My chest tightened. “He wanted me to be comfortable.” Really, he was bribing me. I had no doubt that Marco could force me to marry him. ut I wasn’t going to look a gift horse in the mouth.
“He’s trying to buy you.” My mother threw her napkin down on the plate and got up. “I need to check on your brother.”
“Mom…” I trailed off. There was nothing that I could say to make her stay. She was determined to be angry about this. I didn’t know why. I was going to make sure that she and Mikey were taken care of. I was doing this in part because of them.
Sitting at the table, I tried to blink away my tears. I had never allowed myself to cry in front of my mother, and I wasn’t going to start now. Nikki reached out and squeezed my hand. “Hey, it’s going to be okay.”
I swallowed back my tears and nodded at her. “I don’t know what I was expecting. She hasn’t had a drink in a couple of days, so I knew she was already on edge.”
Nikki nodded, sympathy in her eyes.
I pulled my hand out of hers and wiped my tears away. “Let’s not let her ruin this.” Nikki nodded. “I know that you probably have a million questions.”
She shook her head, surprising me. “Honestly, I don’t. I thought that I would, but this actually explains a lot.”
“It does?” I was honestly shocked by everything. I thought that Nikki would be grilling me.
She leaned closer, so that no one around us could hear. “He’s part of the mafia.”
I blinked rapidly as I tried to think of what to say.
“You don’t have to answer. I already know. Some of the guys who come into the club aren’t as quiet about things as they probably should be,” Nikki explained.
I said nothing. I simply nodded in agreement. Marco had put the fear of God in me, and I would never confirm to Nikki that he was in the mafia. Ever. She was my best friend. Really, the only friend I had, and I didn’t want to put her in harm's way.
“I wanted to tell you that we were seeing each other, but I wasn’t sure where all of this was going.”
Nikki nodded. “I get it. Guys like that aren’t always ones we want our friends to know about.”
I snorted at the implication. A lot of people thought that Marco and I were sleeping together, when in reality the only time he touched me had been awful. I froze as I recalled that moment. I’d been wondering what the physical dimensions of our marriage was going to be. Marco made it clear that we needed to convince people that this was a real marriage, but I still wasn’t sure what that actually meant.
“I honestly wasn’t expecting any of this.” I twirled the ring around my finger watching it warily as it caught the light. It was an exquisite ring. One that was so beautiful that I would never have been able to conceive it in my mind.
“Are you guys going to have a big wedding?” Nikki asked.
I smiled. I appreciated the enthusiasm. I was surprised by her behavior, but I wasn’t going to question it too much. This was all too much, and I needed someone on my side. Though I didn’t love Marco, and I was only marrying him so that I would get his protection, everything that was happening was making me queasy.
“I don’t know,” I told her. I didn’t. “I just know that we want to get married as soon as possible.”
Nikki’s eyes went wide, and her eyes looked down at my stomach. “No!” I yelled out, covering my stomach. “I’m not pregnant.”
Nikki laughed, though I didn’t think it was very funny. “Marco just isn’t the type of man who likes to wait for things. He’s made up his mind, and he wants to tie the knot.”
“Well,” Nikki leaned back in her seat. “His family is rich enough to make anything happen, so you could still have a large wedding if that’s what you want.”
I nodded, unsure of what else to do. Marco and I hadn’t even talked about a wedding, and I assumed that he was going to want to just go to the courthouse and do it. The quicker the better, but I knew saying that was going to lead to questions from Nikki. Questions that I wasn’t going to be able to answer.
“While I’m excited for you,” Nikki said. “I do have to ask. Are you sure about this?” I watched as she played with the edge of her napkin. Her dark red nails contrasted against the perfect white linen, and for a moment, they reminded me of blood. Seeing it made me think about the blood that splattered across the dumpster when Marco shot Adrian. I shivered at the thought. Marco was dangerous, and I needed to make sure that I never forgot that.
I wasn’t sure about any of this, but I had no choice. Not only was I a witness to a crime, but Marco had pulled a lot of strings to get Mikey into a new treatment, and if I didn’t marry Marco, all of that went away.
“I know what I’m doing.” I didn’t know. I had absolutely no clue.
From the way Nikki looked at me, full of sympathy and fear, I knew she was sure that I had no idea what I was doing. “Those guys who came to your house…”
I breathed deeply. This part I had prepared for. I’d told Marco that Nikki and Mikey had been in the house when the Russians came, and I needed something to tell both of them. I’d told Mikey about the wedding, and he’d been excited. He liked Marco from the one encounter that they had had.
“They have issues with Marco’s family,” I told her. “But it’s all taken care of.” Or at least it would be when Marco and I got married. He’d assured me that their little code would protect me from the Russians, and our marriage would protect me from having to testify to the cops.