Page 56 of Handsome Devil

“Guess you’re marrying in it.” He stood up brusquely, buttoning his jacket with one hand. “I’ll wait in the living room. Row, Rhyland, and their respective headaches are still here. Witnesses,” he explained tersely.

“You can’t give me a sixty-second notice and expect me to be at your beck and call.”

“Can’t I?” He rubbed his knuckles over his sternum. “Funny, it seems to be exactly what I’m doing right now.”

Springing up to my feet, I did something I’d never done before. I raised my open palm and tried to slap him.

He caught my wrist in his big hand before it reached his cheek. Slowly, he brought my knuckles to his mouth, brushing his hot, soft lips over them, his eyes boring into my own. “My regal ice queen. Were you worried I wasn’t going to come?”

“You aren’tgoingto come,” I said, deadpan. “Unless you use your hand. This marriage won’t be consummated.”

“Oh, I’ll come.” He dragged his straight teeth over my knuckles ever so gently, making my skin tingle and sticky warm honey pool between my legs. “So will you. Multiple times each encounter, in fact. Making heirs with you will be a pleasure.”

Every functioning brain cell in my head screamed at me to pull away, but my traitorous body remained still, letting him pepper soft, feathery kisses on the back of my hand. Kisses that felt like velvety butterfly wings flapping over my flesh, all while maintaining eye contact.

“I’d have made it to this wedding today if I had to swim my way from England.”

“But…why?”

“Because you’re the only thing I’ve ever wanted and couldn’t buy,” he admitted earnestly. “And because I’m utterly consumed by the idea of destroying your life, sweetheart.”

He dropped my hand, stepping away from me and waltzing to the door.

“Twenty-two seconds, Gia.”

What?

Bollocks.He tricked me. I didn’t think our conversation ate into my preparation time.

He slinked away like the night, the echo of his kisses still dancing over my skin.

City hall was empty other than our guests. It was ten o’clock at night, and the place felt ominous without human traffic.

“Oh, to be young and in hate again.” Dylan clucked her tongue in my periphery, dabbing her eyes with tissue. “Remember when we hated each other, Rhy?”

“I never hated you for real.” Rhyland kissed her temple. “And we never tried to kill or blackmail each other into marriage.”

“I’m sorry your relationship is bland and boring like yourself—” Tate started, then sighed. “Fuck, I’m not even going to finish this sentence. It’s a lie. I’m not sorry at all. You deserve one another.”

Our witnesses included Row, Rhyland, Cal, and Dylan but also Tate’s two bodyguards and all the men in the Ferrante family. Vello, Luca, Achilles, and Enzo. No doubt here to monitor, not celebrate.

Just how deep into shit had Tate gotten us with the New York Mafia?

The clerk inspected me through the thick rims of his ancient reading glasses, fluffy silver eyebrows hitting his nonexistent hairline. “My dear, are you sure you’re…prepared?” His polite way of asking why I was wearing Daisy Dukes and a decade-old hoodie with holes in it. Tate, by comparison, was impeccably dressed, tailored to the last inch of his damn immoral soul.

“As prepared as I’ll ever be.” Lack of enthusiasm dripped from my voice.

I’d be lying if I said I didn’t derive some satisfaction from knowing it infuriated Tate to see me like this. Sloppy and unmade.

The clerk’s brow crumpled further. “Miss, are you being coerced to—”

“Less talking, more marrying us.” Tate snapped his fingers. “At this rate, I’ll be your age by the time I wed.”

We signed the paperwork, answered the clerk’s questions, all the while not even looking at each other.

The wedding being lackluster wasn’t surprising to me. What I didn’t expect was for Tate to accept a work callduringthe ceremony.

“What is it?” I heard him ask just as the clerk was going through the final technicalities. I saw Row and Rhyland exchange exasperated glances, shaking their heads.