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When she opened her hotel room door and I saw her face, I was torn between wanting to throw up and wanting to hunt her parents down and fucking kill them. Izzy was attacked, but she isn’t a victim. She’s too strong for that. Instead of falling apart, she’s determined to fight back, and the more bloodthirsty she gets, the sexier I find her. I’ve been attracted to Izzy since the day she came to dinner pretending to be her sister. The timid, innocent side of her is alluring, but the way she looked me in the eye and unflinchingly told me that her being attacked was my fault changed everything.
I don’t want to use her anymore. I want to fucking own her. I want to hold her close and make sure that nothing and no one ever hurts her again. I’m young, I’m rich, I have influence and power, and I’m only a fucking teenager. The world is my fucking oyster, but tonight, the direction of my future changed. Now I’ll use my money to help her. I’ll wield my influence to aid her and my power to protect her. I’ll be her weapon; she just needs to tell me where to aim.
It’s been three days since we found her at the hotel. Her family doesn’t know where she is, and apparently, they don’t care, despite the fact that the last time they saw her, she was broken and bloody. Davis has had to talk me out of paying Barnaby Rhodes a visit more than once, and if it wasn’t for Izzy’s plan to destroy her family, I’d have gone and beaten the shit out of him already.
Even though our lives now feel intrinsically linked, I still don’t know Izzy that well. But I can already see how special she is, and it baffles me—hell, it baffles all of us—how her parents can have just disregarded her as a person, as anything more than just a lookalike, to step in for Penelope as and when they need her.
Izabella is everything her sister isn’t. She’s strong and determined and angry, but even as she plots her revenge, she’s not being cruel. The guys and I have suggested a hundred ways we could make her family suffer, but Izzy is only interested in watching them hang themselves with their own rope.
Her plan is simple but brilliant, she steps out of the shadows and into the limelight with me and the guys behind her. Then she sits back and watches as Penelope fails AP algebra or one of her other classes without her sister to cheat for her, and the Rhodeses lose it all.
The list of rules Penelope has to follow is exhaustingly long, and if she fails to adhere to a single one, she forfeits everything. Personally, I’d prefer watching them all explode in an epic ball of fire, but Izzy prefers the subtlety of her own version of revenge, and I suppose it’s sort of poetic justice when you think about it.
Izzy is a fucking enigma. With all the bullshit her family has thrown at her, she could easily have become jaded and hardened, but she hasn’t. She’s sweet and funny and pure enough not to let this cruel world we inhabit change her.
In the days we’ve spent together, Izzy has settled into our group like she’s always been one of us. Despite Kip’s obvious crush, she seems to have happily friend-zoned him, laughing and joking with my friends while we watch movies or play video games. Her face is still a mess, but the bruises are fading to an ugly yellow color, and the cut on her cheek has healed to nothing more than a small red line.
The interview with The New York Times is scheduled for the end of the week, and although our engagement might be fake, I’m more than happy to tell the world she’s mine. The level of animalistic possession I feel for the girl sleeping in the room next to mine and wearing the ring I slid onto her finger is all-consuming.
In the past three days, my guilt has morphed into something darker and twisted. I hate knowing that she was hurt because of me, but instead of apologizing with words, I want to make it up to her on my knees with my face between her tempting thighs.
I want Izzy to be mine. I want the ring she’s wearing to be a real sign of my ownership. I want the fake image we’re going to show the world to be real. But I don’t deserve her, and until I do, I’m going to keep the filthy, depraved fantasies I have for her hidden inside my mind.
27
IZABELLA
Staring at my reflection in the mirror, I turn my head from side to side, searching for the bruises I know are beneath the layers of makeup that have made me look flawless and perfect. “Yolanda, you’re a genius, you can’t see a thing,” I say, smiling at the woman standing behind me in the mirror.
Shrugging, she brushes her fingers across her shoulder, smirking knowingly. “That’s why I’m the best, Baby.” She laughs.
“Yes, you are,” I agree, standing up and pulling my hair and makeup artist in for a quick hug. “And thank you for signing the NDA.” I point at my face.
“You’re not the first. Just assure me it wasn’t any of those fine ass boys downstairs,” she says, the smirk falling from her face and replaced with a firm line.
“No, it wasn’t,” I assure her. “I have a lot of events coming up. Can I send you a list and have you come and work your magic on me again?” I ask.
“I’m yours for the next two months. Mr. Winslow already arranged it,” she says, fiddling with my hair and smoothing a wave into place.
Smiling widely at her, I turn and look at myself in the mirror again. My white-blonde hair is pulled up into a mass of loose, flowing waves that are artfully pinned in a way that looks both sleek and messy. My makeup is flawless, my eyes are smoky, and my lips are painted with red lipstick that complements my hair color and skin tone. But it’s the dress that makes me wish the mirror was a camera so I could capture the way I look right now and keep it forever.
It’s a waterfall of red silk, the strapless bodice clinging to every curve, then pooling into an extravagant skirt that billows out behind me, making me look like a fairy-tale princess in the sexiest dress of all time. I’m bare of all jewelry, apart from the huge Winslow diamond playing center stage on my ring finger.
My fingers and toes are painted red to match my dress, and I’ll be barefoot as per Gulliver’s request for the photoshoot. I can’t help but smile as I stare at myself. Wearing this dress feels like I’m playing dress-up, but I’m as enamored with it now as I was when I was a child trying on my mom’s dresses in her closet.
A sharp stab of pain hits me when I think about my family. We weren’t always as broken as we are now. We had happier times, although I struggle to think of any happy memories from recent years.
A knock on the door interrupts my thoughts, and I move to open it with a polished smile on my lips.
“Miss Rhodes, we’re ready for you,” the slim photographer’s assistant tells me.
“Okay, I’ll be there in just a second,” I tell him, closing the door and taking a moment to drag in a shaky lungful of air. In a moment, I’ll be taking part in a photoshoot that will tell the entire world that Gulliver and I are engaged. It’s all a lie, but I can’t help wondering how I’d feel if it wasn’t.
Butterflies burst to life in my stomach. Some of them are fearfully fluttering around, warning me that this is a stupid idea, while others are excitedly bouncing from side to side giggling over the idea of spending the afternoon cozied up to my fake fiancé and his friends.
I’m not stupid. I know I should hate him for all of the lies he’s told and the role he played in my parents finally losing their shit. But I don’t. I don’t hate Gulliver at all. In fact, since the moment he cupped my cheek and promised me that he’d never let anything hurt me, I’ve been fighting feelings that are the complete opposite of hate.
Gulliver Winslow is calculating, determined, and ruthless. He’s rich, his family is powerful, and according to the theme of this article The New York Times is writing, he and his friends are expected to form a powerhouse alliance with the potential to take the business world by storm.
