“Oh good,” Vince said flatly. “Can’t wait to find out who I’m married to.”
“Better hope she doesn’t want laughter from a husband.”
He rolled his eyes.
“Think Damius is behind the whispers?” I asked, mostly joking.
“If he wanted us married, we’d be married,” Vince said. “But he doesn’t control Rome. Or the twins.”
“Fuck no, he doesn’t. We didn’t take that oath for no reason. Anyway,” I ate the last of my food, “Damius is too busy wedding the Harlan Crow cousins to care what we’re doing.”
“Thank fuck.”
“I swear, if I see another bloodline interlock chart with that region’s crest, I’m gonna stab someone.”
“That’s how you start wars, Nik.”
“That’s how Ifinishthem.”
Vince smirked and stood, tossing his empty container into the trash.
“Stealing dynasty daughters,” he muttered again. “The shit they come up with.”
“Luca probably already has a flowchart for it. Surveillance tiers, backup vaults.”
“I give Bastion six months before he starts training her security.”
“They’re still obsessed with that girl from the academy,” I said. “They also think we don’t know about her.”
“Afteryears,” Vince agreed.
“They might be the first of us to actuallytakea bride,”
“If that’s what they want. But you saw her last name. They’d probably have to steal her.”
I nodded once.
“Still, you think she’d survive Bastion’s nightmaresandLuca’s need to control everything?”
“Strong woman to handle both,” Vince said.
Silence followed but it was never uncomfortable. I pretended not to be bothered by that tapping pattern he was doing with a fork. He pretended to ignore I was clocking his health.
“Island wedding’s this weekend,” I looked around the empty house. “Overseas branch.”
Vince nodded, reaching for the bottle of water on the counter. “We flying in together?”
“Yep. We’ll fly back after the blood ritual. Like normal.”
“We cutting left hand again?”
I held up mine. Faint scar still there, right beneath the base of the thumb.
We had been to too many of these damn things. Weddings soaked in ink and blood. Traditions we were too desensitized to call barbaric anymore.
And the sick part?
I didn’t hate them.
