Page 113 of LA King

“I’m sorry, sir,” the guard says, a tremor in his voice.

“Touch her again and you will be.” Alejandro’s voice is ice cold and dripping with menace, and it sends a chill down my spine. While I’m thankful for his intervention, I don’t appreciate being treated like his property. Wisely, I bite my lip and remain compliant—for now, at least.

The car door is opened for me, and I climb inside before two giant bodyguards get in behind me. They sit on either side of me, careful to avoid contact after their boss’s outburst, but I still feel uncomfortably sandwiched between them.

“The boss says to take her home,” the biggest one says to the driver.

Home? That would be laughable if it weren’t so depressing. The place we’re headed isn’t my home, and it never will be. My home is my tiny little apartment back in New York, close to my parents and Kelsey. She should be here. She should have been my bridesmaid and is pretty pissed she couldn’t be. Probably more pissed about the fact that she didn’t get to throw me a bachelorette party. But I played my part like a pro, telling her how madly and quickly I’d fallen in love and how I couldn’t wait a second longer to become Alejandro’s wife. With only twenty-four hours’ notice, she didn’t have time to take off work and fly out here.

She understood. Excited for me, like the good friend she is, she wished me well.

A wave of abject sadness washes over me, but I remind myself that this part of my life is temporary. At least he won’t be expecting to consummate our marriage tonight because he isn’t coming back to the house with me. Maybe we’ll never have to consummate it at all. His reputation as a player is well-documented. If reports are to be believed, he has a different woman for every night of the week.

That shouldn’t bother me. Our marriage is one of convenience and business, and I should be pleased that he’ll continue fulfilling his carnal needs with his mistresses rather than with me. Should be, but for some reason I’m not.

After about an hour, the car pulls up outside a beautiful gated mansion deep in the hills of Bel Air. The Spanish influence is obvious from the minute we drive through the gates, and despite not wanting to be here, I can admit that it’s a magnificent property.

But its beauty brings me little comfort.

A gilded cage is still a cage.

Chapter

Two

Alejandro

Tugging at the collar of my shirt, I lean back against the seat and glare out the window.

“How you doing there, amigo?” Jax asks, the merest a hint of a southern drawl detectable in his tone.

Jackson Decker. My best man. The man I trust more than anyone in the world and who I would be lost without. Who else would have stood by my side on such a day?

“Alejandro?” he says when I don’t answer.

“Fine,” I lie, glancing at my watch, waiting for Carmichael’s inevitable call.

Jax tosses a piece of gum into his mouth and flashes me a wicked grin. “I can’t believe you’re actually fucking married.”

“Yeah, you and me both, amigo.” I release a frustrated sigh and check my watch once more. “Can you drive any fucking faster?” I ask Hector, my driver for today. Like with every other fucking day of my life, there’s a situation that needs to be handled—always a problem demanding my attention. Even on my wedding day.

“Sorry, Boss. Traffic,” he replies.

I lean back against the seat, frustrated despite being accustomed to the heavy traffic on this stretch of freeway. It’s more likely that the tension knotted in my shoulders is because of my new wife and how my life has already changed because of her. Already, I feel the weight of that expectation. Perhaps I should have taken her to the house myself and laid out my expectations. So long as she does exactly as she’s told and doesn’t cause me any problems, I’m sure we’ll get along fine for the next three years.

Jax chuckles, snapping me from my thoughts. “You’re gonna have half a dozen kids climbing all over you before you know it.”

The fuck I will. “No chance, amigo.” My father is eager for me to provide him with further heirs to carry on the Montoya name, which was one of factors that drove him to push this marriage on me. He described her as “good breeding stock.” But I have no desire to be a father myself.

Jax arches an eyebrow at me. “Well, at least you might enjoy fucking her. Maybe you even become a one-woman man.”

I narrow my eyes, directing my anger at him even if he doesn’t deserve it. But seriously, is he fucking with me?

My cell phone rings, and I’m not surprised to see Foster Carmichael’s name on the screen. My new father-in-law.

I answer it quickly, ready to get the conversation over with. Yes, he’s political royalty, and our association with his family gives our business affairs a degree of legitimacy that they’ve never had before, but I cannot fucking stand the man.

“Alejandro,” he says cheerfully, like he didn’t just hand his only daughter over to a devil. “Is it done?”