Just business.
I close my eyes and dig my toes into the sand. Tomorrow is supposed to be the happiest day of my life. So why do I feel so fucking sad?
four
King Dolce
The music starts, and all eyes go to the entrance. The audience stands. I’ve been standing, but suddenly, I need to sit down. This is real. I’m getting fucking married to a girl I’ve met exactly three times—once for an introduction, once for engagement pictures, and once for the rehearsal dinner last night.
At the photo shoot, Eliza apologized for being drunk during the first meeting, but I told her I understood. She probably thought it was some kind of platitude, and I wasn’t going to go into the details about my sordid family, so we left it at that, the words sounding hollow and insincere. I may not have been happy to see her that way for our first meeting, but I do understand. After all, it wasn’t my father who taught me how to survive the Life, how to go numb and feel nothing. Ma taught by example, showing me firsthand the one rule you need to make it in the mafia.
Feeling anything is weakness.
My bride steps into the aisle, and a tight little ache starts in my stomach, right below my sternum. She’s so damn pretty. Her black hair falls in loose curls down her back, a little braid going around the top like a crown. She chose to wear her veil back, so everyone can see her face, the elegant lines of her jaw, her full lips, her thick, inky lashes and luminous, whiskey-colored eyes.
She pauses for one moment, as if waiting for everyone to take in the sight of her, all beauty and pure innocence in that flowing white dress. She doesn’t look like a virginal, blushing bride, though. There’s nothing delicate in her gaze when it meets mine. Hatred burns in her eyes, and she marches toward me with the determination of an assassin going in for the kill. I may not relish the idea of marrying a stranger or a lush, but her feelings are beyond that. A knife could be easily concealed by all that fabric…
Let her fucking try it. I have a job to do, and I’m doing it. I’m not going to be taken out by some mafia asshole, and I’m sure as fuck not going down by my own wife’s hand. If she pulls a weapon on me, she’ll see who ends up paying.
Mr. Pomponio kisses her cheek and leaves her with me. She’s in my hands now. My wife. My responsibility.
She looks up at me with those big, doe eyes. The priest goes on for a minute while I stare back at her. God, she’s so fucking pretty. Too pretty for a mafia asshole like me to put his hands on. Her skin is dewy, her cheeks glowing. She lowers her eyes to her bouquet, her long lashes curling against her cheek. She looks like some kind of fairy, too fragile to touch, too pure for any man, let alone one like me. I haven’t been saving myself for her. I’ve fucked lots of girls, all of them meaningless. And now here is this girl who should mean something, the only girl who should mean anything, and I can’t let her.
I can’t give her what she deserves. I can’t love her.
As I repeat the vows, I mean the rest of the words. I will give her what I can, making up for the missing parts of myself, the ones I can’t give. I can’t give her my heart or my innocence. I no longer have either of those things. But I’ll give her everything else. I can still be a good husband, even without love. I will honor her, respect her, and value her. I’ll listen to her. I will treat her as an equal. I will be faithful. I will provide for her. I’ll take care of our children when that day comes. I will protect her heart by making sure she never loves me, even if she tries. Because the one thing I can’t promise, the thing no made man can promise, is that she won’t end up a widow.
Those things aren’t in the vows, so I don’t say them aloud. But I vow them to myself, and that’s more binding than saying them to her or a priest.
Eliza hands her bouquet to her bridesmaid, the one who’s been eye-fucking me every moment I’m in her line of sight since we met at the dinner last night, where she suggested we fuck before I began my married life.
I’ve been to enough weddings to know the bride usually hands off the bouquet before the vows, and I can’t help but wonder if Eliza kept them between us on purpose, not wanting to be closer to me than she has to, not wanting me to take her hands as we repeated the vows.
I slid her ring on while she held the bouquet in her other hand, and now she slides mine on, shoving it into place with her slender fingers, cold despite the heat of a New York summer.
“You may now kiss the bride,” the priest says.
Eliza gives me a look that says if I dare kiss her, she’ll castrate me in my sleep. But she’s my wife, and there’s no use in an arranged marriage if we’re not going along with what’s expected. I step forward and slide a hand behind her head, under her hair. She goes stiff as a board in my hands. Her lips are plump and pink, ready to be kissed, but I hold back. I lean closer, so close I can feel the heat of that fuckable mouth against mine. “You will kiss me,” I say, my voice so low no one else can hear it, not even the priest.
Her lips pull into a smile, not moving as she speaks through clenched teeth. “Touch me and die.”
“If I don’t kiss you, this is off, and we’ll both die.”
“Oh, I won’t die,” she assures me, her smile turning smug. “I’m a fucking princess. You’re nobody.”
“I’m your husband,” I grit out.
I can hear the crowd getting antsy, but I don’t take my eyes from hers. Someone yells, “Shut up and kiss her!”
Eliza smirks. “You’ll never be my husband in anything more than name.”
“In name, and in public,” I say, curling my fingers into the hair at the nape of her neck and pulling her forward, so she stumbles against me. I clench my fingers tighter, so she has to go up on tiptoes, her head back and fury burning in her eyes as my mouth descends to hers. Her squeal of protest is muffled by the kiss. Our first kiss isn’t tender or even passionate. It’s rough and harsh. She struggles against me, but I force my tongue between her lips. It’s not because I want to taste my new bride. It’s not even to silence her muted denial. It’s to show her that this is how it is.
Her father gave her away—literally. He gave her to me, and she’s mine now. I swipe my tongue across hers, making sure she knows what I’m doing, that she gets the point. I’m the one in control here. Her teeth clamp down, biting into my flesh. I don’t stop, though. I don’t pull back. Let her taste my blood. It only proves my point more fully. We are bound in blood now, just as I’m bound to the Valentis after taking the blood oath that swore me in.
Eliza recoils, trying to break free when the salty warmth of my blood spreads through our kiss. I thrust my bleeding tongue against hers, our teeth clashing one more time before I draw back. People are laughing and hooting and clapping. I don’t know how long I kissed her. Long enough to send a message, that’s clear.
“I hope you die,” Eliza hisses. “Then I won’t have to marry you.”