~ 2 ~
PEYTON
When you’re a bride running back down the aisle, no one really chases you. At least not at first, anyway. If you can cry on command and fake a few tears, you can make it back through the church doors and out onto the sidewalk before anyone even stands up. After all, there’s the shock factor to consider. It’s not every day you see a botched wedding. Most people are too busy covering their mouths with their hands.
I not only factored this in, I was actually counting on it. It was a simple thing to rip off this stupid fucking train, but tearing away the bottom half of my dress so I could actually run took a bit longer. I was at the corner when I heard the church doors swing open, and across the street by the time the first of many alarmed voices reached my ears. Sure, I was leaving an easy-to-follow trail of shredded white chiffon on my way through the neighboring park. But very soon, I wouldn’t be so easy to follow.
My bike was exactly where I’d left it early this morning, after having taken it out on a predawn ride to ‘work out the last of my wedding day jitters.’ Donovan hadn’t cared much, nordid he notice the extra time it had taken me to jog my way back. He was already buried face-deep in three different computer monitors while plotting whatever assault he was waging against the world later today. It didn’t strike me as odd that he’d work on his wedding day, and it didn’t strike him as odd that I was restless.
“Peyton!”
I ignored the first shout while swinging my leg over to the opposite footrest. Motorcycle riding lessons had been my idea, and I’d had to fight hard for them. I’d first pitched it as a couples thing, knowing full well Donovan Prescott would never set his tightly-clenched ass on a leather seat that wasn’t fully heated, and surrounded by a high-end luxury car. With some creative manipulation, the Ducati XDiavel showed up on my birthday, complete with helmet and a big pink bow. Not that a bike like this, molded in black lava and burning red, had anything to do with the color pink.
What I didn’t mention to my now ex-fiancé was that I already knew how to ride, and ride well. A few years back, I had a two-and-a-half-year relationship with a Harley cruising, cigar-chomping sociopath, that predictably ended in unmitigated disaster. A man who not only taught me the correct way to power away and tear out, but who was responsible for the tattoos on my rib cage and ankle as well.
Donovan hadn’t liked those tattoos, nor had he liked the idea of his pretty little fiancée straddling anything else but him. He’d put up with it though, because if there was one thing the billionaire entrepreneur knew, it was how to pick his battles.
I’d imagine it would’ve been dramatic; a runaway bride in a shredded white dress, kick-starting a sexy as fuck motorcycle before blasting off through the Nantucket streets.My beautiful Ducati had a fully electric start however, so all I had to do was push a button.
“Peyton, WAIT!”
Anything else my now ex-fiancé had to say would be said to a cloud of rubber-scented smoke. I lit the tires so exuberantly and with so much satisfaction I managed to spin an unwanted 360 that almost tipped me over. But I jammed a leg down, got control again, then dumped the clutch and tore away.
“WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU—”
My adrenaline spiked higher as I raced forward, passing the few church-goers who’d managed to follow me outside. My ‘distant cousins’ looked appalled. Invited by Donovan to fill out my side of the church, I barely knew them, so they could fuck right off. But the crowning moment of my shattered wedding day was seeing the horrified look on my never-would-be mother-in-law’s face, as I roared past her. I almost lifted my hand from the throttle just long enough to flip her off, but I knew every second counted if I were totrulyget away.
Besides, the controlling bitch’s real punishment would be the shitshow that followed.
