Revenge Is Sweet: Marrying His Worst Enemy

I was staring at the two pink lines on the plastic stick, trembling with the terrifying joy of carrying the heir to the New York underworld's most ruthless faction.

Then the intercom buzzed, and a voice splintered my world.

"The little art student actually thinks I'm going to marry her? It was just a game to pass the time while you were in Europe, Estella."

I froze.

My boyfriend, Holden, was in the next room, laughing with the daughter of his rival.

He explained that I was just a "clean civilian image" he needed to secure a business deal. Now that the deal was signed, he was dumping the "stray" to marry the "Queen."

I tried to run, but freedom only lasted forty-eight hours.

Holden didn't just break my heart; he turned my terror into content.

He kidnapped me, tied me to a chair at the edge of a cliff, and forced me to choose between my life and his new fiancée's.

Then, he pushed me off the edge.

As gravity snatched me, I heard him laughing.

I landed on a stunt airbag. It was just a "social experiment." A sick prank for his amusement.

"Don't be so dramatic, Kenia," he called down. "It's just a game."

He thought I was broken. He thought I was just a prop in his life.

But he forgot that I knew his secrets.

I dragged my injured body to a payphone and dialed the one number Holden told me to fear-the rival Don, Gael Simpson.

"It's Kenia," I whispered, clutching the receiver like a lifeline. "I'm calling in the debt."

Chapter 1

Kenia Hayes POV

I was staring at the two pink lines on the plastic stick, my hands trembling with the terrifying, fragile joy of carrying the heir to the New York underworld's most ruthless faction, when the intercom buzzed with a voice that splintered my world.

"The little art student actually thinks I'm going to marry her, Estella. It was just a game to pass the time while you were in Europe."

The bathroom tiles seeped cold against my bare feet.

I let the test slip from my numb fingers.

It clattered against the porcelain sink, sounding like a gunshot in the oppressive silence of the penthouse.

Holden Dalton.

The man who had courted me for three years.

The man who ruled the city's ports and police precincts with a smile that could disarm a saint.

He was in the study next door, arrogant enough to be careless, unaware that the intercom system was live.

I heard a woman's laugh.

It was sharp, like breaking glass.

Estella Duncan.

The daughter of the rival Capo.

"You're terrible, Holden," she purred. "She's been planning the wedding for months. I saw the dress she designed. It's pathetic."

"It's not a wedding, Estella. It's the punchline to a three-year joke," Holden replied, his voice dripping with an arrogance that made my stomach turn. "I needed a clean image to secure the port deal. A sweet, innocent civilian on my arm made the Commission trust me. Now that the deal is signed, I can dump the stray and marry the Queen."

I looked at my reflection in the mirror.

Kenia Hayes.

The Caged Canary.

That's what the tabloids called me.

I placed a hand on my flat stomach.

A Dalton heir.

A child born of a lie.

If I told him, he would lock me away.

He would turn me into a broodmare for a legacy built on blood and deception.

I wouldn't let a monster raise a child.

I wouldn't bring a life into a world where love was just a strategic maneuver.

I walked out of the bathroom.

I didn't pack a bag.

I didn't scream.

I walked straight to the safe in the closet.

I took out the drafted separation agreement I had prepared weeks ago when I first suspected his infidelity, but never had the courage to sign.

I signed them now.

The ink was black and permanent.

Then I took the wedding dress.

It was silk and lace, hand-stitched with pearls I had saved up for years to buy.

I shoved it into a box.

I grabbed a marker and scrawled Estella's address on the front.

I left the box on the bed.

I walked out of the penthouse, past the guards who nodded at me, thinking I was just going to the market.

I took a cab to the clinic on the Lower East Side.

The doctor asked me if I was sure.

I looked at the sonogram, a tiny speck of potential misery.

"I'm sure," I said.

My voice didn't shake.

When I walked out an hour later, I felt hollowed out.

Empty.

But for the first time in three years, I was free.

I checked my phone.

A text from Holden.

*Dinner at 8. Wear the red dress. I have a surprise.*

I typed back.

*I know about the bet. Check your bed.*

I threw the phone into the nearest trash can and disappeared into the gray city rain.

Kenia Hayes POV

Freedom tasted sweet for exactly forty-eight hours before it turned to ash.

I was staying in a run-down motel in Queens, trying to figure out how to disappear with only twelve dollars in my pocket.

The burner phone I'd bought with cash buzzed against the cheap laminate nightstand.

It wasn't a number.

It was just the word RUN.

Before I could even process it, the door splintered off its hinges.

Two men in ski masks filled the frame, blocking out the hallway light.

They didn't speak.

They lunged.

I fought, my nails raking uselessly against thick leather jackets, my boots connecting with shins.

One of them backhanded me.

My head snapped back, and the world went blurry at the edges.

They dragged me into a van before I could scream.

A black bag went over my head, plunging me into darkness.

The air inside was thick with the nauseating smell of gasoline and old sweat.

We drove for what felt like an hour.

When the van stopped, they hauled me out and marched me across crunching gravel.

I could hear the roar of the ocean.

The bag was ripped off.

We were at the Cliffside Villa.

Holden's private estate.

But it wasn't a romantic getaway.

It was a stage.

I was shoved into a chair in the center of the patio.

Zip ties bit into the tender skin of my wrists.

Across from me, tied to another chair, was Estella.

She looked perfect, even in distress.

Her hair was tousled just right.

Her makeup was smudge-free.

"Help!" she screamed, her eyes darting to a camera set up on a tripod. "Holden, please!"

Holden stepped out from the shadows like a dark prince entering his court.

He held a gun.

He looked like a god of vengeance, jaw set, eyes dark.

"Let them go," he growled at the masked men.

"You can only save one, Boss," one of the men said, his voice distorted by a modulator.

"The other goes over the edge."

He pointed to the cliff behind us.

It was a sheer drop straight into the jagged rocks and churning water.

Holden looked at me.

Then he looked at Estella.

For a split second, the mask slipped.

I saw the flicker of amusement in his eyes.

This wasn't a kidnapping.

This was Prank #98.

I had seen the list on his iPad once.

Social experiments.

Tests of loyalty.

Sick games for rich psychopaths.

"I choose..." Holden paused for dramatic effect, looking straight into the camera lens. "Estella."

He rushed to her, cutting her bonds with a knife he pulled from his boot.

He pulled her into a passionate, cinematic kiss.

The masked men grabbed my chair.

"No!" I screamed, the terror real even if the scenario wasn't. "Holden!"

He didn't even look back.

He was too busy playing the hero for his future wife.

The men pushed.

I tipped backward.

Gravity snatched me.

I fell.

The wind rushed past my ears like a scream.

I squeezed my eyes shut, waiting for the impact of rocks.

Waiting for death.

Instead, I hit something soft.

Air hissed out around me violently.

I bounced.

I opened my eyes.

I was lying on a giant yellow stunt airbag on the lower deck of the villa.

Above me, on the balcony, Holden and Estella were looking down, laughing.

Estella was holding a glass of champagne.

"You should have seen your face!" she shrieked.

Holden leaned over the railing.

"It's just a game, Kenia," he called down, his voice carrying effortlessly over the wind. "Don't be so dramatic. The airbag cost five grand."

I lay there, staring up at the gray sky.

My body ached.

My heart was a crater.

He hadn't just broken my heart.

He had turned my terror into content for his amusement.

I wasn't a person to him.

I was a prop.

And props don't get to walk away.

Kenia Hayes POV

I dragged myself away from the villa, the raucous sounds of their celebration still drifting from the upstairs windows like a cruel taunt.

My ankle was twisted, throbbing in time with my heartbeat.

My dignity was in shreds.

I reached the main road just as the sun began to set, bruising the horizon in violent shades of purple and black.

I had one card left to play.

A card I had sworn never to touch.

Approaching a payphone outside a closed gas station, my fingers trembled as I punched in the number burned into my memory from three years ago.

It rang once.

"Speak."

The voice was low. Raspy. Laced with dormant violence.

"It's Kenia Hayes," I whispered, clutching the receiver like a lifeline. "I'm calling in the debt."

There was a silence on the other end.

Heavy. Thick. Suffocating.

"Where are you?"

"Route 9, near the Dalton cliffs."

"Stay in the shadows. Do not move. If a car passes, hide."

The line went dead.

Gael Simpson.

The Don of the Simpson Syndicate.

The rival family.

He was the monster under the bed that Holden had always told me to fear.

But Holden was the one who had just thrown me off a cliff for a laugh.

Twenty minutes later, a black SUV rolled up, headlights cut.

The back door opened.

I barely registered the shadow of a driver in the front.

I just saw him.

Gael.

He was sitting in the back, dressed in a suit that cost more than my entire life.

He didn't smile.

He didn't offer a hand.

He just looked at me with eyes like burnished steel.

"Get in," he commanded.

I climbed in, wincing as I pulled my injured leg inside.

The interior smelled of rich leather and expensive scotch.

"He broke you," Gael stated.

It wasn't a question.

"Yes," I said, my voice hollow.

"Then the contract begins," he said, his tone finalizing my fate. "Three months. You belong to me."

"I know."

My head spun. The adrenaline was fading, leaving behind a cold, shaking shock.

"I need... I need a hospital," I mumbled, vision blurring.

"Arthur," Gael said to the silhouette in the driver's seat. "St. Jude's. The private wing."

The darkness took me before we even hit the highway.

*

I woke up in a white room.

The steady *beep-beep-beep* of a monitor was the only sound.

A TV was mounted on the wall, playing the news on mute.

I blinked, trying to focus through the haze of medication.

I saw Holden's face on the screen.

He was standing at a podium, looking solemn.

Estella was beside him, dabbing at dry eyes with a handkerchief.

I fumbled for the remote on the side table and unmuted it.

"...tragic misunderstanding," Holden was saying, his voice smooth as poisoned honey. "Kenia was unstable. She was jealous of my engagement to Estella. She threw herself off the balcony in a bid for attention. We are just grateful she survived."

Liar.

"We are praying for her recovery," Estella added, her voice trembling with practiced grief. "She needs help."

The door to my hospital room opened.

Holden walked in.

He was wearing the same suit from the press conference, fresh from his performance.

He held a bouquet of lilies.

"You're awake," he said, closing the door with a soft click.

He tossed the flowers onto the end of the bed.

"Lilies," I rasped, my throat tightening. "I'm allergic to lilies."

Holden paused.

He frowned, genuine confusion knitting his brow.

"Are you?" he asked. "I didn't know that."

Three years.

He didn't know I was allergic to lilies.

He didn't know anything about me.

"Get out," I said.

"Don't be like that, baby," he cooed, stepping closer. "The press ate it up. You're the tragic ex. I'm the benevolent savior. It's good for the stock price."

He reached out to touch my face.

I flinched violently.

"Don't touch me."

"You're still mine, Kenia," he whispered, his eyes darkening into two pits of obsession. "You live in my city. You breathe my air. Don't think for a second you can leave."

He didn't know who had brought me here.

He thought his men had found me.

He didn't know the wolf was already inside the house.