Page 18 of Ruthless Vow
A breath. Then she’s gone, the door clicking shut behind her, and I’m alone in my father’s study with the ghost of her perfume and a decision I can’t take back.
I move to the window. Stare out at the gardens my mother planted. Somewhere out there, my men are securing the perimeter. My sister is being summoned. A judge is being found.
In two hours, I’ll have a wife.
My hand flattens against the glass. Cool against my skin. Grounding.
This is practical. A solution to a problem.
That’s what I keep repeating while the scent of her still clings to the air. While my hands won’t unclench. While my blood runs hot and my jaw aches from grinding and my whole goddamn body calls me a liar.
Bullshit.
By sunset, she’ll be my wife.
And I’m already fucked.
5
CASSIA
The judge has tobacco-stained teeth and a voice like gravel scraping metal.
“Do you, Dante Marcello Santoro, take this woman to be your lawfully wedded wife?”
I’m standing in the same study where I offered myself two hours ago. The afternoon light slants through the windows, turning dust motes to gold. Outside, birds are singing. All that brightness, and my lungs have gone shallow, my pulse thin and distant, my hands cold at my sides.
“I do.”
Two words. His voice doesn’t waver.
The judge turns to me. Watery eyes behind wire-rimmed glasses. He’s been paid well to ask no questions, to file no public records until Dante says otherwise. That’s how things work in this world. Money buys silence. Power buys discretion.
“Do you, Cassia Renata Neri, take this man to be your lawfully wedded husband?”
My hands are steady. I made sure of that before we started. Pressed my palms flat against my thighs until the tremblingstopped. I will not shake in front of these people. I will not let them see what this is doing to me.
“I do.”
The words come out clear. Precise. The voice of a woman who knows what she’s agreeing to.
I don’t. But they don’t need to know that.
The ring is cold when he slides it onto my finger. Simple gold band, no stones. His hands are warm, steady, and he doesn’t look at me as he does it. Just efficient movement, a task being completed.
I notice there’s a stack of papers on the corner of the desk that aren’t aligned with the edge. Off by at least an inch. My fingers itch to straighten them.
Focus.
“By the power vested in me by the State of Louisiana, I now pronounce you husband and wife.”
Done.
Just like that. No fanfare. No rice. No first dance or champagne toast. Just a legal transaction completed in a study with four witnesses and a judge who’ll forget my face by the morning.
I’m a Santoro now.
My fingers find the gold band. The metal is warming against my skin, but the rest of me stays distant. Detached. Like watching someone else’s wedding through smudged glass.
