Page 44 of Marrying the Savage

He leads me back toward the altar.

No one stops us. Not my uncle. Not Dmitri. Not the Sokolovs.

Damir’s men have the room locked down now. Sergei’s men are still standing, but their guns are lowered or angled away. Dmitri’s guards look torn between rage and self-preservation, which is apparently what happens when the man paying you is bleeding and the man threatening you looks completely comfortable in a church full of guns.

My dress drags over crushed flowers. I step over a smear of blood on the stone.

This is not how I imagined my wedding.

Actually, that’s not true. I never imagined my wedding. That was the problem.

Damir stops in front of the minister, who looks as if he has aged ten years since I last saw him.

“Continue,” Damir says.

The minister stares at him. “With the ceremony?”

“Yes.”

His eyes dart to me, to Dmitri, to my uncle, and then to the armed men lining the aisle. “I’m not sure I can⁠—”

Damir’s voice stays calm. “You were prepared to marry her to one criminal today. Don’t develop morality now.”

A strangled sound comes from Anya’s direction. I don’t dare look at her.

Dmitri steps forward, blood still marking his mouth. “Are you seriously going to allow this?” he demands, looking at my uncle. “After he humiliates us? After he touches her in front of everyone? She is your blood, Sergei.”

My uncle says nothing. The silence is terrible.

Dmitri stares at him, disbelief twisting into something uglier. Then he looks at me. “You stupid little bitch,” he says. “You think he wants you? He wants to ruin us. That is all you are good for now.”

The words have barely left his mouth when Damir draws his gun and shoots him in the leg.

The sound splits the church open. Dmitri screams and drops hard to one knee, clutching his thigh as blood spreads dark through his trousers. Women scream again. Someone sobs. The minister drops his book.

I freeze.

Damir doesn’t even look disturbed. He lowers the gun slightly, face cold and composed, as if he has simply corrected a rude interruption. “Speak to my bride like that again,” he says, “and the next one goes through your mouth.”

My heart is pounding so hard I feel it in my throat.

My bride.

I should hate the sound of it. I should hate him.

Maybe I do.

But when Damir stands between me and Dmitri, when he makes the whole church understand that insulting me now has consequences, something inside me goes quiet for the first time all day.

Not safe. I’m not stupid enough to call this safe.

But less alone.

Damir turns back to the minister. “Pick up the book.”

The minister bends with shaking hands.

I stare at Dmitri on the floor. Then at my uncle, who remains silent, face carved from stone. Then at Damir.