Page 46 of My Horrible Arranged Marriage (Bancroft Billionaire Brothers #20)

ISAAC

M y guilty conscience wasn’t just a nagging voice.

It was screaming at me to tell Mina the whole story.

But I couldn’t. I wasn’t going to stress her out.

And I did love her. The reason we got put into each other’s paths didn’t matter.

All that mattered was that we found each other.

After the wedding, I would tell her. She’d know by then that my feelings were true.

We finished our meal and sat quietly for a few minutes. We were both tired. Drained. We didn’t have to talk. We could just enjoy the warm night and the quiet city that was spread out around us.

Mina got up and walked to the wall that surrounded the patio. She stood there, barefoot with her dress slightly blowing in the breeze. Her hair lifted and moved to the side, exposing her neck.

I got up and moved to stand slightly behind her. I inhaled the scent of her perfume. The city glittered beneath us, a thousand lights blinking across the skyline. A trail of red lights in a steady line on the streets below had both of us mesmerized.

Mina leaned into the railing, her arms resting on the cool metal. She let out a long exhale. I couldn’t resist reaching out and brushing the rest of her hair from her shoulder.

God, I was in over my head.

She tilted her face toward me, her smile soft and real. “It’s beautiful up here.”

“Yeah,” I said, though I wasn’t looking at the skyline anymore. “It really is.”

She caught me staring and rolled her eyes, laughing under her breath. “You always do that.”

“Do what?”

“Look at me like I’m the view.”

“Because you are.”

She shook her head, cheeks flushed, then returned her gaze to the city. We stood there for a long time without saying anything, just breathing in sync, the kind of silence that feels comfortable.

“Tell me something I don’t know about you,” she said. “I know you’re a swimmer.”

“Was,” I corrected. “Now, I just like to swim.”

“Okay.” She shrugged. “Tell me anything. Something random. Childhood memory. Deepest fear. Weird food habit. I don’t know, we’re getting married—I should probably know all your skeletons.”

I smirked. “Well, I used to cry every time the vacuum came on when I was a kid.”

“No.”

“Yep. Cried like someone stole my puppy.”

She laughed. “You cried over a vacuum?”

“Loud noises, man. Traumatizing.”

Mina nudged me with her shoulder, grinning. “Alright, your turn. Ask me something.”

I considered for a moment. It felt like I was being given the opportunity to ask a very important question. “Okay, biggest childhood disappointment. Something that crushed your little soul.”

She pursed her lips, thinking. “I once spent six months begging my father for a puppy. I made presentations, wrote essays about responsibility, even saved my allowance to prove I could contribute to its care.”

“Let me guess,” I said. “No puppy.”

“Oh, he got me a puppy,” she said, her voice dropping. “A stuffed one. With a diamond collar that probably cost more than an actual dog. He thought it was the perfect solution—no mess, no training, no responsibility.”

“That’s,” I searched for the right word, “cold.”

“Yeah,” she said with a small shrug. “I cried for days. Then I cut the collar off and gave the toy to our housekeeper’s daughter.”

“What happened to the diamonds?”

“I buried them in the garden,” she said, a mischievous glint in her eye. “They’re probably still there.”

I burst out laughing. “You were a little hellion.”

“Still am,” she said, winking. She turned to face me fully, her back against the railing. “Did you and your brothers have pets?”

“A couple,” he said. “My mom was not interested in cleaning up poop. She said she had enough boys to keep her running twelve days a week and didn’t need to take care of something that only pooped and ate.

She didn’t care if it was a goldfish or dog.

And honestly, we were all so busy all the time, we didn’t really have the time for a pet. ”

“That makes sense,” she said. “I was an only kid. A dog would have been nice. I did have a fish for a while, but you can’t cuddle a fish.”

“Do you want a dog now?” I asked.

She shrugged. “I don’t know. Maybe.”

“Our kids are going to want a dog,” I said.

She went rigid. “What?”

“If our kids want a dog, I’m on board with it. Will you be?”

She licked her lips. “Um, yeah. I mean, if we have the room. I don’t really want a dog in an apartment. That’s too much work. And I don’t know if it’s fair to the dog.”

“Agreed,” I said. “When we start home shopping, we’ll make sure we have a yard. A fenced yard.”

“Did you like your childhood?” she asked.

“Yes. I didn’t have a bad childhood, not by any stretch. But I had one of those upbringings where it could be a little hard to get any real attention. The house was loud and rowdy and a lot of competition.”

“Do you think we’ll be good parents?” she asked.

“Yes.”

“You answered quickly.”

“Because I know you’re going to be a good mom,” I said. “I’m probably not going to be a great dad, but I’m going to try. I’m going to learn. My brothers will be fountains of advice and experience. They always are. Always have been.”

“Are you close to all of them?”

“Yes. Each relationship is unique. I look up to some more than others.”

“Like who?” she asked.

“Hudson,” I admitted. “I know my other brothers think Hudson is probably the last guy anyone should look up to, but I do. Even now, when we’re not exactly getting along, I still look up to him.”

She straightened. “Why?”

“Hudson’s the one who calls us on our bullshit. Always has been. He’s the guy we all know we can turn to if we’re about to do something stupid and need someone to talk us out of it—or into it, if it’s the right kind of stupid.”

She smiled. “You two aren’t talking right now?”

“Not really. He’s mad at me.”

“For what?”

I paused. “He has a pretty high bar for all of us, and when I don’t live up to what he thinks I should be, he gets grumpy.”

The words left a sour taste in my mouth. Mina didn’t press, thankfully, but her hand reached for mine, lacing our fingers together.

“Can I help?” she asked gently.

I looked at her and everything in me wanted to just say it. To come clean. But I couldn’t, not now. The timing was wrong. The trust would break. And I wasn’t ready to see that look in her eyes.

“After the wedding,” I said instead. “It’ll pass. Hudson’s the kind of guy who lets things stew, but he always comes around.”

She nodded slowly. “He sounds like he’d make a great uncle.”

I barked a laugh. “Do you know how many nieces and nephews we already have? He is a great uncle. And father.”

Her eyes lit up. “So are you.”

I arched a brow. “Are you flirting with me, Miss Duvall?”

She shrugged, all innocent. “Just making an observation.”

I pulled her in closer, wrapping my arm around her waist. Her body melted into mine like it belonged there. Like she’d always fit.

“I wish we could’ve had that Bancroft BBQ,” she murmured after a moment. “I was really looking forward to it.”

“So was I,” I admitted. “But someone had to go get appendicitis and derail everything.”

“Oh, so now it’s my fault?”

“Blame your insides, not me.”

She rolled her eyes. “Some of the wives tried to reschedule. I heard from Marigold and Dixie, but they couldn’t get things to line up with your stepmom’s schedule.”

And I knew why Kathy suddenly had a full dance card. She didn’t approve of the marriage and wouldn’t want any part of what she thought was a staged relationship.

My jaw clenched, but I forced myself to stay casual. “She’s probably just busy.”

“Yes. That’s the problem with a big family. You’re dealing with twenty schedules instead of two.”

“We’ll make it happen,” I said. “We’ll see most of them at the wedding. And then we’re getting the hell out of here for the honeymoon.”

She turned in my arms, resting her hands on my chest. “Where are we going again?”

I had convinced her to let me schedule the honeymoon. It was a job I could actually handle and there were no shades of pink to worry over.

I smiled. “South of France.”

Her eyes widened. “You’re kidding.”

“Not even a little. Private villa, no schedule, endless wine and gourmet cheese.”

She tilted her head, amused. “That sounds amazing.”

I leaned down and kissed her forehead. “You deserve amazing.”

Her expression softened. “So do you.”

If only she knew how much I didn’t.

Because beneath the surface of this perfect night, I was drowning in guilt.

I’d made a choice. A selfish one. I’d chosen to stay quiet. To get everything I wanted. I wanted this woman. I wanted the life she promised. And I was looking forward to the future. I knew that it might be at the cost of her trust.

I could feel it, rising in my chest like a tidal wave. Regret. Shame. Dread.

I hadn’t just let her fall in love with me.

I’d orchestrated it. Helped lay the foundation of a lie. And even though it wasn’t supposed to go this far, even though Hectar swore it was just an arrangement of convenience to solve both our problems, I’d known deep down there was no clean way out.

Mina trusted me.

More than anyone ever had.

And I was going to break her.

Because when she found out what I had done, how I’d been part of the deception, it would feel like betrayal. No matter how real my feelings became. No matter how hard I fell for her the second I laid eyes on her. She would never trust my feelings were real.

I’d stood at a fork in the road and picked the path that led straight to her. Not because it was right. But because I couldn’t bear the idea of not having her.

She was talking about family, about kids, about trust and home and the kind of parents we’d be, and I was lying by omission every single second I held her.

What kind of father did that make me?

What kind of husband?

Her hand moved up to touch my jaw, her eyes searching. “Hey,” she said softly. “You okay?”

I nodded, lying again. “Just thinking.”

“About?”

“You,” I said. “Us.”

She smiled. “What about us?”

“That I don’t deserve you.”

Her brows pulled together. “Don’t say that.”

“It’s true.”

She shook her head. “You’re the best man I know.”

And that just made it worse.

I pulled her closer, kissing her forehead again, then her temple, then the edge of her mouth. Her lips parted beneath mine, and for a few moments, I let myself forget the truth.

“Want to go downstairs?” I asked quietly.

“I thought you would never ask.”