Kiss Me in the Dark Anthology - Monica James Page 0,151

sting as my father slaps me across the face hard enough that I make a choking sound in my throat. “Ow.”

“I’m sorry,” Daddy says, straightening my hair as I hold my smarting cheek. “I didn’t know what else to do to snap you out of this state you’re in.”

I blink, once, twice, and then without thinking, I hit him back. Right across his freshly-shaved cheek. It probably hurts me more than him, my palm buzzing angrily as I watch a red mark rise on his cheek.

“Feel better?” he murmurs.

I shrug, feeling embarrassed. “A little.”

“Your self-defense is getting sloppy,” Daddy remarks. “You never used to hit like a girl.”

“I’m usually hitting inanimate objects, not my father,” I mutter.

“If you say so.”

“You need to leave,” I say to my father. “You need to get out of my face now, because if you don’t, I am going to lose my fucking mind.”

My father sets his teeth inside his jaw so hard, I can see the vein in his forehead throb.

“Fine,” Daddy says. “I’ll see you out there, I suppose.”

“I suppose you will,” I reply sharply.

“And Avery,” Daddy adds, always needing the last word. “Don’t get any ideas. Don’t try to run off. Just do as you’re told, for once in your life.”

And he slams the door.

I look back to the mirror, breathing deeply, letting the calm wash back over me. I’ve already cried enough today to last me the rest of my life. After I left the cemetery, with black eyeliner all over my face, I went straight home, sat on the floor of my shower, and cried. It was probably a good thing that it happened the way it did. I can’t imagine Will’s face if the engagement had been announced at the party. In fact, I’m pretty sure he would have killed Joshua Grayson with his bare hands if he could. Thank goodness for small miracles, I guess.

Then again, maybe it would have been a good thing if Will had spared me from having to marry such a horrible man. I’m deep in an elaborate daydream about Will and Joshua, fighting to the death for me, when Nathan enters the room without knocking. He whistles as he takes me in. “You look good,” he says.

“I should hope so,” I reply. “After all, I’m the entertainment for the night.”

“Poor little rich girl,” Nathan says, stroking my hair, but I know he actually feels sorry for me.

I look at him pointedly. “What aren’t you telling me?”

He shrugs. “It’s nothing.”

“Come on, spill,” I say. “If I can’t have any excitement in my life, at least I can live vicariously through you.”

“Well, I might’ve met a girl.”

“Really,” I say. “And what might this girl’s name be?”

“Never you mind about that,” he replies. He pulls two travel brochures out of his back pocket. “Fiji or the Caribbean?” he says. I make a face. “Poor little rich boy,” I mimic him. “Can’t decide where to take your new bang buddy?”

He rolls his eyes. “Fiji it is.”

It’s then that I notice the small suitcase in the corner. “When are you leaving?” I ask, suddenly alarmed.

He shrugs. “Tomorrow, I guess. Whenever we can fire up the jet.”

“Nathan, a Capulet jet is not going to take you all the way to Fiji. You have to get on a commercial flight for that.”

“Ugh,” he says, frowning. “I know, right? We’re flying down to LAX in the company jet, meeting the commercial flight there. Peasants, they’ll call us.”

“Again,” I say, “Poor little rich boy.”

“I’ll send you a postcard,” he says.

“How about I just stow away in your luggage?” I suggest. “I think that would be less painful to everybody. Daddy can forge my signature on the marriage certificate, put one of my embryos in a gestational carrier. Jesus, I don’t even need to be here at all.”

Nathan starts fussing with my hair. “That’s true,” he says, “But you’re forgetting the most important part.”

“What’s that?” I ask.

“The part where Joshua Grayson gets to wear you as arm candy.”

“Isn’t that what Photoshop is for?”

Nathan laughs. “I guess. Anyway, they’re not going to let you leave the country, because we all know you’d never come back.”

“Well, the least you can do is pick me up a souvenir, okay?”

“Done,” Nathan says, moving my hair into the exact same style it was in when he started fussing with it.

“It’s going to be fine, Avery,” Nathan says, suddenly serious. “Just get through tonight, and take it as it comes. I don’t even think it will be as bad