Feeling all eyes on me, I clear my throat. “Yes?”
“Your vows?”
Vows? Why the fuck would I have vows?
You’d think that at an arranged wedding, vows wouldn’t be expected. We barely liked each other a year ago, for fuck’s sake. Now we tolerate one another, but not enough to write vows.
“Alright, I guess,” I mumble, wringing my hands. “Sylvie Crenshaw, you are one of the strongest women I’ve ever met. You know what you want and how to get it, and I admire that. I’m pleased to call you my fiancée, and soon, wife.”
With a broad smile on her face, Sylvie’s eyelashes flutter as she blushes. The crowd fawns at my words, unknowing that I pulled them straight out of my ass.
The officiant turns to the bride. “Your turn, Sylvie.”
Sylvie glances at her manicured hand, her cheeks still red. “I don’t have any. Kingsley knows what he means to me.”
The officiant’s eyebrows knit in concern, mirroring the looks of annoyance from many in the crowd. The frowns on my groomsmen also show their displeasure. I’m the only one not thrown off by her dismissal. Sylvie’s not going to make up vows if she does not feel like it.
Oh, but if I blew off the vows in front of everyone? I’d sleep on the couch the night of my wedding.
“Sylvie,” Shawn blurts, and I hold back a sigh before even hearing his full sentence. “You can at least say something.”
Sylvie’s head jerks backward, as if she couldn’t believe Shawn dared to speak to her. Those two have never gotten along.
“Why are you talking?” she asks, eyes looking down on him.
“Kingsley,” Sylvie’s mother booms. “Tell your groomsman to keep my daughter’s name out of his mouth.”
I pinch the bridge of my nose. I’m a naïve idiot for thinking this wedding had a chance of going smoothly. We’re surrounded by the world’s most opinionated, must-always-be-right people to be alive.
“Kingsley,” Sylvie pesters, hands on her hips, angrily. “Defend?—”
A loud bang erupts throughout the garden, making my heart skip a beat as everyone ducks. The silence is chilling as something wet splashes me, causing my eyes to slam shut. My ears are ringing intensely, and my hand wipes at the warm wetness all over my face.
Panicked, blood-curdling screams come seconds later, but they’re muffled. My hands go cold at the distinct sound offirearms being drawn, likely from the guards. I try to piece together what’s happening, but everything around me slows, leaving me completely disoriented as my ears continue ringing.
When I finally open my eyes, I register nothing. My eyes fall to my hands, and the first thing I make out is the red splattered not just on them, but on my whole body. That’s when I notice the blood, thick and dark red, at my feet.
My heart pounds in my ears, and I know I shouldn’t look, but I do anyway. My throat goes dry as I stare at my wife, lying on the ground, body pale and dress soaked with blood. Her eyes are lifeless before me, and in her chest lies a large bullet wound.
She was dead the moment the shot went off.
And the hollowness in my chest makes me wonder: Am I dead too?
1
Kingsley
Imiss my bed.
Instead of being wrapped in my quality sheets like I planned, my arms are resting on the sticky, brown table, watching the bartender mix drinks like a clown juggles pins. The complete opposite of residing in my room all day.
It especially doesn’t help the situation that I am waiting on the bartender to hand me my screwdriver I ordered ten minutes ago. He’s too busy trying to impress the obviously uninterested women beside me with his mediocre bartender skills to remember my vodka and orange juice.
This is why I only go to my family’s club. It pisses me off when everyone recognizes me instantly, but hey, at least they aren’t pulling stunts like this.
If they let any more people in here, it’ll be a fire hazard. That’s another thing my family’s club would never do—pack people into the place like damn animals. The Beaumonts are too classy to let it get out of hand.
Braids that are brown with streaks of blonde collide with my face, and I’m two seconds from yelling when I realize whose hair smacked me.
