“Despite everything, you do make a beautiful bride.”
Anastasia joins on my other side, also dressed in black. They collectively agreed to treat the ceremony as Alessio’s funeral the other night, for their own amusement. I wish it’d be enough to force a smile.
“Van’s right. Dress looks great on you, even if you hate it. Perhaps without the lace, it’d be more you. Anyway, you remember how to reach every weapon?”
“Two thigh holsters, a knife in each,” I recite what they’ve told me a million and one times. “And at my right hip.” Courtesy of Anastasia’s unexpected sewing skills. She made a small pocket in the skirt to hide another knife beneath the top layer.
Vanessa reaches into her red clutch, where she’s presently storing my cell, and pulls out a small baggy of crushed pills. “First chance you get.”
She slips it in the space between my breasts, the tight bodice holding it in place. I push it further down, ensuring Alessio won’t see. Lights catch on the diamond engagement ring as I do—yet another reminder.
“Make sure you use them before he tries to undress you,” Anastasia reminds me with a frown. “If there’s no opportunity to drug him, hide them. Toss it beneath the bed if you must. Flush them. Anything that’ll save you.”
The two women glance at one another, sharing identical concern that speak volumes. They’re afraid Alessio will spot the drugs before I get to use them, and he’ll punish me.
Vanessa changes the subject by spinning me away from the mirror, her eyes darting to the clock on the wall. “You still have twenty minutes until that shrew of a wedding planner comes to harass you. Want me to grab Zeno?”
“Not yet. Can I be alone?”
She nods, her eyes sweeping me again. Her arms come around in a half-hug—a middle ground. A friendly hug from my sister should be a normal thing on any woman’s wedding day, but this isn’t a normal wedding, and we’re not regular siblings.
After a moment, she pulls away and heads for the door, which Anastasia opens. A figure suddenly looms, and I tense, assuming it’s Alessio come to lord more of his power, but Ana’s sigh tells me it’s not. “She asked to be alone.”
“Too bad.” The familiar rumble breaks through every barrier, and my anxiety melts away almost instantly. He’s all I want. All Ineed.
“It’s fine,” I murmur to them.
Anastasia frowns. “Okay, well, I’ll stand guard.”
The door shuts behind Vanessa and Anastasia, leaving me alone with Lev. With them gone, I give him my attention, hands grasping the edge of the thin veil. Never would I have thought something given by Alessio would be the thing to ground me from Lev’s intensity.
But here we are.
He’s staring at me like I’m a stranger. Like nothing will ever be the same again. Like everything changes with his look. Like the ground is shifting, propelling him forward, and yet, I can’t move.
“I know,” I break the terse silence with a grimace. “The dress is a bit much. I’d choose something slimmer.”
“Ty idealen.”
Even without understanding the translation, it makes me blush.
He crosses the room, stopping short. His hands lift but immediately drop. He glances at his fists, brows furrowed, and tries again, but he still doesn’t reach out to me.
“Touch me,” I whisper, tilting my face to catch his shadowy eyes. “I want you to.”
“I can’t,” he breathes “Look at you… I’ll break you.”
“You can’t break what’s yours.”
His eyes glint with something delicious and dangerous, like my words have snapped him from the invisible cell he’s locked himself within. He grasps my hips and hauls me against him, the buttons of his tux biting into my skin.
“How is it,” he starts, voice low, “that I can hate you in this dress and want to worship you all the same?”
“It’s just a dress.”
“No. It’s all you, Fina.” He strokes a hand around my side, sliding up my back and towards the end of my curls. “You’re fucking gorgeous. The fact you’re about to walk out there, looking like this, tohim…” The hand fists, catching the ends of my hair in his grip.
“But thinking of you,” I remind him softly, touching his black tie. “You look handsome.”
