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“I still don’t understand why it’s you and not me. I’m prettier,” she snaps.
She sounds like a jealous little girl who didn’t get picked for dance team.
“It doesn’t matter what we think,” I reply. “The decision has been made. There’s nothing else to be done about it.”
“Run away,” she whispers. “Just run so I can be the queen.”
I almost laugh at her, but instead, I feel pity. She wants to live this life? Why? I have no doubt that her desire to be in my shoes is merely because my mother has somehow built it up in her head as if I’m going to be someone special now.
“If I run, then who knows what will happen to the family.”
She leans forward, her eyes finding mine. “They don’t care who is in the wedding dress at the end of the aisle as long as she’s a virgin.”
“And you are?” I ask.
Her lips curve up into a grin. “I’m young enough and do enough Kegels to pass, and I have tightening cream. They’ll never know.”
I could tell her that they would figure it out. No doubt about it. These men, if they specifically requested a virgin, they’d know if she wasn’t. I keep my smile plastered on my face.
“I’m not going to run away. I agreed to this, so it’s what I’ll do.” My words are a lie. I didn’t agree to shit. I want to run away. And I don’t want to do any of this. But I’m going to because even if she acts like this is something she wants, I don’t believe a word she’s saying.
“I still think it’s stupid. Mom and Dad should have never agreed,” she whispers. “You’re not even pretty,” she repeats herself. I hate that her words affect me. They shouldn’t. I know they are just petty jealousy.
“Better pack your bags. We leave tomorrow morning,” I say as I get up.
Shelby calls out my name. I stop with my fingers wrapped around the doorknob, turn my head, and look over my shoulder at her. She is watching me, a confused expression on her face. I wish I could tell her the truth, my plan, but it would put everything in jeopardy, and I can’t have that. It would make her flock to these people.
So there is nothing else to do but pretend that I have accepted my fate and that I am going to do this without complaint. Every single second of every day, I am, without a doubt, dying inside. Although, that stranger, the one who came to my bed, the one I gave my virginity to, made everything a bit more bearable.
Wonderfully so.
There is silence, complete silence, as she watches me, then she lowers her gaze to her lap. “I know I’m a bitch, and I’ll be glad when Mom and Dad have their finances back in order, but I’m going to miss you.”
I bite the inside of my cheek as I watch her. She stands and walks past me, ignoring me completely, then vanishes down the hall. If someone told me that she was adopted, I wouldn’t be surprised. I have blonde hair, while she’s a vibrant redhead. Where I’m curvier, she’s long and thin, waiflike and stunningly beautiful.
She’s always been this bright beacon, and I’ve always been a dull lamppost, one of those ones in the shopping mall parking lot that’s about to go out. That’s me. Dull, lifeless, plain. Except when the stranger looked at me, touched me, was inside of me. Only then did I feel beautiful and desirable.
I wish I knew his name, knew who he was, could find him again. I would run away with him. At least run to him and beg him, get down on my hands and knees for him. Whatever he wanted me to do, I would do it just to avoid this coming week.
Because I can’t deny I’m terrified of what my husband-to-be will do to me once I tell him I am no longer a prized virgin.
Allowing me to leave will be the best-case scenario.
The worst?
Death.
ChapterEight
COLEMAN
I walkinto my father’s office and sink down in the chair across from him with a heavy sigh. He watches me for a moment, his gaze taking me in, then he leans back and lifts his hands to his mouth.
“Well,” he says. “All is well?”
I grin. “Very well.”
He shakes his head. “You’re not going to elaborate?”
