Total pages in book: 33
Estimated words: 31279 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 156(@200wpm)___ 125(@250wpm)___ 104(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 31279 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 156(@200wpm)___ 125(@250wpm)___ 104(@300wpm)
My father watches, satisfied as a general who finally maneuvered his pieces into checkmate.
Fuck this.
Sometimes the only way to win a rigged game is to flip the table, and that’s precisely what Kara and I intend to do.
Chapter 12
Ariel
“Breathe,” I tell myself, palms flat against the cool wallpaper outside the dining room. “Just breathe.”
Inside, I hear the tinkle of laughter, the chink of champagne glasses, and my name passed around on silver tongues. Outside, I’m a lonely heartbeat that tries to escape my chest.
Kara and Everett promised they’d tell everyone the truth. That the fake engagement is a fantasy their parents are still writing. They’ll do it. They will.
Right?
I wait until my pulse stops galloping and my eyes aren’t full to the brim, then turn to slip back in—only to stop dead. Everett’s father strides toward me like a storm with a sneer.
A string quartet swells in the dining room. He glances over his shoulder to check the hallway is empty before grabbing my elbow in an iron grip and steering me into a paneled office that smells like leather and manipulation.
“Now, little miss spy,” he says as he shuts the door behind us and moves to his desk, “the wide-eyed innocent act may have worked on my son, but it doesn’t fool me. What’s it going to take to get rid of you?”
“Pardon?” I sink into the chair opposite because my knees think I’ve been shot.
“You’re not as naïve as you pretend.” He settles behind his desk and flips open a small rectangular book. His pen rasps. He tears out a paper and flicks it at me. “That’s ten grand. Take it or leave it.”
I don’t touch it, folding my hands under my arms. “If it’s money, I don’t want it.”
“Damn you, stop playing games!” He slams his fists on the desk, his face turning purple. “I don’t know what you’re after, but you’re not wrecking this merger. My son may have fucked you, but that doesn’t mean he’ll ruin decades of planning. Everett will marry Kara. I care about one thing: keeping our families and our business running smoothly. If you care for my son, you’ll take the money and disappear.”
“I don’t just care for your son… I love him.” The truth leaves my mouth before I can cage it.
His eyes flare dangerously. “Listen to me, girl.” He leans across the desk, breath sour with gin. “I’ve been watching. I don’t know what your little fascination is with Starfall Lake, but if you don’t leave him alone, I’ll destroy it piece by piece.”
My eyes widen, unsure I heard him right. “You… what?”
“Algae, dead fish, reeds rotting on the banks,” he says, counting them off like items on a menu. “I’ll pay the right crews to dump, buy the silence of the inspectors, and make sure anyone who tries to clean it up finds their permits delayed or their boats mysteriously wrecked.”
He lets the words hang deliberately. “You think I’m bluffing? I own the people who make a mess and the people who look the other way. Walk away, or I’ll ensure the lake you love is a memory.”
The room tilts. My mouth goes dry. The words slide under my skin and root there, cold and real. He means it. I see it in the smug certainty on his face, the itch to push the button just to prove he can. He’d salt the earth and call it landscaping.
Because—oh, Gods—he makes the mess. He poisons the water, then cleans it just enough to sell salvation.
My hands shake in my lap. I press them together to stop it. I see the places I know and love shutter and go dark in my head. “You’d kill the lake,” I whisper.
He smiles. “It’s called business.”
The air feels too thin to breathe. I realize with cold clarity that the danger isn’t only to me. If I stay, he’ll bleed the lake until it’s lifeless. Every inlet I learned to read, every child who’s ever swum in the shallows, every reed and swan—it will all rot.
I want to scream. Instead, I stand. My voice is small but steady. “You won’t win.”
He laughs softly, smug and sure. “Everyone says that before they drown.”
Something hardens inside me even as my legs shake. I know I’m not worldly and sophisticated—not above the water, at least. But I cherish the world I left behind, despite being banished by my own flesh and blood. I can’t leave them to this fate.
My choices are limited: lose the man I love… or lose everyone—everything—else I’ve ever loved.
There’s no version where I get to keep both.
I swallow the bile in my throat and taste the truth of it.
“Dad? Have you seen Ariel?” Everett appears in the doorway, his expression concerned. “What’s going on? Ariel, are you okay?”
I reach deep for the strength I didn’t know I possessed and paste on a smile. “Of course. Your father was just… telling me about the lake and his plans.” True—diabolically so. “I’m not feeling well, Everett. Could you take me home?”