Secrets and Lace: A Dark Romance Thriller (Fatal Hearts Series Book 1) (16 page)

Jim nodded, then he walked out. It only took him about ten minutes to return, followed by two men in their mid-twenties, with Mohawk hairstyles and nose rings, cameras hanging from their necks.

“Not many people out there,” Jim whispered to Miles.

Miles nodded, and while I was still taken aback by the idea of getting married in front of complete strangers, Miles introduced himself to the men. They shook his hand and mine, telling us their names were Boris and Aaron from California. They confirmed they were over the age of eighteen and showed their identity documents to Miles and Jim.

Instead of worrying about the strangers, I focused on what was most important. As long as Miles was present, nothing and no one else mattered.

Jim folded his hands in front of him and turned to Miles. “Ready to get started?” he asked.

“Yes, let’s do it,” Miles said.

In the next few minutes, Jim said all the things he needed to say, and read a few verses from a Bible he’d brought with him. Then he asked us to say our vows to each other, as we had planned to. I went first.

“Miles,” I started. “You have changed me in so many ways. You love me and protect me, and make me feel like the most special woman in the world. No—you make me feel as if I'm the only woman in the world. Every day I spend with you is a dream come true. I cannot wait to build a life together, to have your children. I will cherish you and be faithful to you always. I promise to love you forever and beyond.”

Miles took a deep breath. “Chloe, you have no idea how long I've been waiting for you, for this... to see the happiness on your face on our wedding day. You're the woman I have been searching for. The day I found you, everything fell into place. I knew what I had to do. I had to make you my wife, to give you everything you deserve. I promise you a future you will never forget.”

Jim didn't waste any more time. He pronounced us husband and wife.

I was so filled with joy, it was hard to breathe as we exchanged rings. I had never been this happy in my whole entire life. This one moment made everything else seem insignificant. I was finally Mrs. Chloe Durant.

Chapter Twenty-Six

After Jim joined us in matrimony and had us—and the witnesses—sign the necessary papers, Miles and I thanked him, Boris, and Aaron. And then they left us alone to celebrate.

Miles and I kissed for a long time, locked inside our bubble of happiness.

When my stomach let out a rumble, disturbing the atmosphere, Miles led me to the kitchen to feed me. He reached for a bottle of expensive champagne instead of food. Alcohol on an empty stomach might not have been a great idea, but we had just gotten married. We had to celebrate.

“I promise to give you some food afterward.” Miles smiled. “But it would be wrong to start our marriage without a toast.”

“I agree.”

He produced two champagne flutes from a glass cabinet next to the fridge and filled them with the bubbling liquid. We toasted, drank, and kissed again. I tried to get my hands into his pants, the need for food already forgotten. My body begged for him. I couldn’t stop my hands as they tugged his shirt from the waistband.

“It would also be so wrong to start our marriage without you know what,” I whispered in his ear.

“We’ll get to that soon enough. We've been waiting a long time for this day. Let's take it slow, make every second count.”

“Yes, let's.” I pulled away with a sigh. He was right: We didn't have to rush anything. We had three whole days to consummate our marriage, and the rest of our lives for everything else.

Miles shrugged off his tuxedo jacket and sat me down on a stool while he prepared dinner. To keep my stomach happy before the big meal, he placed a plate of finger food in front of me, which I nibbled on while sipping my champagne.

“You know,” he said, “I never thought this would ever happen… not really. That someone like you would marry someone like me. I never told you this, but I was secretly terrified something would get in the way.”

“Let’s be glad nothing did.” I picked up a green olive and popped it into my mouth. “Tell me, how were your past relationships different from ours?”

Miles stopped chopping the onions. “My past relationships, were just placeholders. You were the one I was waiting for.”

“Just as I was waiting for you, my love.” I stood up and went to wrap my arms around his middle, feeling the slabs of muscle beneath my fingers. I leaned my head against the back of his neck while he continued chopping the ingredients. After a while, he turned around and buried his hands in my hair. “Don't start what you can't finish.” He let me go and threw the ingredients into the pan.

“You underestimate me, Mr. Durant. I can definitely finish what I start.”

He fixed his dark eyes on my face, then he guided me back to my stool. “Stay right here. I'll be done soon, then we'll move on to other things. It will be worth the wait, I promise.”

“Fine, I'll hold you to that.”

Our conversation was disturbed by the sound of my cell phone ringing. It was in my purse, back in the bedroom. I stood to go and get it. “I'll be right back.”

As I reached for the phone, Miles came through the door and stopped me from answering. I turned the phone over in my hand as Lester’s name flashed across the screen.

“Come on,” Miles said, “we're only here for three days. No phone calls; just you and me. Promise?” He took my phone, switched it off, and pushed it into his pocket.

I hesitated. My euphoria from the wedding was dissipating fast and my stomach was already knotting up. How would I be able to focus for the rest of the evening? It would be so hard not to wonder what Lester wanted to tell me. He said he would only call when he had something important to tell me. And it was late, which meant it had to be something I needed to know.

Then again, I had no idea which time zone we were in. My internal clock was all messed up. It could be early evening or afternoon where he was.

But we only had three days of honeymoon before we returned home. It would also be too risky to talk to Lester with Miles around. I still wasn’t ready to tell him everything yet. My confession would ruin the little time we had alone together.

“Okay. No calls while we're on this trip.”

We returned to the kitchen, and Miles continued cooking, but my head was swimming with thoughts of my phone inside his pocket. Maybe I’d get the chance later, when he was sleeping, to see if Lester left a message.

Until then, I tried to force myself to relax. By the time Miles was done cooking, I was salivating from the aroma of spices and meat that wafted in the air. He had cooked chicken Alfredo with pasta and potato salad. It was a simple meal, but it meant everything to me. It was prepared with love.

During dinner, it was hard to keep our hands off each other. Our hands touched and clasped over the table, skin stroking skin. Miles touched my face, tucked a strand of hair behind my ear, and kissed me over and over. It was romantic and tender—an unforgettable meal. A dream wedding with hundreds of guests could not compete with what we had right now.

Finally, to my delight, Miles gave in to his desires, forgot about the rest of our dinner, and gathered me into his arms.

In the bedroom, he took his time undressing me, piece by piece, even though I saw the torture in his eyes, watched him fighting the urge to just rip my clothes off my body. But it was our wedding night, and he was staying true to his word about cherishing each second.

Once I lay there naked, with only the sea breeze sweeping over my skin, he undressed. His eyes never left my body. He took his clothes off so slowly, he could have been stripping.

I grinned. “Looks like you have other skills you haven't told me about.”

“There’s so much you don't know about me. Allow yourself to be surprised.”

“I cannot wait.”

He approached the bed, his eyes dark pools of passion. I climbed under the sheets, and he did the same. My skin tingled against the starched sheets and his skin when his thigh brushed my hip. I leaned in for a passionate kiss, but he pulled away, his lips curling into a smile.

“Playing hard to get, husband? Isn’t it a little too late for that?”

“Don't say a word.” He positioned himself on top of me, but didn't enter me just yet. He slid my nipples into his mouth, taking his time with each one. With his mouth and tongue, he worked every sensitive spot on my body just the way I liked it.

“Your turn.” I ached to have him inside me, but it was only fair to treat him as well.

“That’s right; it’s my turn. But I'm the one calling the shots here.”

He didn't turn onto his back so I could put him in my mouth. Instead, he turned me onto my stomach and slid a hand underneath me, pulling me upward until I was on all fours. Then, just like that, he stroked into me. My breath caught from the unexpected turn of events.

“I thought…” I frowned. “I wanted to—”

“I know what you wanted to do,” he whispered into my ear, “but like I said, I'm the one in charge.” He pushed into me so hard that pain overrode pleasure. He pulled out suddenly, then slid into me again. I lost my balance, my face falling into the pillow. But he kept going, fucking me so hard my head and body slid in the direction of the headboard.

“You’re hurting me,” I murmured into the pillow, struggling but failing to push him away. Tears of disappointment soaked the expensive sheets. My head had reached the headboard, and with each new thrust from him, my forehead slammed into the engraved wood. How could he not hear it, the sound of my skull against the wood?

He kept fucking me, and I cried harder, attempting to pull away, but he was too strong for me. He pressed a hand on the back of my head and pushed my face into the pillow until I struggled to breathe.

“What the hell are you doing?” The pillow swallowed my words. “Please stop, Miles, you’re hurting me.”

Not a word from him. Finally, he grunted and shuddered as his orgasm gripped him. He was enjoying himself while my head felt as though it had been hit with a hammer. I gasped for air.

He released me and walked into the bathroom, slamming the door, leaving me paralyzed by confusion.

I pulled myself up on the bed, shivering with pain, with shock, unable to understand what had just happened. This was not how I had imagined our wedding night. What the hell?

The toilet flushed, and I heard the water running. Then the door flew open.

I flung myself at him. My bunched up fists pummeled his hard chest. Rage caused my temples to throb. “What the fuck's wrong with you? I told you to stop. You were hurting me.”

A huge grin split his face and his eyes narrowed. He caught both my hands, shoving me away so hard I fell back on the bed, giving me a look that made me shudder. Something was wrong. Very wrong.

“I have been waiting for this moment for so long. I was being honest—I never thought it would arrive, but here we are.” The grin was still on his face. His eyes were intense, a dark shade of brown I had never seen before.

“What you did was not right. This is our honeymoon. How could you do that? You just took what you wanted knowing full well I was in pain.”

“You don't get it, do you?” He took a deep breath, frustrated at my lack of understanding. “See, it was
meant
to hurt.”

“How can you say that?” I shook my head, tears flying everywhere. “I don't even know you right now.”

“You don’t know me? Are you sure about that? Look harder.” He reached for a robe on the back of the bedroom door and put it on. His eyes didn't leave mine. “I don’t blame you. It
has
been a long time. Thirteen years, five days, and three hours, to be exact. I've been counting.”

“What...? What are you talking about?”

He pointed both thumbs at his chest. “It's me, Kelly… Alvin Jones. You thought you killed me. Well, turns out I'm not dead.” He laughed. “And now it's my turn to do to you what you and your friends tried but failed to do to me.”

My stomach dropped. I gripped the edge of the bed. I felt like I was falling.

He shoved a hand through his hair. “I know, I look quite different from that boy. It took a few surgeries and a lot of exercise to create this brand-new me.”

“No,” I whispered. Fear clawed through me, and sweat trickled down my spine. I felt like I was having an out-of-body experience. I didn't even realize when I lurched forward and vomited on the side of the bed. He didn't seem perturbed. Trembling, I swiped the back of my hand across my mouth and turned to look back at him, whishing it were all a dream. “Miles?”

“Don't call me that. Miles is gone, and Alvin is back from the dead.” He sat at the foot of the bed, and I scooted as far away as I could. He didn't try to touch me, just kept giving me that sickening grin. I searched for Miles in his face, in his eyes, but the man in front of me was unrecognizable. Even the sound of his voice.

“No, no. You can't… you can’t be.” My mouth turned dry. “You’re lying.”

“No, baby. It was me all along.” He cocked his head to the side. “I played the game like a master. I pretended to love you, to be the man of your dreams. I could have gone on pretending, but revenge is so much sweeter than love. Everything I did was meant to lead up to this moment. It was so much fun sending you those cards and watching you squirm with fear.”

He reached into a drawer and removed a stack of envelopes. “With each card, I waited for you to tell me what you did, to confess. If you had, maybe I’d have forgiven you. But no. You lied to me each and every time.”

He threw the envelopes down on the bed next to me. My heart collapsed, and my world started to spin. Words, thoughts, and memories swirled inside my head in a terrible tornado.

All this time, it was him. My fiancé, my husband, was a man who didn't exist. He was never real. He was an illusion. Fear hit my core like icy water, rendering me speechless.

He pointed a finger at me. “Seeing you like this? It’s priceless. I can see the wheels turning inside your head.” His mouth twisted. “Want to know why I went to all the trouble of being the best man for you? I wanted to make you happier than any man had ever made you, to give you your own fairytale and everything. For the grand finale, I wanted to see your pain when I took it all away. You're so fucking stupid, you fell for it.” He pinned me with his eyes, his jaw set. “I went through a lot to get here. Everything I did was part of the grand plan to make you pay. Now do you understand why I named this yacht
Vendetta
?” He held up a hand to stop me from responding. “Does that name ring a bell, remind you of something? Does Vendet Group come to mind? Well, it doesn’t exist. The merger wasn’t real. What kept me busy the last few weeks were preparations for this day. I had no idea it would come so soon. By the way, eloping was a brilliant plan. I didn’t have to wait until the honeymoon. I’d waited long enough already.”