Beautiful Revenge (A Good Wife #1) - Sienna Blake Page 0,23

years I have planned.

Five years I have worked towards this moment.

Now I am treading the first steps down destiny’s path. The path that she set me on all those years ago.

Revenge. A dish best served cold.

As my eyes rest upon her, I don’t expect to be smacked in the face with how she’s changed. I didn’t expect this savage surge of fiery hatred in my veins.

She is no longer a girl of fifteen. Her body has bloomed with womanly curves, being hugged and shown off by her dress, her stunning neckpiece falling between generously formed breasts. I try not to think of what she would look like under her clothes. Her hair is long and straight, falling over her shoulders like a golden waterfall. Straight hair? I frown. I don’t like it this way. Where have those wild curls gone?

Some things haven’t changed. Like her eyes, still the same dappled green and yellow, like leaves when they start to turn. Now they’re filled with shock and, there it is…the longing underneath. It feels like she sees right into me. The love in her eyes is like fingers prying open my heart again. A tumble of unwanted feelings that I thought I had crushed underneath my boot begin to rise like a phoenix out of the ashes. I shove them down.

Fuck her. Fuck her for gazing at me with such longing and desire in her eyes. Fuck her for looking the way she does.

I do not love her. I am not that stupid little boy anymore. She ripped out my heart and tore it to pieces all those years ago. I will not fall for her charms again. This is just…wisps of nostalgia threatening to derail me. I will not be derailed. I slam down the cold mask across my face and my soul. She will never get inside again. Never.

Her soft, supple mouth parts in a gasp. I force myself to remember all those brutal words that spilled from that pretty mouth all those years ago. I feel the wounds they made as if it were yesterday.

“He’s nothing but a thief and a simpleton. He’s never going to be anything more.” I repeat her cursed words in my head, the words that revealed the truth of her cruel, shallow heart. “It would kill me to marry Dimitri.”

My heart hardens, turning to ice. Yes, good. I remind myself of the only reason I am here.

Revenge.

If she still loves me then this will be icing on the cake to my plan. It will make her hurt all the more.

Bit by bit, she will watch her charmed life crumble to the ground.

Then, when she needs me the most, when she is desperate, scared and alone like I was all those years ago…

I will destroy her.

18

____________

Alena

Dimitri is here. He is here.

My husband’s voice greeting Dimitri breaks through my reverie.

Shit. I’m not alone with Dimi. Emily and my husband are here next to me. My husband.

Thankfully, my husband is so besotted with Mr Wolf that he doesn’t notice the gale force of emotions tearing through me. My husband uses lavish words, his voice tighter than usual, his desperation to please is so thick, it’s almost suffocating. This nags at me. My husband is never as flustered as this. He’s never the one to need the approval of others. He must want Dimitri’s investment badly. Why?

Dimitri’s large hand practically swallows my husband’s. I remember how those hands used to find the skin of my belly, the way he’d touch me with them, full of tenderness and fire. Heat coils in my lower belly.

Dimitri turns to me. Emily steps in our way. I feel a small stab and have to repress the urge to shove her aside.

“Oh, Mr Wolf,” she gushes, her voice light and breathy, “we’ve heard so much about you. We’re so happy you could come and stay.” I can almost imagine how her eyelashes are fluttering, like that time she had a crush on the young gardener and wanted to spend all her time “enjoying the outdoors,” even though it was in the middle of a freezing winter.

Oh God. Emily is developing a crush on Dimitri.

I can’t blame her. Dimitri is utterly mesmerising. Still, a sickness starts to grow in my heart.

“I am very happy to be here, Miss Emily.” Oh God, his voice. Dimitri’s beautiful baritone has deepened even further. It reverberates through the air like a bass note in a slow blues number.

Finally, Dimitri steps around Emily and faces me. We are