Page 73 of Chains of Recompense
“Not a chance. She definitely didn’t want her parents finding out I took her virginity.” I rub a hand over my jaw.
“You what?” Miko barks, his eyes widening.
“Yeah, my thoughts exactly. I knew it could start a conflict—that it definitely wouldn’t be good for our family—so I cut things off when I found out who she was.”
“No wonder she hates you,” Sandro says, eyebrows lifting. “I’m shocked she agreed to marry you at all.”
“She doesn’t hate him,” Miko mutters. “She wants to hate him. There’s a big difference.”
“Not helping,” I say.
Sandro sighs. “But she never forgave you.”
“No.”
“Because you broke her heart,” he says.
I look away. “Apparently.”
He walks a few quiet steps with me before he speaks again. “So, why not try talking to her? Get to know her now, not the version of her in your head from five years ago.”
“Because it doesn’t matter,” I say, and it’s the truest lie I’ve ever told. Because our marriage is fake—and we’ll dissolve it the second things are settled with the Yakuza. “What matters is that our alliance is stable, and this marriage—however rocky it might be—is the only thing ensuring the Murrays will keep their word.”
“It’ll matter fifty years down the road,” Sandro says quietly, his expression grave. “You don’t want to spend a lifetime with someone who can’t stand to be in the same room as you, Brother.”
If only he knew how right he is. “Who’s to say I’ll live that long anyway, right?” I joke darkly, clapping him on the shoulder.
Sandro frowns. “You’ll drive yourself crazy if you don’t talk to her.”
I nod, because arguing clearly isn’t going to end this discussion. “Thanks,” I say. And I mean it, because Sandro is my anchor. He always has been.
But the guilt sits heavily anyway.
Guilt that I can’t tell my brothers that my marriage is a sham.
Guilt that I can’t fix what I ruined five years ago.
Guilt that Genevieve’s ghost still sits between me and any possible future.
Guilt over the way Aisling can no longer meet my eye.
I never should have lost control with her.
Because every time she walks out of a room to avoid me, something in my chest twists tighter, and I’m starting to think the tension between us isn’t going anywhere.
But God help me, I’m not sure I have what it takes to keep my hands off her.
15
AISLING
I groan when I look at the calendar on my phone and realize that I’ve put off dress shopping far too long.
It’s the morning of the gala, and I don’t have a clue what I’m going to wear.
“Everything alright?” Evi asks over her daily hot chocolate—the vise she’s replaced coffee with, I found out, since she’s several months pregnant.
I love that she’s made a habit of joining me in the kitchen to drink it, a silent display of friendship that I know could be seen as picking my side over her brother-in-law’s, because I’ve learned that hiding in the kitchen means I can avoid seeing Raf at all most mornings.
