Page 21 of Sinful Bride

The thought should make me angry, make me want to prove her wrong, to show her that I'm more than she thinks I am. And maybe tomorrow, it will.

But right now it just makes me tired.

I park in the underground garage and take the elevator up to my floor. The penthouse is dark, empty, and silent. Lonely. I pour myself a whiskey and stand at the window, looking out at the city. I'd hoped her presence here after the wedding would make it less lonely, that perhaps we could be companions and partners, even if love doesn't factor into this. But tonight has left me with no illusions about that.

I think about Elena in that green dress, her hair pulled back, her expression carefully controlled. I think about the pain I heard beneath her words, the anger and frustration and fear. She doesn't want this marriage any more than I do. But we're doing it anyway, because that's what duty demands, and neither of us really has a choice.

I finish my whiskey and set the glass down. Elena is trapped. Just like I am. And in one week, we'll be bound together. Husband and wife, in a marriage neither of us wants.

This is going to be a disaster. I know it in my bones. But it's the disaster I've chosen, and I'm going to see it through.

6

ELENA

The ring sits in my palm, glittering up at me in the light from the lamp next to my bed.

I'm back in my room with the door locked behind me, the sounds of the dinner party fading into distant murmurs and laughter. My hand trembles as I hold the ring up to the light from my bedside lamp. The diamond catches the glow, throwing tiny rainbows across my walls, across my skin.

It's beautiful.

Damn him.

I wanted it to be gaudy and tasteless. Something I could dismiss with a single glance, something that would prove everything I said to him was right—that he doesn't understand our world, that he never will, that he's an outsider playing at being something he's not.

But it's not gaudy or tasteless. It's elegant and beautiful, expensive, the diamond flawless, the platinum perfect against the cool tones of my skin. It's what I'd be drawn to if I walked into a jewelry store. All of what I wear is like this—simple and luxurious without being overstated.

And Declan noticed that. The ring proves it. It says I see you instead of you belong to me.

I hate it. I hate that it's beautiful. I hate that some traitorous part of me wants to slip it on my finger and admire the way it looks against my skin. I hate that he chose something that actually suits me instead of something that would suit his idea of what a mafia wife should wear.

Most of all, I hate that it makes me feel something other than contempt.

I close my fist around the ring, feeling the metal dig into my palm, the sharp edge of the diamond pressing against my skin. Not hard enough to cut, just hard enough to remind me it's real.

This is real. In one week, I'll marry Declan Murphy.

The thought makes my chest tighten and makes it hard to breathe, and I'm afraid I'm going to have a panic attack. I cross to my dresser and yank open the top drawer, where I keep things I don't want to look at but can't bear to throw away. Old photographs. Letters from my mother that I've never been able to throw away. A pressed flower from my thirteenth birthday that Alessio gave me before he became the man my father wanted him to be, instead of a brother that actually cared about me.

I drop the ring inside and slam the drawer shut.

My hands are shaking. I press them flat against the dresser top, leaning forward and trying to steady my breathing. The wood is cool and smooth under my palms. Expensive. Everything in this room is expensive. The silk sheets on my bed. The Persian rug under my feet. The chandelier overhead. The clothes in the dresser and the closet. The jewelry box full of diamonds and other gems and gold.

All of it bought and paid for by my father, a reminder that I've never owned anything that was truly mine.

Not even my own future.

The anger rises hot and sharp in my throat. I want to scream, throw something, break something, make someone understand how furious I am. But there's no one to scream at. No one who would listen. No one who would care.

My father made his decision, and Alessio reinforced it. And I⁠—

I have no choice but to obey.

I've always known this day would come, that eventually, my father would choose a husband for me, and I'd be expected to marry for the family's benefit rather than my own happiness. I've prepared myself for it. Steeled myself. Built walls around the soft, vulnerable parts of me that wanted to have some say in my own life.

I never imagined it would be a man like Declan Murphy, a rough, dangerous man who looked at me like he wanted to devour me and dismiss me all at once. Not an outsider who doesn't have a family legacy, who took over an organization under circumstances everyone whispers about and who doesn't belong in the elegant, glittering world I've spent my entire life learning to navigate.

Not someone who makes me feel things I don't want to feel.