CHAPTER 5
Chapter Title: The Queen’s Gambit (Part 1)
Kimberly
Delish thrummed with a pulse that could make any small town feel like it was flirting with the big leagues, especially on a Friday or Saturday night. Crisfield’s waterfront glowed, its lights splintering across the glassy bay like shards of broken stained glass, spilling through the club’s floor-to-ceiling windows. Inside, the air was a heady cocktail of perfume, cologne, spilled beer, and raw ambition. The DJ’s bassline vibrated through the polished concrete floor, a primal rhythm that made your bones hum.
I stepped out of the Uber, my heels clicking on the wet cobblestones. The night air was cool, tinged with salt from the bay. I adjusted the silk strap of my ivory slip dress—simple, clinging in all the right places, whispering wealth without shouting it. My lipstick, a deep crimson, was still flawless. My smirk? Sharper than the stilettos I wore.
Fun fact about Henry "Hank" Williamson III: he graduated high school right here in Crisfield. You’d think someone with Divine's pedigree, a senator’s wife with a fortune older than the Chesapeake itself, would’ve shipped her only son off to some elite ivy-draped boarding school. But no. Divine kept Hank local, rooted in this sleepy coastal town, surrounded by kids who worshipped or feared him. It was a calculated move, cloaking him in small-town normalcy while ensuring he remained untouchable—a local prince with a national dynasty awaiting him. The facade of humility only sharpened his inner bully, honing a vicious edge that thrived in the shadows of his mother’s ambitions.
And every bully needs a posse. Hank’s crew was a predictable mix of entitled, overprivileged egomaniacs, each one nursing their own insecurities beneath the swagger. Cole Jones, Emma Morgan, and Allison Reed—they were the inner circle, the ones who’d orbited Hank since high school, basking in his glow while sharpening their own claws.
They were still up to their old tricks, even now, years later. Hank had moved on, setting his sights on inheriting his father’s Senate seat. He rarely partied with them anymore—too busy playing the dutiful son in D.C. or wherever Divine’s ambitions dragged him. But his absence hadn’t slowed the others down. For Cole, Emma, and Allison, it was business as usual: same games, same stakes, just another night.
The line outside Delish snaked along the waterfront, a mix of locals and out-of-towners buzzing with anticipation. I spotted Cole at the door, his broad frame silhouetted against the neon glow of the club’s sign. Owner and bouncer, he played both roles with a grin that could charm a snake. Six-foot-one, black hair, hazel eyes, and a mole above his upper lip—he was Hank’s reflection in more ways than one: same height, same effortless charisma, same old-money pedigree. His father owned the marina.
Back in high school, Hank was the quarterback, Cole his center, always there to snap the ball and block the hits. Loyal to a fault, Cole was the kind of guy who’d take a punch for you and smile about it.
“Make space. Royalty’s here,” Cole called, his voice cutting through the chatter as he waved me forward, shooing a cluster of impatient club-goers to the side. He was dressed in a navy button-down, crisp white trousers, and white Sambas, a red ruby stud glinting in his left ear—a patriotic ensemble that screamed confidence. Or maybe overcompensation.
I flashed him a warm smile, the kind I’d perfected over years of playing nice. Cole was easy to like, with his unpretentious boyish charm, a stark contrast to Hank’s rigid propriety. Hank was all pressed suits and calculated pauses, the kind of man who’d bore you to death before he’d surprise you. Cole, though? He had stories, and I’d heard one I couldn’t forget.
“Kimmie,” Cole slurred, five whiskeys deep during his birthday bash at Delish, his voice thick with hurt over Hank’s absence—tied up in D.C. with some Senate powwow alongside his father. “Back in the day, Hank wasn’t this uptight. We had real fun, wild times, until he got tangled up with that... with that skank—”
Emma had cut him off with a sharp slap to his arm. “Cole, bathroom. Now. Splash some water on your face and come back when you’re not embarrassing yourself.” Then she seized my hand, her grip tight, tugging me off the plush leather of the VIP booth—more as a distraction than an invitation. “Come on, Kimmie. Let’s dance.”
I’d been biding my time ever since, waiting for Cole to get sloppy again, to spill the rest of that story. Tonight could be the night. A faint sheen of sweat glistened on his upper lip as he worked the door, his eyes a little too bright. With a quick, practiced motion, he wiped his gums—coke, no doubt. Not enough to derail him, but enough to loosen his tongue if I played it right.
But why bother? After putting Divine in her place, I was in the mood for fun, not work. There were easier ways to drag the truth out of Cole.
“Is Emma inside?” I asked, stepping past him into the club’s dim interior, the bass wrapping around me like a second skin.
“At the bar,” Cole shouted over the music, already turning to block a trio of giggling girls trying to flirt their way past the velvet rope. “You can’t miss her.”
Emma Morgan, Hank’s distant cousin and self-appointed queen of their little clique, spotted me before I reached the bar. She held court near the counter, her glossy chestnut curls bouncing as she laughed, surrounded by three trust-fund frat boys and a bored-looking man in his forties—someone’s husband, no doubt, slumming it for the night. Her manicured hand waved me over with the enthusiasm of someone craving a distraction. Or maybe she just smelled blood in the water.
Hank’s single status in high school had only amplified Emma’s influence. With no girlfriend to rival her, she slipped into the role seamlessly—the voice at his ear, nudging his choices whenever he dismissed something as beneath him.
I didn’t trust her—never had. Emma was Divine’s eyes and ears, reporting every word, every glance back to the Williamson matriarch. But I needed her on my side, at least for now.
“You made it,” Emma said, pulling me into a perfumed hug, her smile as brittle as spun sugar. “I heard dinner was... tense.”
I slid onto the barstool beside her, raising an eyebrow. News traveled fast in Crisfield, especially when Divine was involved. “Tense is one word for it. I’d go with ‘rehearsal for psychological warfare.’"
Emma laughed, tossing her head back, but I wasn’t fooled. She pretended to dislike Divine, but she was as much in the senator’s wife’s pocket as anyone else in this town. “And yet here you are, glowing like you just walked off a Chanel runway.”
“I aim to please,” I said, my lips curling into a smug smile. I knew every word would reach Divine’s ears by morning.
The bartender—a guy with arms carved like a Greek statue and a smirk just shy of arrogant—slid a vodka tonic across the counter without me asking. Perfectly chilled, with a twist of lime. Emma’s doing, apparently.
“On me,” she said with a wink. “Your reward for surviving Divine.”
“Barely,” I muttered, sipping my vodka, savoring its sharp, pleasant burn.
As I cradled the glass in my hand, a brief shadow crossed my face...
Not everyone survives Divine.