The artichoke soup with black truffles suddenly tasted like sour acid in Seth Sandoval Cervantes's mouth. He neatly took the napkin, spilling the contents out before he stared at Tessa Urquillo across the table.

"W-where is this coming from?" he asked, amused at how their very romantic dinner had taken a sharp turn south. He never stuttered, yet the word caught in his throat.

"I've been doing a lot of thinking, Seth. You are always busy, I'm also busy with my career. This… this isn't working out for us," Tessa said, her blue eyes unwavering. Seth knew she was lying; her voice, always high-pitched when deceitful, betrayed her.

Only one woman would want to break what they had: Jessica Davis. His fiancée's best friend, a woman he loathed as much as she clearly loathed him. "Did Jessica suggest this?" he demanded, anger crawling in his veins.

Tessa hesitated, her voice climbing higher. "No. J-Jessica had nothing to do with this."

"God damn it Tessa! When are you going to realize that Jessica is evil?!" he growled. Tessa cried, then slowly, deliberately, removed her engagement ring and placed it on the table. The 1.6-carat light pink diamond glistened, mocking him.

Later, drowning his sorrows in whiskey with his best friend Lance, Seth murmured, "Jessica Davis. She is to blame. She did this."

Lance, ever the pragmatist, suggested, "Then make her like you." A nasty idea brewed in Seth's mind. Woo Jessica Davis, get her to like him, and then she'd nudge Tessa to come back. It was foolproof. "Oh yes," he thought, "I'll kidnap her, take her to one of my islands in the Philippines and force her to like me in thirty days."