Page 15 of Violent Reign (Violent Kingdom)

For an instant, I’m Avery Capulet—the woman nobody dares fuck with in Verona. But then I’m something else. Margot’s face shifts. “The processional is about to start,” she repeats. “Mr Capulet is waiting. It’s time to go upstairs.”

Jennifer wordlessly offers me her arm, and the two of us climb the stairs behind Margot.Throw yourself down,says that insidious little voice inside me.Tumble backward and crack your head open and then you will not have to marry Nathan.

And then I will never see Rome again. I’ll have no hope of it. And Rome—well, Rome will die too, just as surely as we would have died from those pills if Elliot hadn’t shown up in time. Stay alive, Avery. Stay alive.

Margot arranges us at the big double doors leading into the nave. She produces a fresh layer of lip gloss for Jennifer and sweeps illuminating powder onto my cheeks. The music has already started. This isn’t my wedding—atmywedding, the music wouldn’t start until I was good and fucking ready. This is Nathan’s wedding. I just happen to be cast in the role of blushing bride.

It’s not real. The wedding with Rome was real, and this is not real. This is just something to get through.

Bright wildflowers. A brilliant blue desert sky. Rome’s eyes, the same blue as that sky, the edges around them creasing as he smiled, as he confessed his love for me. I cling to that memory. It’s all I have.

Jennifer pastes a smile on her face that’s so false I wish she’d frown instead, and begins her trek down the aisle to Margot’s cue. The poor girl takes halting steps, her shoulders curving forward. She probably expects someone to jump out and stab her at any moment. She could very well be right.

And then it’s my turn.

My strapless Monique Lhullier gown makes me a vision. I float outside my body and watch myself come down the aisle. This is Avery Capulet on her wedding day. She wears a serene smile and takes slow, measured steps. She has perfect posture. Her bouquet tumbles down over her hands in a delicious waterfall of flowers. Her heart is broken and bloody, lying dead in the hollow bottom of her rib cage.

My soul slams back home. Ugh. Get out. I’d rather not be in my body for this. Because in my body, I’m acutely aware of all the enemies who’ve filled the chapel to watch me get married.

Tyler sits in the front row and winks at me as I go by.Motherfucker. Eliza’s to the right of him, dabbing at her eyes with a silk handkerchief. And at the front, there’s Nathan, beaming at me.

He’s fucking won, hasn’t he? This is the greatest victory of his life. Avery Capulet on her wedding day. Taking her cousin Nathan’s hand.

Eliza lets out a contented sigh when our skin touches. Someone murmurs something to her. A piece of my soul chips off and flies back to Joshua Tree. Back to Rome’s blue eyes, reflecting every cloud in the sky as they journey lazily overhead. The way he grinned as he slid the ring onto my finger. The scratchy lace of the dress I wore. How hot it was, how vibrant. I was alive.

And now I’m a dead woman.

Words wash over us. Lawfully wedded wife. The covenant of marriage. The gift of community. Cleaving. My brain gets stuck on cleaving, flooding my memories with blood and sliced skin and that girl on the mattress, a gun to her head. Then the space where part of her head used to be. It’s not your typical wedding imagery, I’ll give you that, but it’s better than focusing on Nathan’s face.

“Repeat after me,” says the priest.

The only way to describe what happens then is a total separation. It’s notmevowing to be an obedient wife to Nathan. It’s notmeaccepting the slim band on my finger—the slim band that has to nestle against the biggest, gaudiest ring I’ve ever seen. It’s notmetilting my head up and to the right to let Nathan kiss my lips.

And it’s notmewho leans back into his palms. He dips me, and it’s notmyarms that go up to wrap around his neck for balance. This is it—this is the money shot. Let the photographers get it now. They’ll never know what ugliness they’re really capturing. What devastation. Anything can look beautiful on the outside.

Finally he lets me go and our kiss—our brand-new union—is greeted by thunderous applause. Nobody would be caught dead giving anything less than enthusiastic support of the Capulet dynasty. That’s why none of them will ever be able to help me escape. I’m surrounded by my own captors, and most of them don’t even know it.

Jennifer’s at my side, sweat beading at her hairline. This has been too much for her. But it doesn’t stop her from handing me my bouquet with that death’s door smile. She’s the one who bends down to adjust the train of my dress as Nathan escorts me back down the aisle.

I think of my father, still comatose in that godforsaken hospital bed. How I’ve been married twice now, and neither time has he been with me to walk me down the aisle or give me an encouraging smile. I’m sad he missed my union with Rome, but I thank the stars he isn’t here today to witness the atrocity that just unfolded. I think of how he would see me right now: His only surviving child, freshly married the the devil, wearing a serene smile and crinkling her eyes so her expression appears joyful in the photographs that will go out to magazines and newspapers and gossip websites.

Inside, her heart is worse than broken. It’s dead.

Chapter Nine

ROME

“Oh, she looks so pretty.”Rosaline presses a knuckle to the corners of her eyes, pretending to get misty-eyed. “Look at that dress. Do you think she picked it out herself? I need a man who will pay for me to have a dress like that.”

“You don’t think Ty will buy you—whatever that is?”

“Someone designed that for her.” There’s a real longing in Rosaline’s voice. Rosaline, the strung-out addict who would rather fuck a man to death than anything else, wants a white wedding in a big fancy church with a dress that looks like it was made by Cinderella’s fairy godmother.

Rosaline holds up the phone so it stays in my line of vision and chews a fingernail with her teeth. The wedding is being live-streamed on the local news. It’s like when the royals in England get married, only—so the announcers remind us in hushed tones—it’s better because it’s here.

It’s killing me.

A plastic measuring spoon snaps in half in my hand and clatters to the floor. “Fuck.”

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