Rival by M.C. Cerny

Hunter - Chapter One

“Power is not given to you. You have to take it.” Beyoncé Knowles-Carter

ELIZABETH

Four years and a wedding…

Most girls my age fantasized about the happiest day of their life filled with flowers, pearls, lace, and fanfare. Maybe balloons, and evening fireworks, or a silly bet placed with their fiancé.

Not me.

I nursed a hangover, and an ulcer the size of Lake Champlain downing pink chalky shit to keep from throwing up the mimosa I’m not of legal age to drink. I dry heaved in the car. In the bathroom. In the basket next to the confessional amid tittering smiles of my hair and makeup team thinking I was excited for the night to come.

Apparently, eighteen year old virgins were a novelty.

Sequestered away with a bunch of nuns in the woods, I might as well have been in a Victorian novel. For the longest time, I thought my biggest threat had been bears. Boys were banned from the campus as well as my access to them–teaching staff included. I didn’t have friends at school, mostly because of the whispers of being Adam Huntley’s ward, now bride. I should have known, the biggest threat had always been the same.

The man himself.

I felt like the bride of Frankenstein and after reading so much fanfic, I kind of wish there was an alternative ending to my story–but there wasn’t.

My staff of wedding preppers speculated I might be knocked up by the dark prince. A baby. That was so far down on my list of things to avoid like the plague. I had ninety-nine problems, a baby wasn’t going to be one of them. Survival mode didn’t allow for anything else.

The flowers smelled cloying as if anticipating a funeral which was fitting-considering. I finally had a strand of pearls perfect for clutching. The shiny perfect gems of clam spit choked me. The lace itched like pins and needles. The only fanfare happening were the silent screams inside my head. Forget about the church filled with over three hundred gossiping guests. There wasn’t enough alcohol and opiates in the world to get me through today. None of my schoolmates from the last four years had been invited. Adam didn’t think they were worthy enough.

Adam.

Arrogant.

Asshole.

Adam.

It always came back to him. The man who would be my husband in just a few short hours. The man who had sent me boxes of inappropriate toys the last few months to prepare me for today. Did you ever see a shocked nun’s face after being caught googling anal play and butt plugs on the school’s moderated internet network?

Yeah, me either until about a month ago.

I didn’t know what the shiny purple plastic item with ridges was supposed to be until I searched the browser. I was shocked. Mortified. Oddly curious, but I would deny that to the death.

Adam’s hostility grew along with his snippy attitude since I finished my education at the all girls’ private school in Vermont. In a strange twist of fate, he likely planned all along, I didn’t stay at his house long before he shipped me north as close to the Canadian border as he could without validating my passport. I think he was secretly afraid I’d find a way across the border once the wounds in my feet healed.

For the first time in my life, I was grateful to be unwanted and found lacking. I missed my long walks on the rocky beaches of Lake Champlain, and waking up alone and safe in my single dorm room. It’s amazing what I took for granted in the last four years thinking and hoping he’d just forget about me. If I could stitch my eyes closed and never lay eyes on this man again it would be a blessing. Sure, there were a lot of rules I had to follow, but I didn’t have to worry about being violated until now.

The door slammed against the wall of the church’s bride room making me jump in my dress. Twenty pounds of lace and beading jolted with the threat of unraveling.

“Where is she?” My vapid attendants scattered like mice dropping hair brushes and makeup leaving me with the cat hunting its prey. I was a poor substitute for Cinderella. There was no golden light of hope in me. I was all darkness and despair, a shriveled up spring with dead overgrowth choking me. I moved behind a useless chair for protection against him.

On a deep breath, I forced a smile. Hades had arrived.

“Adam… you know it’s bad luck to see the bride before the wedding.” Cajoling him nervously did nothing as he stalked me from the mirror’s reflection. He paced looking me up and down. I beamed through the bile rising behind my lips. His tuxedo blacker than nightfall made him look like a dark prince ruling over us all, but I knew the truth was much closer to something derelict and demonic straight from hell. He’d finally come to steal the rest of my life. You’d find no fairytales here, and the only happy endings were hand jobs in back alleys if Adam’s bodyguards were telling the truth.

“I control my luck, Elizabeth.” He seemed extremely bothered by something and I didn’t ask. If the last four years taught me anything, my husband to be wasn’t big on clarification.

Adam believed his own words while I lived it in fear suppressing a shudder from my body. Swallowing back something cute to say, something I knew he wouldn’t appreciate, I sank down in the chair frozen like stone dabbing my lipstick, watching him from the corner of my eye. I may have looked like a common brown sparrow, but inside beat the heart of a hawk. My eyes tracked his movements in the mirror. He turned me into a predator lying in wait for the moment to strike, or at least that was the bravado remaining from my hangover.

It killed me inside waiting. He paced with unsettled energy. Survival meant never taking your eyes off the hunter. No matter what Adam Huntley did to me, I would beat him at his own game and deny him the very essence of my soul. He thought I was his new toy, but I vowed right then to become the thing of his nightmares.

It was some straight up underworld fantasy shit that played out in my head over and over again.

I cleared my throat, my mind blanking out the darkness so I could proceed placating the beast. “What do you need, Adam?”

I reminded myself to remain passive; this wasn’t the time to argue back. The last thing Father Morely needed was a bride with a busted up face in front of three hundred of Adam’s closest friends and associates, none of whom would come to my rescue because I had always been, and would always be his property.

“You. I need you, Elizabeth.” His voice didn’t match his body language, but my body was primed. Years of training to respond as scared harmless prey ingrained in my muscles and bones.

“You have me, Adam. Always.” I smiled back watching him pace the confines of the stone room and stained glass windows.

“Do I?” His paranoia was palpable and bitter like the sour champagne in my drink.

“Of course.” Reassuring him was the only way out of this. I swallowed back the acid bubbling up. It was a miracle I didn’t have a permanent ulcer from all this stress and bullshit.

He leaned in speaking softly against my ear. “Today is my birthday, darling.” Dread filled me like lead in my veins and bones.

I slow blinked licking my dry lips, “It shall be the happiest of days then, my almost husband.” Craning my neck back, all I could see was the darkness lingering in his eyes.

“You know, if I find out you’ve been with anyone, and I mean anyone, you will regret the day you played with me on a rooftop.” The cold words could have frosted the windows, but they left me exposed and raw.

I was about to deny his accusation but he placed a gentle finger over my lips smearing my nude lipstick.

“You know there are four things you can never get back.” He said, his green eyes blazing. He said this before, years ago, only telling me one thing then.

I swallowed back the unease and answered. “The stone. The stone you thrown cannot be returned.”

He nodded agreeing and I waited.

“The second are words. You can’t take back words once they are spoken.” He said.

Regrets were a funny thing. I regretted every morning I woke up realizing this was no dream. There never was, and never would be a happily ever after for me.

I hissed standing from my seat. “You’re a psychopath.” My heart fluttered and a tear leaked smearing my perfect makeup. I guess I still needed to work on the work-life-survival-balance.

He turned stalking me until my back hit the wall. His hand circled my neck slowly stroking the column of my throat peppered with pearls pressing in against my pale skin. He shook me stopping my visual examination of his character. The musty scent of the church made me ill and I blinked my eyes to clear the tears.

“Elizabeth,” he said in that disappointed tone, brow furrowed, and I let out a breath I’d been holding onto for far too long. “I prefer creative. After all, I made you.”

My chest nearly caved with the release of air trapped inside. This was the reason I put a cage around my heart.

“In your own arrogant image, I’m sure.” I muttered, heart galloping a million miles an hour.

Ignoring my sass, he released me and paced the room again.

He turned pointing a finger at me. His manicured nail more lethal than a bullet.

“You play me baby, and I’ll make sure you fly with broken wings.”

His threats were real. I witnessed enough of them on the rare holiday home to not question him.

Ever.

“Never, Adam. I’m yours.” I backed away to the chair sinking down. Anxiety kept me subdued as I forced my body to bend to his will accepting him. Part of my soul died, but it was a sacrifice for the greater good I hoped to achieve.

His hands fisted and he shook them a moment before releasing his grip shaking them out. A grin spread over his insanely beautiful face. “God help anyone who fills your cunt with his seed because I’ll rip out the fetus and make you watch. You belong to me.”

The image left me weak and disgusted. I had no doubts what he was capable of, but even that was the most heinous thing he’d said to date. I couldn’t image bringing an innocent baby into this. I wouldn’t do it, I end it before it got far enough along, and that was the kindest thing I could do knowing what I did of this man.

“A-Adam.” Bile touched the edge of my lips. He was deadly serious, but he had nothing to worry about, letting a man or anyone touch me terrified me more than anything.

“Your brother is here.” He changed the topic with lightning speed.

I steeled my expression to remain neutral. Of course Eddie was here. He probably brought Fiona with him. I’d begged Nelson to send them an invitation to this farce, but I had no idea if they’d gotten it. Now I had my answer.

Cautiously, I stated the obvious. “He’s on leave this month.”

“Did you invite him?”

My lips pursed pressing the long lasting matte finish lipstick against the top and bottom of my lips. I would endure any punishment he dished out to see my brother and Fi. If all I had were minutes, I’d steal every single one.

“Adam, he’s my only family, of course I invited him.” He stalked behind me placing his hands on my shoulders squeezing them painfully until tears pricked my eyes. Again. The mirror reflected red finger prints under the silk, satin, and lace. The promise of punishment for my defiance of him.

“I’m your family now.”

He was mad, insane, and easily injured by the suggestion he wasn’t anything to me.

“Yes, yes you are.” His hands circled my neck pressing against my pulse points leaving me light headed. My heart felt like it would explode right then from the stress of holding back a response.

I shut my eyes hoping my vision would clear. All this time was nothing more than a horrible dream, some awful thing created by eating a heavy sandwich from the bodega too late before bed. If only it could have been something so simple.

Adam leaned down, his face cheek to cheek with mine, baby fine coarse hairs missed by his electric razor, and our eyes now locked on one another, mine blue, and a grey-green storm of turbulent waters were his. My nostrils flared in the mirror, the only part of my body capable of involuntary movement at the moment.

“I want you to remember Elizabeth, this is the church your life began in, and it will be the one it ends in, if you so much as disappoint me today.” I wasn’t religious, but I knew a zealot when I saw one.

“I understand, Adam.” My mouth dried up looking at the thin platinum band resting permanently on my left ring finger. The metal stayed cold, never fully warming to my body temperature. It suffocated me from within even years later. He threatened to cut my finger off the day I put it on. I’m surprised it hadn’t rotted on its own, wearing this ring, his brand. The tiny cuts had scarred over, but it didn’t matter. Nothing protected me from him.

“See that you do.” I watched his eyes dip down the lace covered décolletage of my dress. I looked like an obscene American socialite trying to be something I wasn’t honed from generations of tradition. I was nothing more than the spawn of poor broken half-Brazilian, Irish potato farmers, illegal immigrants, and drug addicts from the ditches of the Ironbound. I was as close to being royal as a rat from the gutter. Adam reminded me of that sitting high on his throne of his corrupt kingdom.

Four years and I still wasn’t any closer to finding out what he wanted from me.

“The wedding will start soon. You should go wait with Father Morely.” I took a breath to steady myself, but it was pointless as his eyes feasted over me.

“And then we’ll get to the honeymoon.” Adam’s hands slowly caressed my arms covered in sheer lace while his lips kissed below my ear with a strange tenderness that only fueled my anxiety further. His evil should have turned my pale skin black, with the oily ooze I felt from his tainted touch.

“I’m looking f-forward to it.” I said with as much enthusiasm as a hopeless terrified shelter animal on their way toward a lethal injection.

“Perhaps we should start early.” He goaded arching his eyebrow suggestively.

Panic flared through me and my eyes bugged, there was no hiding that reaction from him, and to my surprise he laughed. Adam Huntley the biggest asshole I knew on the planet laughed a deep belly chuckle throwing his head back in a maniacal gesture.

He had a shit sense of humor and sadistic need to keep me off-kilter.

“With a kiss, Elizabeth. There will be plenty of time later to drive my point home how much you belong to me.” Grabbing me, he hugged me tight stealing my breath and crushing my lace.

Tonight was the part I feared most.

Adam fixed the tousled curls of my hair, his hands cupping my face as he touched his lips to mine. The kiss was chaste all things considered, and his hands roamed freely molding me to him. It felt different, as if he’d reigned himself in for the moment and simply wanted a kiss. His madness restrained. Though, his kisses were anything but simple. He demanded. He ruled. He conquered. I reached for his suit lapels pulling him closer. The mix of moods was like a sweet and sour cocktail. Nice one moment, but the bite was coming. He pulled away first and rubbed the pad of his thumb over my lips fixing the smudge of lipstick. Adam was uncanny at leaving my axis of reality off kilter and my body responding in ways I didn’t expect.

“Be good.” He laced his words with those demands, rules, and conquering smirks.

I listened for the door to close and my heart to resume beating. Being good was the only thing I knew. I trained for it like an Olympic athlete even if I felt like I was failing at that.

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