Chapter Four #3
‘Am I? My acting skills must be on par with yours then,’ he says smoothly, the smile on his lips not reaching his eyes.
We move from table to table, from toast to toast. Laughter. Speeches. Flashing lights. His hand never quite leaves me. Always hovering. Possessing.
When it’s time for the ceremonial kiss, the guests begin to chant.
‘Kiss! Kiss! Kiss!’
Ashon turns to me. His eyes, all fire and ice with heat and mockery, flick over my mouth and, for a second, I think he might resist.
But then he steps in, wraps his arm around my waist and pulls me flush against him. Our lips meet.
And the world falls away.
The crowd cheers. But I barely hear them. Because Ashon’s kiss isn’t gentle. Or staged.
It’s possessive and demanding and punishing.
And worse… I kiss him back. Probably because I wish to give him a taste of his own medicine, I tell myself.
That he deserves to feel a little bit of his shaken bewilderment I feel.
And because memory flares with the reminder that he’d fallen under my spell that night, regardless of the inexperience I brought to his bed.
Or perhaps because of it. After all, didn’t men like him thump their chests at being the ones to master their bed partners? Fuck their conquests to oblivion?
I’m drowning in sensation, in memory, in the way his mouth moves like he’s been waiting to do this for days. Maybe longer.
It’s not until his hand skims too low, too intimately, that I pull away.
The applause crashes over us like a wave.
We bow and smile. And at the very first opportunity, I pull my fingers from his and retreat.
Inside the palace, everything is quieter. Dimmer. But my pulse is louder than ever.
It’s only as I’m approaching my bedroom door that I realise that Ashon is following me to the bridal wing. God, he’s really like the predator he referred himself to.
And simply because I refuse to be prey, I go on the offensive. ‘I’ll pay you back for that,’ I murmur, breath still ragged from the kiss he stole. Or maybe the one I gave back far too willingly.
His smile is lethal and assured, but his eyes are anything but amused. ‘Look forward to it, wife.’
The word scrapes something raw inside me. Not because it’s a lie, but because just now it didn’t feel like one. Not entirely.
My skin still buzzes from the way he touched me in front of all those people. From the way I responded, melting into it like I had no pride, no memory, no plan. Like I didn’t know exactly what kind of man he was. Is.
I fold my arms, trying to contain the tremor that’s started in my chest. ‘Still believe everything’s gone your way?’ I ask because I need to reclaim some footing. Because my heart is still galloping and my body is still betraying me.
His smile turns sharp, his tone even sharper.
‘You’re wearing my ring, the clothes I bought you, sleeping in my house, and now carrying the very name you claimed to despise.
And all it’s going to cost me is a few hundred acres of land, barely a dent, that I won’t even miss once I hand it over?
I’m very happy to call that checkmate to me. ’
I don’t flinch. I’ve spent my whole life preparing for worse men than him.
‘At least I’m doing it for something that matters,’ I say, voice quiet but steady. ‘For my baby. For my family. What are you doing it for, Ashon? Another headline? More fame? More fortune?’
The smile falters. Only a fraction, but it’s enough.
Beneath all the polish and swagger, I hit something.
A nerve.
He doesn’t answer right away. He stares at me, dark eyes unreadable, like he’s seeing too much and not enough at once. His jaw tightens. A muscle ticks in his cheek. But when he finally speaks, his voice is measured.
‘For appearances,’ he says, his voice low, his face unreadable, ‘we should talk about a honeymoon. A very public, very far-away one.’
I raise an eyebrow. ‘You’re here to build a movie studio, Ashon. Let’s not pretend you have time to lounge on beaches and pretend we like each other.’
His smirk is bitter. ‘Ah. So you’re afraid of being alone with me?’
‘I’m not afraid of you,’ I lie. ‘Of anything.’
He steps closer, one hand braced on the doorframe above my head. ‘Could’ve fooled me. Every time I touch you, you flinch. Every time you look at me, your pupils blow wide. You’re terrified of what’s still between us.’
I look away. ‘I just don’t want to repeat mistakes.’
His laugh is sharp. ‘Sure. Let’s call it a mistake.’ There’s a beat of silence, thick and charged. Then he shakes his head. ‘A very beautiful mistake. Enough to convince an ordinary man not to look beneath the surface.’
I glance at him, seeing the trap lurking in his eyes. ‘Since we both know you believe yourself to be extraordinary, whatever this is…don’t.’
‘I mean it. I have to hand it to you, you’ve played the role quite convincingly.’
‘That doesn’t change anything.’
He jaw tightens. ‘Indeed. No need to drive the point home, wife.’
He starts to turn away, but I stop him with a hand on his wrist. And I know the words I’m about to say next are as much a warning drawn in the sand for me as they are for him. ‘I meant what I said, Ashon. No intimacy. No lies. No love.’
His mouth curls, cruel and knowing. ‘Watch it my dear, you’re fast approaching “doth protest too much” territory.
’ He spins on his heel, then pauses. ‘I’ll see you downstairs for the next scene.
And when Renée gets in touch with potential honeymoon destinations, don’t dawdle.
Remember, unless and until I get what I want, your own needs will be equally denied. ’
His words are meant to remind me of the land, the studio, the stakes. But they land somewhere else entirely. Lower, deeper. Like he’s talking about hunger. Mine. His. Ours.
For a beat, as I watch his formidable form stalk away, I forget why I should hate him.
Then I lift my chin, shut the door and remind myself exactly what’s at risk if I don’t.
And no, it’s not just the land. Not just the deed that should’ve been passed down with my mother’s love and my father’s faith.
But the part of me I haven’t let anyone touch since that night in his LA mansion. The part that stupidly, stupidly believed there might’ve been more to Ashon Biney than power and prestige.
Because I’d thought I sensed it that night beneath his flawless black jacket the night he returned from his mother’s funeral.
I’d heard the crack in his voice when he’d murmured, ‘She’s gone,’ like it was the first time he’d allowed himself to acknowledge his loss.
The first time he’d accepted he was human and could feel pain like the rest of us.
And I should’ve walked away. Should’ve offered condolences and slipped out into the hallway like the professional albeit with a hidden purpose. But I didn’t.
Instead, I stayed. Let my fingertips press into the back of his neck. Let him kiss me like he was drowning and I was the shore. Let a single moment of human comfort unfold into a night of tangled limbs and whispered nothings that felt too close to hidden desires.
And what haunts me isn’t just the sex—though God knows it left an imprint—but the way it felt like a surrender. Like falling into something I’d been craving since the moment I stepped into his house.
That night nearly wrecked me. Because, for a breathless, traitorous moment, I thought maybe I’d used him too for those desires I didn’t even know I craved until I was beneath him, sobbing with pleasure.
Which is why I can never risk going back there.
Because I sense that this time, if I fall again, I might not have anything left to bargain with.
Ashon
I married her today, my fake fiancée.
The woman who promised hell on behalf of her family for a mere thousand acres of her family land.
It would be almost laughable if a part of me didn’t grudgingly admire the fierceness with which she fought for those she cared about.
If it didn’t remind me that with my own father gone, there was someone left to fight for me. If I needed it.
Which I don’t.
A lesser man would reel at the twists and turns of this particular movie. It’s a good thing then I’m well versed in the art of keeping an audience gripped. My smile tastes bitter because of course this is my life, not a fucking movie.
And this particular scene? It’s verging on the pathetic.
Because it’s nearly midnight and I’m alone in my father’s old study, surrounded by half-drunk whisky and blueprints for a dream I’m beginning to wonder if I can still afford—emotionally, at least. The irony isn’t lost on me.
My wedding night and I’m in here working, while my bride—my infuriating, too-beautiful, pregnant bride—is down the hall behind a locked door.
Under different circumstances, we’d be in that room together. Naked. Tangled in sheets. She’d still be gasping my name. I’d be buried deep inside her, chasing the way she clenched when I told her not to stop saying please.
The way she never did, not once that night. The memories are too vivid. Too fucking dangerous. Because they weren’t supposed to mean anything.
And yet…
I push back from the desk, every muscle in my jaw clenched tight. I should hate her. I want to. The way she baited me. Played her hand like a pro, held back the truth about that damn land until she could use it as leverage.
I hear her voice in my head again, all faux-innocence and outrage. ‘It was a cocoa farm. My father’s livelihood. My mother’s pride. My childhood.’
Naturally, I had my people research that claim in the days after her revelation.
Quietly. And when it came back with several sharp grains of truth, I asked Nana about the acquisition.
He’d barely looked up from his morning papaya and coffee.
‘I don’t remember who owed me what. If that tenant had paid their dues, maybe they wouldn’t have lost the land.
That’s business, Ashon. You can’t get sentimental about every sob story. ’
I hadn’t told him why I was asking. I didn’t want him to know she’d gotten under my skin.
Or that she still is.