Page 87 of Brutal Vows

My fingers creep into his hair. All that soft, silky golden hair. I tug on it, wanting him even closer. Wanting him to devour me with his mouth.

The low sound of pleasure that rumbles through his chest makes me shiver.

The kiss goes on and on, going from sweet to hungry and back again. I’m floating and flying and falling, all at the same time. His mouth is decadently lush. His taste, delicious. I don’t care at all that we have four hundred witnesses, or that my life is over, or that I’ve traded my freedom for Lili’s.

I’ve never been kissed like this before.

Muscles I didn’t know I had are waking up and stretching. Desire unfurls like a heated lotus under my skin. A steady pulse beats between my legs, my breasts feel heavy, and my nipplesache. I feel a wild, animalistic urge for him to throw me onto the altar, hold me down, and fuck me.

When he finally breaks away, I’m gasping and unsteady, woozy as a drunk.

My eyes drift open. I find him gazing down at me with blazing eyes, panting, his parted lips stained red with my lipstick.

He breathes in astonishment, “Fucking hell, woman.”

There’s a swell of noise. Clapping. Hooting and laughter, stomping feet. I turn my head and blink at the riotous crowd, unable to understand what’s happening because my brain is still floating somewhere in outer space.

Then Quinn’s handing me a ring. It’s an unembellished band of dark matte metal, black on the outside and gunmetal gray within.

He says, “I took the liberty of buying my own wedding ring, considering nobody asked me what I wanted. Put it on.”

Concentrating hard on maintaining consciousness, I take it with shaking hands and slide it onto his left ring finger.

He stares at it for a moment, his expression pensive as he examines it.

Then he looks up at me and grins. “I just wifed a viper.”

My laugh is faint and disbelieving. “And I just married an insect.”

“Arachnid,” he corrects, eyes sparkling.

“Excuse me. That’smuchbetter.”

He kisses me again, grabbing my face between his big hands.

The priest lifts his voice to the congregation. “Dearly beloved, I give you Mr. and Mrs. Quinn!”

The roar from the crowd is deafening.

That’s when my knees finally give out.

Before I can hit the ground, Quinn sweeps me up into his arms and carries me off, hollering for Declan and Kieran to follow us.

To me, he says, “Take me to your brother and Lili. I need to get that sorted.”

I can’t find my words, so I point in the direction of the dressing room.

Quinn strides down the aisle with me in his arms, nodding at people in the crowd as we pass. I consider the possibility that I’ve been drugged, or that he put me into that coma he teased me about, but decide I wouldn’t feel quite so much if this were all just a hallucination.

I didn’t know my body could contain so much emotion. It must be bursting out of me, seeping from my pores, visible for everyone to see. I feel achingly alive and sick and terrified, and I long for somewhere to hide so I can think all this through to try to make sense of it.

But there’s nowhere to go.

Not now. Not ever.

If there’s one thing I know about Quinn, it’s that he’ll never let me run away and hide. He’ll be in my face, challenging me and forcing me to expose myself to him for as long as we’re together.

A little voice inside my head whispers that if things get too bad, I know how to get rid of him, but I push that aside and focus on giving directions to where I left my family in shambles before heading out to get married to the Mob.