Page 47 of Brutal Vows

“That’s because you could turn Father Christmas into the Grinch, woman.”

“What did I tell you about using the word ‘woman’ as a pejorative?”

“Something I couldn’t hear over how loud your resting bitch face was screaming.”

My smile dies. Breathing hard, we glare at each other in blistering silence.

After a pause that feels endless, he says tightly, “You don’t have to like me, Reyna. But you do have to show me respect.”

“Right back at you, Quinn. And let me make it perfectly clear for you in case it already isn’t: Idon’tlike you. And I especially don’t trust you.”

“And why is that?”

I answer without thinking, saying the first thing that comes to mind.

It’s something I believe absolutely.

“Because a man who’d marry a woman for any reason other than love has the soul of a monster.”

He clenches his jaw. He stares at me, visibly restraining himself from speaking, until finally he says from between gritted teeth, “You ever consider you’re not the only person on this fucking planet who’s been hurt before?”

“Of course I know that.”

“Aye? Because you’ve got a stick shoved so far up your arse about how bad marriage is that it’s blinded you.”

Exasperated, I say, “Blinded me towhat?”

After a long, blistering pause, he growls, “Forget it. It’d be a waste of my fucking breath.”

“No. No way, Quinn. I’m not letting you off the hook so easily. If you think I’ve got a stick up my ass about marriage, you’re right. You know why? Because a man gains everything when he takes a wife. A maid, a cook, a housekeeper, a social manager, and a toy he can fuck whenever it suits his convenience. But for a woman, a wedding is where her life ends.”

“If you really believe that, you’ve been hanging out with the wrong women.”

I scoff. “I was raised in the Cosa Nostra. All the women are in the same situation I was. That Lili is. We’re auctioned off like assets to men who don’t know how to love.”

“Or ones who just can’t bear to be broken again.”

He lets that hang in the air between us, crackling like a live wire.

I stare at him, speechless. I simply can’t find any words.

Not only because of the raw vulnerability of it—something I never would have believed him possible of—but also because I know in my heart of hearts that what he said is the truth.

Histruth.

He’s not like Enzo, or any of the other made men I know who take young brides in exchange for power, money, or family gain without a second thought to the girls’ feelings about it.

For Quinn, marriage isn’t part of a bigger game. It’s not about positioning his pawn on a chessboard like it is to my brother, or to have someone weaker to rule over with an iron fist like my husband did.

It’s about escape.

He wants to escapeintomarriage with the same longing I wanted to escapefromit.

For me, marriage vows were the beginning of a long, horrible tumble into the dark.

For Quinn, they’re the end of it.

He’s been hurt so badly, he doesn’t think he can survive it again.