Empire of Hate: A Second Chance Enemies to Lovers Romance

Nicole looks at me as if she wants to kill me then throw me to rabid dogs.

I share the feelings.

Or maybe mine go a step further.

Maybe mine is mixed with an unhinged sense of hatred that I don’t usually allow myself to feel.

A hatred that’s so childish in nature but also lethal.

The reason I chose to become a solicitor isn’t because of a warped sense of justice or even profit.

It’s because I’m vindictive. To a fault. With enough black emotions to drown the Dead Sea.

And because I’m vindictive, I’ve become colder to Nicole. I’ve turned her everyday life into hell and made sure she never goes home at a reasonable hour.

Except for earlier today.

I had this thought that was basically “what the fuck are you doing, Daniel?” and decided to let her go home.

Until I had a glass of whiskey—or two, that is—and started imagining her with her “family.” The same family she was on the phone with the other day and called “hon.”

No clue why, but I became equal parts annoyed and murderous.

That’s why I magically invented a contract and ordered her to come over.

The girls just showed up on their own because I sent a half-drunk text.

It doesn’t even take effort anymore. They see my face on magazine covers and hop on my lap like kittens with separation anxiety.

It’s all too easy. Too convenient.

Too fucking boring.

I don’t have a goal in life aside from building a career, I guess. I don’t even think about opening my own firm like Knox does, because…well, I didn’t choose law because I could see myself practicing it for life. I chose it because it was the farthest thing possible from my beloved family affairs.

I don’t have that, either. A family, I mean. Not after Father fucked every escort his assistant could get her hands on, then died while he was with one of them. Fitting as fuck, if you ask me.

As for my mother, she checked out years ago, not to mention she always preferred Zach over me. To say our relationship is stagnant would be the understatement of the century.

We barely speak. Actually, change that to never.

I haven’t visited England since I left it.

Not even once.

If Astrid misses me, she makes a trip here, but those trips have become few and far between ever since she had three spawns.

I swear that fucker Levi keeps knocking her up for sport.

Point is, I might have subtly cut myself off from the family tree, but I’ve done well for myself and got everything I strived for.

The only thing that’s not easy, convenient, or boring is the woman standing in front of me, her blonde strands about to catch fire from the flames in her eyes.

They’re so light and green and fake.

She is fake.

Or was.

Either way, I want to fucking strangle her for it.

The feeling is mutual apparently, because she looks about ready to transform into a hulk and smash me into the nearest wall.

“You’re here,” I drawl the words nonchalantly with boredom in my voice.

“Obviously.” She throws a dirty look at the girls who are still clinging to me as if they’re extensions of my body. “I thought there was a contract to review.”

“There is. Over there, on the table.”

“You clearly have company.”

“Doesn’t mean you can’t work.”

“If you’re too preoccupied with other things, surely this can wait until tomorrow.”

“It can, but you’ll work on it tonight. Now, sit your arse on that chair and proofread the contracts.”

She purses her lips, which is her way to stop from spouting nonsense, then whirls around in a cloud of metaphorical smoke and forcefully sits down.

I expect to see ashes surrounding her, but none appear.

Yet.

The girls giggle, smelling of strong perfume that nearly bleed my nostrils. One of them kissing me on the cheek. “Let’s go to your bedroom.”

“We’ll make you feel good,” the other says.

Apparently, it’s not quiet enough, because even though Nicole is focused on the documents and the tablet, her leg bounces under the table and her lips are set in a thin line.

I know because I’m watching her like a hawk. My attention isn’t on the girls, it’s on her.

The ice in my whiskey clinks as I swirl it and take a sip. “You can start right here.”

They giggle again, and the sound is annoying. What are they, preschoolers?

Nicole never giggled. Not even as a child. She always had elegance and was the walking form of proper manners. Now that I think about it, I don’t remember seeing her laugh either.

And probably never will, considering my status as the warden of her hell.

One of the girls lowers herself between my legs and I lazily open them wide, letting her settle in the middle.

She looks like a malnourished pubescent, which I know she’s not, but the fact that she reminds me of a minor is a major turn-off.

Or maybe the whole fucking scene is.

I keep comparing them to Nicole’s voluptuous body that’s become sexier than a porn star’s. Not that she wasn’t hot back in school, but she’s all grown up now.

All woman.

The girl brings my attention back to her when her fingers latch onto my belt and she meets my eyes with a seductive look. “I’ll start. Remember when you told me I’m good at giving head?”

No, I don’t, but I nod absentmindedly anyway. “You’re a doll.”

Nicole jerks up to a standing position, taking the documents with her. “I’ll finish these in the kitchen.”

I resist a smirk by taking a sip of my drink. “You’ll finish them right there.”

“It’s distracting.”

“I pay you to tune that out. Sit down.”

She glares at me, but there’s something else in there, hatred and a feeling I can’t identify.

When she doesn’t make a move to comply, I jerk my head to the chair. “Sit the fuck down if you want to keep your job.”

“My job doesn’t entail witnessing my boss receiving sexual favors.”

“Sexual favors? What the fuck is this, a detective show? It’s called a blowjob, and if I say your job requires that, then it does.”

“Are you trying to prove a point?” she asks, her face red, whether with anger or something else, I’m not sure. “If that’s the case, then I already know you get more pussy than Casanova during his prime and you love it. I get it, congratulations on the meaningless record. Now, can I please go home?”

“No.” I slowly push the one kneeling in front of me. “Both of you, out.”

“W-what?”

“Do you have hearing problems? I said get out.”

They pale, but not more than Nicole as they grab their flimsy bags, give her a dirty look, and saunter out of my flat, huffing and puffing as if they have breathing issues.

I stand and Nicole watches my every move, closely, without blinking.

“Are you going to sit or should I throw you out as well?”

She flops down on the chair, her gaze glued to the paper.

“Where’s my food?”

She fumbles in her bag and produces a container.

“Doesn’t look like Katerina’s.”

“The restaurant didn’t accept orders when I called so…I brought food from another place.”

“Always going against orders.”

“I couldn’t exactly force open the restaurant or make her fix you something. You know, with the thirty-minute time limit and interrupting my quiet night.”

I stare at her, but it’s not because of the attitude. I’m starting to think she’ll never lose that mouthy side, no matter how much I threaten to fire her. And for some reason, I don’t want the fire to disappear either.

The reason behind my pause is the way she’s speaking while reading from the document. Multitasking at its finest.

I slide across from her, abandon my glass of whiskey and open the container. Even I know drinking on an empty stomach is bad, and since food is the work of the devil, I wouldn’t have come near it with a ten-foot pole if it weren’t out of necessity.

I grab a fork and glare at the pasta as if it’s my next battle. There’s neither parmesan nor pesto, because for some phantom reason, Nicole knows I don’t like them.

Fact is, I don’t like all food, but those two were what made me vomit the first time.

Still can’t figure out how she knows about my preferences, but that doesn’t deny the sense of satisfaction that fills me at the fact. “Since when do you like quiet nights?”

She slowly lifts her head, appearing taken aback by the question. “I’ve always liked quiet nights.”

“Could’ve fooled me with all the parties you made sure to become the center of attention at.”

Her eyes glitter, turning a molten green, almost too bright to look at.

Too real.

Too…uncomfortable.

She’s every obscure emotion that religions ordered humans to stay away from.

She lowers her head, allowing a stray strand to play hide-and-seek with her face. “Back then, I was chasing an unreachable dream.”

“And now?”

She tucks the blasphemous piece of hair behind her ear and sighs. “Now, I’m just surviving, Daniel. I wouldn’t have worked for you and allowed you to treat me like the dirt beneath your expensive Prada shoes if that weren’t the case.”

Nicole is not the dirt beneath my shoes. She’s the rock in it. Always has been since the first time I saw her and thought she was a snobbish little princess.

She still is.

It doesn’t matter if she wears cheap clothes from a department store. Being a princess is an aura and she exudes it from a mile away.

“You mean to tell me you didn’t like the attention?” After enough procrastination to trick my stomach into accepting the devil’s fruit, I take the first bite of the pasta and pause.

Usually, I don’t.

Usually, I swallow my food without even chewing. It’s only a mundane thing I religiously do so I’ll survive. I’ve never taken pleasure in eating.

Not since I saw my father kissing that woman with food all around them; then a week later witnessed him fucking another woman, by inserting all sorts of vegetables and fruits inside her arse while he had his limp dick in her cunt.

Place of the traumatizing event—the table we ate at every day.

Time—when I was twelve.

I told Astrid I loved my mother’s scones and we often fought for them, but whenever I had a taste of those unfortunate things, I threw them back up when my friend wasn’t looking.

It’s a habit I had for seventeen years, so I became a professional at training my stomach on which times it’s allowed to be a freak and which times it has to act as if food is the creation of heaven.

The taste of this pasta, however, is…peculiar. Simple yet exquisite in its ordinary ingredients.

“I didn’t,” Nicole replies to my earlier question. “Attention exhausted me. I always had to look a certain way, speak a certain way.”

“Be a bitch in a certain way.”

“That, too.” She has the audacity to flip her hair and I’m tempted to pull her down by it. “Couldn’t let anyone beat me in anything.”

“Until you lost it all.” I take another forkful, pausing to savor the taste. “Hurts to fall from grace, doesn’t it?”

“Not really. It felt peaceful.”

I narrow my eyes. “It felt peaceful to lose everything you ever owned?”

“It was never mine. I only enjoyed what I was given.”

“Am I supposed to applaud you now? Be fooled by your “I’m a changed woman” speech?”

“I don’t want anything from you, Daniel.”

“Not even your job? Because the door is right there.”

“Aside from my job.” She focuses back on the papers, fingers digging into the edges as if she’s stopping herself from ripping them to shreds.

It’s then that I realize I finished the pasta, the first meal I’ve enjoyed in…forever. I don’t even remember liking food all that much prior to the “Dad fucks with food” episode.

“What’s the name of the restaurant?”

Nicole’s head whips up so fast, I’m surprised it doesn’t roll on the floor post-decapitation style. “W-why?”

“Give me a name.”

“They’re…nobodies. I mean, they’re small. If you didn’t like it, I promise not to get you anything from there anymore.”

“On the contrary, I need all my future meals from there. What are they called?”

“Lolli’s,” she blurts, then winces.

“Bit weird name for a restaurant. Sounds like a stripper’s stage identity.”

“It is what it is.” She pauses, then asks suspiciously. “You really liked the pasta?”

“It’s fine.” It’s the best meal I’ve had since I was a teen, but she doesn’t need to know that. “Just tell them to have more variety and I’ll pay handsomely.”

“Got it.” She has a shit-eating grin on her face, and it makes her features happier, shinier—almost too girly.

Ever since she came back to my life, I’ve been so angry and pissed off, and a million other indefinable emotions, that I failed to notice just how much she’s grown up.

In a way, she’s still the same Nicole who made every male’s head turn in her direction. The Nicole who left a cloud of cherry perfume behind her—the scent boys jerked off to in their lonely showers.

The Nicole who called every one of those sorry cunts gross, and other colorful synonyms for even attempting to breathe near her.

But then again, she’s not the same. She’s more reserved now, more introverted than extroverted.

And she’s ten times prettier than she was eleven years ago. Her curves are that of a woman and her face has matured with age.

She stopped hiding the tiny beauty mole above the left corner of her lip with makeup. Every fashion magazine considers that a sign of beauty, but for Nicole, it was an unwelcome disturbance of her flawless face.

I always liked it, though. That small distinction made her perfectly imperfect. Prior to when she hid it like her life depended on the fact.

Before I realize it, I’m reaching out for her face, for that small imperfection that she’s finally embracing.

The moment my fingers connect with it, she jerks, her wide eyes meeting mine.

“Why do you no longer hide this?” I ask, ignoring her disgust with me and the squeezing in my chest that I’m promptly chalking up to being half-drunk.

“Why…why are you touching me?”

I don’t know either. Could be the alcohol or the way she grinned or the fact that she’s even in my vicinity again when she shouldn’t be.

It’s over.

I erased her from my life.

I fucking got over her.

So why does she think she can walk back in and set each of my barriers on fire?

“Answer the question, Nicole. You started hiding this as soon as you hit puberty. Why do you no longer do it?”

“How do you even know that?”

“I just do. For the last time, answer the fucking question.”

“Because I used to feel self-conscious about it.”

“You don’t anymore?”

“I don’t really care now.”

A heavy silence falls between us as I glide my index finger over the tiny beauty mark and accidentally—or not really—brush against her upper lip.

My skin refuses to leave hers, refuses to part from the warmth mixed with tremors.

So I don’t.

Like an addict, I continue sniffing the forbidden powder.

Nicole inhales stuttering breaths, her lips parting.

“What happened after you left?” The question leaves me before I can stop it.

I’ll blame that on the alcohol, too, even though I usually hold my liquor like a sailor.

Her compliant albeit confused expression disappears and a fire ignites in her eyes.

“You’re eleven years too late for that question.” She jerks to a standing position and slams the documents on the table. “I’m finished. So if you have anything you want to be changed, please let me know, sir.”

“What the fuck got your knickers in a twist?”

“You and your useless questions. What do you care what happened eleven years ago when you never glanced my way?”

I never glanced her way?

What in the ever-loving fuck, and I mean this, type of crack is she on?

“Should I remind you of what you’ve done, Nicole? If I make a list, I’ll break some fucking record.”

“Just like you broke a record of being a stage-one bastard, you mean.”

“Did you just call me—your boss—a bastard?”

“You’re the one who brought up the past. Why would you? Do you like tormenting me for fun?”

“Maybe I do.”

“Maybe you have too much time on your hands.”

“Not nearly enough to turn your life into hell. I have a wish list of the things I’ll do to you every day.”

“I hate you.”

“Careful, Peaches. Hate is a mixture of love and jealousy on steroids.”

Her mouth falls open and I realize my mistake too late.

I called her Peaches after vowing to never use that nickname again.

Before I can retract it or think of an insult to erase it, she clears her throat. “I suppose the fact that you’re not reading the file means you’re not in a hurry. So, I’ll take my leave.”

Then she’s practically jogging out the door, leaving her cherry perfume behind.

It’s cheaper, not nearly as strong or authentic as back then.

But just like eleven years ago, I’m left confused, angry, and with a fucking hard-on.