Sixty Days To Love My Enemy

[Lara's POV]

I have just made the biggest decision of my life at twenty-four years old. Or maybe I should call it what it really was—my biggest mistake, wrapped in white lace and sealed with a signature I could barely force my hand to write. Married to my distant cousin. On paper, legally bound in a ceremony that felt more like a funeral than a wedding.

I should be in mourning right now. I should be wearing black, not white. I should be grieving the brutal deaths of my parents, whose assassinations I had witnessed just two months ago in a scene that replayed behind my eyelids every single night when I tried to sleep. 

But instead, here I was in my so-called matrimonial home, legally bonded to my fucking cousin Amiir Blackwood.

The rage I'd been containing all day finally broke through.

  "Argghh!" The scream tore out of my throat. My hands swept across the dresser, scattering expensive makeup and skincare products someone had arranged so neatly. Glass bottles shattered. Powder compacts exploded. Lipsticks rolled under furniture. I wanted to destroy something, anything, to match the destruction inside my chest.

The door burst open.

Amiir filled the doorway, flanked by armed security. They had weapons drawn, hands hovering near holsters like they expected an active threat.

For a moment, nobody moved. Amiir's gaze swept the room—scattered cosmetics, broken glass, my heaving chest and clenched fists. Understanding dawned across his features, followed immediately by amusement.

He made a small gesture. His men filed out immediately, the door clicking shut behind them.

The silence felt suffocating.

  "You scared me, wife." The word rolled off his tongue with deliberate slowness, stretching it out like he was savoring the taste of it. Like he knew exactly how much it would irritate me to hear him say it. "When I heard that scream, I thought something terrible had happened. I thought maybe you'd hurt yourself."

The mock concern in his voice made my stomach turn. I could see the smug satisfaction playing at the corners of his mouth, barely contained. He was enjoying this. Enjoying watching me break apart in front of him. Enjoying the power he now held over every aspect of my life.

He took a few steps forward, moving deeper into the room with the kind of predatory grace that reminded me that Amiir Blackwood was dangerous, in ways that most people never got close enough to understand. Ive heard whispers about the things he'd done to grow his power within the family business, but I'd never been the direct target of it before.

Not until my parents died and suddenly I became his responsibility. His asset. His wife.

  "Are you hungry?" His tone was conversational now, like we were just two newlyweds having a normal discussion about dinner plans. "I can have the chef prepare something for us. We should eat before we get to work tonight, because I'm anticipating it's going to be a very long night."

The implication in his words was unmistakable. The way his eyes traveled slowly down my body, taking in the white dress that suddenly felt far too thin, far too revealing. The slight curve of his lips that suggested he was thinking about things that made my skin crawl.

I flinched before I could stop myself, taking an automatic step backward even though there was nowhere to go. My back hit the edge of the dresser table, sending a few remaining items clattering to the floor.

I wasn't trembling from desire. I was shaking with pure, undiluted rage at his audacity. At the casual way he stood there implying that he expected me to fulfill some kind of wifey duty, like I was a property he'd just acquired and now planned to use however he saw fit.

  "You can kill me," I said, and I was proud that my voice came out steady despite the trembling in my hands, despite the way my heart was hammering against my ribs hard enough to hurt. "You can kill me just like you killed them. But you will never have me. Not willingly. Not ever."

Something flickered across Amiir's face—surprise, maybe interest. He tilted his head, studying me like a puzzle, and I realized with sinking dread that I'd said exactly the wrong thing.

Because Amiir didn't want obedience. He wanted a challenge. And I'd just given him one.

The amusement in his expression deepened. "You know what? You can have this room to yourself. I'll sleep in mine tonight. Give you some time to adjust to your new home, your new reality. I'm not completely unreasonable."

He started toward the door. For one brief, stupid moment, I thought he was actually going to leave me alone.

But he paused with his hand on the doorknob.

  "I'm a patient man, Lara. I can wait for you to come around to the reality of our situation. But I need you to understand that I don't have unlimited time to waste on your resistance." His voice had lost all traces of amusement now, replaced by something harder, more businesslike. "So here's how this is going to work. You have sixty days. Sixty days to fall in love with me, to accept your role as my wife, and to give me an heir."

I opened my mouth, but he continued before I could form words.

  "Or I take what I want anyway. Your choice."

Then he was gone, the door closing behind him with a soft click that somehow sounded louder than if he'd slammed it.

I sank down onto the floor among the scattered cosmetics and broken glass, my white dress pooling around me, and for the first time since my parents died, I let myself cry. Not the quiet tears I'd shed at their funeral while cameras flashed. These were ugly, desperate sobs that shook my entire body.

Because I finally understood the trap I was in. My parents were dead, murdered in front of me. Everything they'd built had passed to Amiir through archaic family law. I had nothing. No money, no property, no power, no allies.

I had nothing except sixty days and a choice that wasn't really a choice at all.