by Lana Hartley
We’ve been dating a year and it’s been the most glorious year of my life. We are so in love and we’ve had so many passionate encounters that I’ve lost track of when and where they all occurred. Leo keeps me constantly on my toes and I never knew a love like this could exist, yet alone be mine.
Luckily, Barry was convicted of stalking, harassment, and attempted murder so that he got a lifetime sentence and we never have to worry about him coming back for revenge. He turned out to be a total monster and I’m overjoyed that the most terrible piece of my past is history.
I’m wandering barefoot through the great expanse of our new home looking for my man. I’m so excited that we took this leap together and that we are ready to move in. It feels like the best parts of my life are yet to come. I find Leo in the garage, and he’s not wearing a shirt and the view of him is gorgeous. His tanned, toned torso is moist with sweat and I admire him from afar before he sees me. He comes up upon me but I run away. I’m not getting my outfit stained with that sweat! I run but he catches me and clutches me in his arms making sure to get his sweat all over me.
“Leo! Gross.” I laugh with him.
Secretly, I don’t care and I’m glad to be captured in his arms. I’m glad that our new life together is beginning in this way, in such perfect total happiness.
“I’ve got my bathing suit on,” I say. “I’m going for a swim. Wanna come?”
“I’m gonna go through these last boxes first.”
“Okay, how bout I help? I can search for the pots and pans. I know we need them for tonight.”
He laughs, “You of all people should not be worried about the pots and pans.” He teases me. I will never live down the fact that I don’t cook well.
“Hey, I planted an herb garden. That’s a start. And anyway, you won’t be saying that when you’re starving,” I say as I continue to look for the pans.
With that he pulls me in for a long kiss. “As long as I get dessert, I’ll be fine.” Our eyes lock for a moment, we feel that intense heat, and then I’m the one to pull away. Even though I’m so happy, Leo stills makes my stomach swirl and my head spin. I can never get enough of him.
He pulls me back into his grasp. He’s not done with me yet. And he kisses me hard. He takes off my newly moist slip dress and I’m standing there before him in my new gold bikini. He likes what he sees and we’re kissing. I’m reaching for the bulge in his jeans, but before I can I find him down on one knee.
Now my head is really spinning. My world just got even better. I was never expecting this, not so soon. I look at him and tears of happiness stream down my face. My dreams are manifesting so quickly and I feel like the luckiest girl on the planet. I’m crying as he opens the Cartier box to reveal one huge emerald cut diamond ring.
“It’s modeled after the one Grace Kelly wore.”
“I know,” I say in between tears. I know what’s to come.
“My beautiful Elena, my most gorgeous angel, you are exquisite both inside and out. I love that your soul is so pure and that you would do anything for anyone. You have such strength and beauty and wisdom. You have made me become a better person, and when I’m with you, the world ceases to appear and it’s just you and it’s just me. I want it to be that way forever. I never want to be apart from you, not for one single day. And with that will you do me the tremendous honor of becoming my wife?”
“Yes, Leo. Yes! Of course I will marry you!” I jump now into his arms and he’s holding me suspended in the air. Time stands still and we kiss and become one for the rest of eternity.
Murder/Love
A Dark Romance
By Lana Hartley
Copyright 2018 by Dark Princess Press
All rights reserved
This is a work of fiction. All names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or persons is entirely coincidental. This work is intended for adults only.
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Carrie
The gossamer gown I’m wearing reflects every glittering crystal along the ballroom walls.
Laurel Jameson turns 18 today, and the entire class of Westwick Preparatory Academy is gathered in the hotel ballroom to celebrate her. Every lavish design, expensive gift and extravagance has been laid at Laurel’s feet. The catering is something to be reckoned, some of it getting better plane tickets that people who are flying into this city. It is a despicable waste of time and money, but who am I to say so? I have never wanted to celebrate my birthday at all, much less by parading the entire class around with a show of extravagance and then pretending like everything personally offends.
“You must be having fun,” Laurel says to me in a biting voice, flouncing her wrist in my direction. “You’ve got no life, Carrie. But I can’t believe my parents let the caterers freeze and reheat these trays. And serving four kinds of salad? And this seafood stinks.” Laurel drops her glass on the ground, and it doesn’t shatter against the plushly carpeted floor, just spilling. Laurel walks away from me, done with her current jab and the beverage that so dissatisfied her.
I see her stalking toward one of the caterer’s staff members. The woman fearfully makes her way towards Laurel to give her a new champagne flute, even though everyone knows she didn’t drop the glass by accident.
“This is my birthday!” Laurel says, slamming her hands to her hips and squeezing herself for added emphasis. “I want real fucking champagne, not this sparkling kid shit. I am an adult at my fucking birthday and you’re serving me bubbling fucking piss. If I tell my daddy how you treated me, he won’t even send the check. And do you think your boss is going to pay you if he doesn’t get paid?” Laurel steps close enough to press her nose to the server’s nose, hunkering over her to make sure she feels just how low she is. Really, a class act.
“Ma’am…I can’t…you’re underage–” The server stammers. Doubtless she’s new and hasn’t dealt with enough prep school socialites to know that they all act like they’re entitled to the fucking air around her and no one else should be able to breathe it.
Lindsay stomps over in little steps. Her seven-inch heels aren’t conducive to much more than costing six thousand dollars and making her tall enough to tower over the server. “My mother is planning to use your company for my party next, and if I tell her about this, there’s no way that your shitty caterer boss is getting that job if you don’t stop harassing us,” Lindsay says with what seems to be genuine indignation.
“Stop,” I groan. I don’t mean to talk to these girls, but I can’t stand how they’re treating this woman. When they pick on me, that’s one thing. I can ignore them. But the poor server doesn’t deserve this treatment. “We’re all 18, we can’t have real champagne. Money can buy the law, but not quite like that.” I narrow my eyes. “This woman is just trying to do her job. Leave her alone.”
It works. The whole gaggle of prissy bitches who run Westwick Prep turn and circle me.
“It doesn’t matter how hard your desperate mother tries to buy you what’s in season, you’re always going to be a fucking joke. Don’t ruin my party or I will tell your mother what a cunt you’re being,” Laurel says, one hand on her hip and the other wagging a finger at me.
Mara, another one of the future trophy wives, jumps forward and pulls on my dress. “You are so fucking weird, even this dress can’t change that. I almost bought the same one. No way I can now. I’d gag thinking about you.” Mara shoves me.
The needless viciousness from my peers might be painful if I cared at all. But I don’t. Not in the “that’s what I say because really I’m so torn up inside” way. I don’t care at all. It’s how I deal with the fact that my parents are too worried about keeping up with everyone else to ever worry about their daughter. My parents only care about themselves, so I’ve never felt any real affecti
on for them as long as I can remember. It would be lonely, but I spend most of my time buried in a book. Fictional worlds are much better places to be.
I turn and leave, a sea of gasps and bitchiness fading into the noise behind me.
The hotel bar isn’t very crowded tonight. I sit on the far end and pull out my phone.
“What’ll ya have?” the bartender asks, his eyes forming two slits when he sees me, obviously underage.
“Ginger ale, please,” I say, handing him a wad of the money my mother gave me for tonight. Never go anywhere without enough money to look like you can just spend and it doesn’t matter, that’s what my mother always says.
The bartender nods. “Sure thing.” He returns momentarily with a full glass of bubbly ginger ale. I take a sip and look at my phone. I should just read a book, wait for my mother’s call. The white noise of the bar could be nice for reading. But I don’t want to be here. I want to be in my room. I want to be alone.
I dial Mother’s number into my phone, because even though I should, I don’t have her as a contact. I don’t know why I didn’t add her number, but I don’t have any contacts in my phone anyway.
Just like I don’t have friends at this party.
Likely, it’s a waste to call Mother. I know what she’ll say. It’ll be just like Lindsay’s party the week before. What the next party will be like.
I call, and the phone rings several times. I can almost hear Mother sucking her teeth. I can smell her cloying perfume when I start thinking of her.
My options are slim.
One, I can remain in the Maxor Hotel’s ballroom. Drowning here in the empty conversations and endless mockery, or…
Two, I can go home. Suffocate in the inescapable obsession over my appearance and my social status.
My heart is aching for a place that’s truly home. It isn’t a place I’ve been before. I don’t know if it’s a place that I’m going.
“Hello?” Mother picks up the phone, finally, and pretends that she wasn’t watching my phone call on her phone’s screen the entire time.
“I’d like to come home, please. Could you pick me up, or send Father?” I ask. My voice sounds like it’s fading away. Am I whispering? “The party is winding down.” I hope this detail will grant me an exit, but it won’t. Mother wants me to schmooze, to never miss an opportunity to make impressions and connections. “Other people are going home.”
“No,” Mother says. “You’ll stay. We’ll let you know when you can come home.” I can almost hear her eyebrows knit in frustration. She’ll stop when she thinks of the lines that might form on her skin. “Socialize!” she groans. Mother hangs up.
Jeremy
Lorenzo Sirvio doesn’t know that he’s breathing his last breaths tonight, but I know it. I know, because I’m going to snuff him out.
His propensity for cruelty isn’t a well-kept secret. Not like how I manage to rid the world of plenty of terrible stains like him. No one knows that I’m a serial killer. Being clever, wealthy and unpredictable has lent itself well to my dangerous hobby.
Tonight, Lorenzo is getting a surprise. I’m going to slide my knife in him and listen to his gasping breaths and know the world is a better place because he’s not in it.
Sitting on the far side of the bar, I wait for Lorenzo to show up. I’ve watched him enough to know his schedule down to when he eats an extra candy bar he keeps stashed in his desk.
Running my finger along the condensation on my glass, I lick my lips and watch the entrance. A girl in an elegant gown walks into the room. Everyone notices her — how could they not, with that monstrosity of a dress wrapping her up like some delicate little present?
I watch her. Forgetting Lorenzo, and his impending death, for a moment. The beautiful girl carries herself like she wants to be anywhere but here. If she notices the eyes on her, it would surprise me. She sits on the far side of the bar. I watch her order a drink. She’s too young for alcohol. The bartender brings her a ginger ale.
What a good girl.
The Maxor Hotel bar likes to serve underage girls, but this particular bartender doesn’t and I approve. Yes, the murderer with morals, that’s me.
I come here for the scum and clean up some of it, but I’ve never seen someone so enchanting as her. I’m not sure what about her presence compels me to move closer, but I remove some of the distance between us and sit nearby.
“Another?” the bartender asks. I wave him away. I can’t be bothered to look away from this delicate little woman.
In the room, I can observe everything around me, hyperaware and keyed up for action. She is the opposite — dialed out and utterly drained by everyone and everything. She’s so disconnected. I want to change that.
I see her, sweet little beauty, all by herself and away from the world. Some of her peers bolt into the room. When they enter, holding bottles of champagne and walking in a tangled gaggle of leering, the air becomes putrid. They stink of superficiality and arrogance. Nothing like her. When she’d entered the room, she had tried to cocoon herself back into solitude. These girls boisterously wander in, and they spot her.
I clench my fists. My legs urge me to stand when I see the newcomers close around her.
“We got some champagne. If you want some, you can have it, but you’ll have to suck it off our cocks. I mean, we have to know you’re worth it,” I hear one of them loudly proclaim.
“Yeah, Carrie, we can throw some dick at you so you won’t be such a weirdo,” one of the girl says, taking a swig of her champagne bottle and then burping. “Or do you need to find some other caterer to try and save from actually doing her fucking job and getting us what we want when we want it?”
I would kill every one of them to pull sweet Carrie from this situation. But that’s not how I’ll procure my beauty. I quiet the monster inside, for a moment, and let calmness come. Carrie will be mine.
“Are you done yet?” Carrie asks the intruders, bored and unperturbed. As she’s looking down, she catches me staring at her.
Carrie sees me. She smiles in such a soft way. She seems surprised by my stare, and her cheeks get pinker. The color on her is ravishing, and for a moment I swallow just thinking about how fucking hard I am at her little reaction.
I leer at the lovely Carrie, and she smiles again. It charms me in a way that I don’t think I’ve truly experienced before. I have fucked hundreds, maybe thousands of women, but my cock is harder than it has ever been for my innocent beauty. Does she know that she’s trapped herself? Would those kind eyes still regard me in such a pure way if she knew what I’m going to do to her?
Carrie
Mother finally calls, hours after my original plea and several ginger ales into a dreadful evening, to tell me that I’m released from this hell of a party, and I’m thrilled. I wait outside for the car to pick me up. The chill whipping wind reminds me that I had a wrap, a wrap I’d left back in the ballroom, but I’d rather freeze than re-enter that hells cape of boozed up prep school kids. Hugging my arms together will have to suffice.
I rub my hands up and down my arms in hope that I’ll create enough warmth to bridge me through the wait. A feeling like someone is watching me ripples down my spine, and I turn to see a pair of striking green eyes. The same eyes that belonged to the man looking at me in the bar earlier. I normally ignore whatever attention I receive, but this man’s whole presence seems to slip me from reality into a place where only the two of us exist. My breathing stills but my heartbeat increases. My palms start to sweat. My mouth runs dry. I remember feeling my face heat when he looked at me before. It’s odd; I generally have no interest in boys, yet this man is just that — a man. I don’t know why he’s looking at me. I don’t know why I want to keep looking at him.
Shouldn’t I find this creepy? So what if he’s got the chiseled jawline of a man crafted from marble? His lips are sensual. I look between his strong eyes and his full, pouty mouth and wonder how a man can have such suggestive lips.
Yes, suggestive.
Because suddenly, I don’t feel like being Carrie the virgin anymore.
Oh god, he’s walking closer to me! Can he tell by my face that I’ve been thinking about him? Maybe the shock reads through my eyes. I shut my mouth, snapping my lips closed when I realize they’re hanging open at the sight of him.
I can’t look away. He’s got to know I was staring at him, and he can only know because he was staring at me, too.
If I had a single calm bone in my body, I could tell myself to relax and then, you know, actually do that. But I’m awkward and totally unsure of how to act in situations like this.
“Are you cold?” the green-eyed man asks when he approaches me. There’s a dark, rich tone to his voice that sends shivers down to my toes, making the hair at the nape of my neck stand at attention. I didn’t know eyes could be so striking. I didn’t know a voice could be so…delicious.
“No,” I say quickly. I am cold, but for some reason I say no.
“You look cold, Carrie,” the stranger says.
He knows my name. Why doesn’t it raise some kind of red flag for me? The sound of my name on his lips charms me rather than scares me, and that scares me more about myself than it does him. That’s got death wish, or at the very least, weirdo written all over it.
His eyes crinkle in a charming smile. “My name is Jeremy Burke. I saw you with your friends at the bar.” He pulls off his coat and places it on my shoulders, his hands holding me for a few extra seconds. The extra touch prompts me to put my hands on his, and I hold them there for a few very long seconds. Jeremy looks into my eyes so intensely that I think that if I had secrets, he’d know them just from that look. If I had secrets, I’d want him to know them.
How can I be so utterly bewitched?
I pull my hands from under his, sucking in a breath. “They’re not my friends at all.”
Jeremy laughs, a quiet, haunting sound. I feel as though I recognize the pain behind that laugh, and he recognizes something in me, too. Jeremy’s eyes promise as much. “I didn’t think they would be. You didn’t seem like you wanted to be here tonight, yet you are.”
