness of the hedges. The man's screams were cut short by a dull thud.

Delia kept her hands over her face, letting out ragged, theatrical breaths.

"Delia!"

The voice came from the corridor entrance. Ansel burst into the rain, holding an umbrella over his head. He stopped dead when he saw her standing in front of his brother.

"You followed me?" Ansel shrieked. "You crazy bitch! You followed me here?"

He stayed five meters away, his free hand flying up to cover his nose again.

Delia lowered her hands. The tears she had prepared didn't come. She was too annoyed. She wiped the rain from her cheeks and looked at Ansel.

"Follow you?" she asked. "Ansel, the world doesn't revolve around your paranoia."

"You're trying to appeal to Killian!" Ansel pointed a shaking finger at her. "It won't work! I won't marry you! Even if you beg him!"

Delia turned to look at Killian. He had returned to his chair, watching this domestic dispute with a sudden, terrifying interest.

"This is your brother?" she asked Killian. Her voice was polite, detached. "Maybe you should have him checked for a brain tumor. The delusions are getting severe."

The corner of Killian's mouth twitched. It was a microscopic movement, but Delia saw it.

"You..." Ansel sputtered. "What did you say?"

Delia took a step toward Ansel.

He scrambled backward, slipping on the wet stone. He gagged, a dry, heaving sound echoing in the garden.

"Get back!" he choked out.

Delia stopped. She tilted her head, putting on her best medical student face.

"Ansel," she said loudly, ensuring the bodyguards in the shadows could hear. "Is this a condition? You vomit every time you get close to a woman?"

"In the medical journals," she said, her voice dripping with faux sympathy, "psychological erectile dysfunction often manifests with nausea. Is that it? Is that why you're so afraid to touch me?"

Ansel's face turned a violent shade of purple. "I do not have... I can... Shut up!"

"It's okay," she said soothingly. "There are pills for that. Though, honestly, I don't think it's worth the prescription cost."

She turned back to Killian. She offered him a slight, respectful nod.

"I apologize for the intrusion, Mr. Gibson. Since the engagement is clearly off, I won't waste any more of your time."

She didn't wait for permission. She turned and walked between them. She passed Ansel without looking at him.

She felt Killian's eyes on her back until she rounded the corner.

"She's lying," Ansel hissed to his brother. "She's a lunatic."

Delia paused just out of sight, pressing her back against the cold stone wall to listen.

"Did you say she followed you?" Killian's voice was low.

"Yes! She must have!"

"Her shoes," Killian said. "There was no mud on the soles. She didn't come from the main entrance. She came from the side gate."

Silence.

"I don't understand," Ansel said.

"She's lying," Killian murmured. "But not about you."

She heard the flick of the lighter again.

"Find out everything about her," Killian said. "The little wild cat has claws."

Delia burst out of the club's heavy double doors and sucked in a lungful of humid air. The rain had slowed to a drizzle.

She dropped the shoulders. She let the 'confused girl' mask slide off her face. Her eyes went cold.

Her phone vibrated in her clutch. The screen flashed: Sterling.

She answered.

"Delia?" Her brother's voice was tight.

She pinched the bridge of her nose, then pitched her voice up an octave. "Sterling..." She let a wobble enter the word. "Ansel... he was so mean."

"What did that bastard do?" Sterling roared. As the second brother and the family's resident artist, Sterling's temperament was as volatile as his abstract paintings. He lacked Preston's cold logic or Foster's quiet menace, reacting instead with raw, protective emotion. "Where are you? I'm coming to get you."

"No," she sniffled. "I'm taking a cab. He... he said I made him sick. He called off the wedding."

"I'm going to kill him," Sterling growled.

"Just... let me come home," she whispered and hung up.

She stared at the phone. No tears. Just calculation.

She hailed a taxi. As she slid into the backseat, she pulled a slim black device from the lining of her purse. She connected it to her phone.

Her fingers flew across the screen.

Target: The Zenith Club Security Mainframe.

Status: Bypassing Firewall... Success.

She accessed the camera logs. She found the file labeled Garden_Cam_04. She watched herself slipping behind the statue. She watched the execution.

She hit Delete.

Data Scrubbing... 100%.

She leaned back against the worn seat of the taxi, exhaling. She knew this left a digital footprint-a void where data should be-but leaving the footage of her witnessing a murder was a death sentence. A glitch was safer than a confession.

High above the city, in the penthouse office of The Zenith Club, Killian Gibson sat on a leather sofa.

Ansel was pacing the room, still ranting about Delia's audacity. Killian wasn't listening. He was holding a tablet.

"Boss," his assistant, Dirk, said, stepping forward. "We have a problem with the security logs."

Killian didn't look up. "Let me guess. The footage from the garden is gone."

Dirk blinked. "Yes. Someone hacked the system. It was a remote wipe. Very clean. We can't trace the IP."

Ansel stopped pacing. "What? Someone hacked us?"

Killian smiled. It wasn't a nice smile. It was the smile of a man who had found a puzzle piece he didn't know was missing.

"She tried to erase it," Killian said. "She thinks she's safe."

"Who?" Ansel asked.

"Delia Fitzgerald." Killian tapped the screen. "She's not just a spoiled brat, Ansel. She's a professional."

"A professional what? Shopper?" Ansel scoffed.

Killian stood up, walking to the floor-to-ceiling window. He looked down at the street, watching the yellow taxi disappear into the traffic.

He took a drag from his cigarette.

Killian narrowed his eyes. "A cat that knows how to sheathe its claws is far more intriguing than a lion."