“I know you don’t want this,” she says hastily. “You were quite clear at the wedding.”
Ohfuck. Fuck my honour, and fuck whatever made me think I could be a good man. In particular,fuckthe sentiment that I don’t want Ruby.
“I’m sorry about that night.” Just about ambiguous enough. “Where did this come from?”
“I didn’t make it up, if that’s what you’re thinking,” she babbles.
Sweet girl. I wouldn’t mind if she had.
“Rest assured, I won’t take this as anything other than a random accident. And I swear I had nothing to do with it either.”
“It’s just so weird.” Her brow creases as she tells me the story of it arriving in the post, and finishes with a worried shrug.
“I wonder how it happened,” I ponder aloud, potential culprits running through my mind.
“Maybe it got mixed up when the certificate was being fixed after Alpi ripped it up? The priest was…”
“Shitfaced,” I fill in. But I don’t think it was him.
She snorts with reluctant laughter. “He was a bit tipsy.”
The sound of her voice and the recollection of how we kept that wedding on track—together—reopens the cavity in my chest I thought I’d sealed. We were a team, understanding each other and communicating without words.
And then I spoiled it all by pushing her away. I wish I had taken her up on the promise in her eyes, and the temptation of her unpractised kiss.
“I guess it was an accident. We can fix it,” she says.
My head snaps up. Fuck no.
“Get it annulled.” The joy in my heart that we’re married must not show on my face, as Ruby continues. “Or divorced. I’m never sure what the difference is, or why it matters.”
“Annulled means legally the marriage never occurred. Divorce is breaking a real marriage,” I reply numbly.
“Oh.” She swallows. “Probably annulment then.”
I nod, even as every part of me yells,no. I will never pretend this didn’t happen. The moments Ruby is my wife areprecious.
“Yes.” The word is bitter and thorned, like eating a rose stem instead of admiring the petals. “But until then, you need to be my wife.”
Her face creases in confusion.
“You just announced to half of London’s most powerful mafia bosses that you’re my wife. The news will be all over London by now. They’re terrible gossips.”
Her eyes go wide, as though she’s surprised to find me casually discussing the mafia. “You’re really a mafia boss?”
Ah, yes. We skipped that detail, didn’t we? “I run Clerkenwell.”
She bites her lip.
“I didn’t tell you because…” I wished I wasn’t a man twice your age and with blood on his hands.
“You didn’t think you’d see me again,” she finishes.
I don’t reply. That’s true, but it’s far from the whole truth.
“I’m sorry about your… associates,” she says in a small voice. “You could tell them it’s a mistake?”
It’s not a mistake. Well. It is… And yet, I can’t stop this.
