Kingston

 

 

I watch as Gloria twists a strand of her platinum blond hair between her fingers, absentmindedly staring at her phone through her thick fake eyelashes. She's sitting across the drawing room from me with her legs crossed, dressed in a sharp beige new women's suit that I've never seen on her before. I wouldn't be surprised if she bought it just for this meeting. Her earrings and matching necklace, both in that heavy gold tone I hate so much, also look new to me. Her thin lips are painted a deep red, matching her strong eye makeup and the rouge on her young cheeks, making her look so much older than she is.

Gloria is only 25 years old, but today her hair is styled like that of a middle-aged high society lady. Too similar to our mother's hair. It looks fucking ridiculous, and I know she only does it to please our stuck-up families.

She's playing a game. We both are. But she's so much better at this than I am.

"Don't you think we should be sitting next to each other?" she says, without looking up from her phone.

I huff. "I doubt it'll make a difference."

She looks up, piercing me with her steel blue eyes.

"I think it does," she hisses. "Fiancé."

She pats on the cushions next to her, inviting me to sit beside her as if I was a trained puppy.

I glare at her without moving an inch from my armchair on the other side of the seating area. This whole arrangement is ridiculous enough as it is, I won't make it any more believable by sitting next to the woman I'm supposed to marry per my parents' wishes. They both know that I don't care for Gloria the way a man should care for his wife-to-be – and it doesn't matter to them.

"It worked for us," they keep saying. Marriage is not much more than a business agreement in their eyes, and in the eyes of the circles in which my family socializes. This is all the more true for firstborns like me. My younger brother fled to the West Coast when he started college, that lucky bastard. The responsibility is not his to take on, and he pretty much gets to do whatever he pleases over there.

It's all on me. The main heir, my father's successor to the family empire.

I wouldn't be doing this if my parents hadn't threatened to take this position away from me. They've been pestering me to settle down and lose my promiscuous ways ever since I graduated from college and became CEO of one of our family’s shipping companies. I'm good at what I do, and I enjoy being the boss. The way I see it, I'm not only able to continue the company's success, but make it even greater, because unlike my aging father, I'm capable of changing with the times. Things have changed, even in our traditional and century-old business, but he doesn‘t understand most of these changes. It‘s hurtful to the company, but every time I bring it up in front of him, he gets enraged.

I can‘t have our fortune destroyed by old man failures, but he refused to give me full control unless I‘m willing to get married, settle down, and produce family heirs.

So, here we are. Gloria Waldorf and me. We've known each other since childhood, and she's one of the few women in my social circle who I've never hooked up with. That's how much I loathe that woman. She's superficial, manipulative, and there's not a single likable thing about her personality. She’s shallow, and her snootiness and nosiness leads her to get involved in other people’s business. Everything she says is either gossip, spiteful comments, or commands, because she's used to being served and treated like a princess. She always gets what she wants, and that includes a number of men. That may be the only thing we have in common, the promiscuity.

It may be surprising that nothing ever happened between us, even after our engagement was announced. However, next to my dislike for her, we also grew up together, which makes her seem more like a hated sister to me. Also, I’m simply not attracted to her with her excessive jewelry, the fake lashes, and the dyed platinum blond hair. The worst thing is that she smells like my mother because they both bathe in a similarly obtrusive stench of flowery perfume every day.

Yet, all of that makes her perfect to become my wife.

I know love is not for me. I haven't worked on my body this hard to be locked up in a cage, allowed to have just one woman for the rest of my life. I'm a player, and I have my looks and my wealth working for me. It's almost too easy sometimes because girls are easy. They all want the same thing, and I can give it to them. Three nights, three fucks, and never sleeping in the same bed - those are my limits. After that, I'm done with them. Always. I don't care if they're not done with me, but a few dodged phone calls usually gets the message across.

Seeing as neither Gloria nor I are in this for the love and the hellhole that's monogamy, I don't see why there'd be a problem for both of us to continue our way of living, as long as we keep it secret from our overly conservative parents.

It's perfect. All I have to endure is the wedding and the damn preparations and parties that come with it. Our families are going all out with this, and we – the well-trained puppets that we are - go along with everything they want.

I hate every minute of this bizarre circus, and I hate even more that they want to include us in every single step of the planning process, thus robbing me of valuable time that could be spent elsewhere. Between a pretty girl's legs, for example. I picked up a particularly cute one at the VIP section in a club a few nights ago. A cute brunette with huge eyes and firm tits that she wants me to believe are real, but I can't be fooled. I'm not a fan of fake, but those perky tits drive me insane. I can't wait to see them bouncing up and down again as that little slut rides my thick cock into oblivion.

Alas, I have to waste my Friday evening with this idiotic meeting to discuss the details of our upcoming engagement party in a few weeks. We already discussed the guest list and parts of the catering menu today, both of which took hours to decide because Gloria decided to suddenly have an opinion on these things and engaged in long debates with both of our mothers.

Gloria and I were the first to return to the drawing room to discuss the last matter for today: the musical accompaniment. My mother is a trained actress and attended Juilliard School before she married my father. She feels very close to her alma mater and insisted on hiring one of their students to accompany the engagement party and possibly every event that follows.

My father and both of Gloria's parents were not supportive of the idea, but they filed it under my mother's well-known whimsical traits and decided to let her have this one, if the student managed to convince us with his or her skills.

That's why we're having this ridiculous get-together on a Friday evening. I know Gloria and I share the sentiment of not wanting to be here. She keeps checking her costly watch again and again.

"Where is everybody?" she asks in a nagging voice that drills through my skull.

However, her question is legit. Both of our parents are late, which is very unusual for them.

The double door behind my back squeaks and Gloria lifts her eyes. Her annoyed frown is instantly replaced by a bright smile as she gets up from the sofa she's been sitting on.

I follow her lead and get up myself, fixing my suit in the process, as I turn around to face the door. Gloria's parents enter the room, greeting us with polite nods as they walk in. They're followed by my father and my mother - and her.

The girl who'll rob me of my sanity.