Page 6 of Marrying the Silver Fox

Her hands rest in mine, and they tighten briefly when she hears me say the words out loud. I wonder if she thought I would see sense before we got to this point, but she has no idea what it is that I’m risking by letting all of this fail, and I’m not about to let anything get in the way of what I know is mine.

“And do you, Andrea Miller,” the officiant continues, turning his gaze to her, “agree to take Nikolai as your husband? In sickness, in health, in wealth, in poverty, to love and obey and honor him above all others?”

She draws in a deep, shaky breath. I can see it in her eyes, how close she is to telling him no—to saying that this is all crazy and exposing the mess that I’ve drawn her into.

I stare down at her, reminding her silently of what’s on the line for her if she screws this up for me. I know she likely doesn’t deserve to be at the receiving end of my fury for Natalie’s fuckup, but that doesn’t mean I won’t follow through on everything I said to her back in that hotel room if she makes a fool of me now.

“I do,” she whispers.

Thank God. She saw sense. She might not know me well, but she knows enough not to make this mistake here in front of everyone.

One of the bridesmaids, who’s staring between us with a look of utter confusion on her face, steps forward to hold out the rings on the small velvet pillow she has been keeping them on in preparation for this moment.

We both take the rings from the pillow, and I pull Andie’s hand toward me—I can’t help but notice how long and delicate her fingers are, still trembling as I slip the silver band over her finger, studded with diamonds worth more than this whole room. She takes the other band and pushes it down to the bottom of my finger, staring at it the whole time, as though trying to work out if this is really happening.

“You may kiss the bride,” the officiant announces.

I had almost forgotten I’d have to do this part at all.

Natalie and I have hardly been physically affectionate since we got engaged. I think the closest we’ve been so far is posing for our engagement pictures, Natalie hanging off my arm with a beaming smile on her face that dropped every time the camera stopped flashing. I should have known then that there was something seriously wrong, but I never could have imagined that she’d have the nerve to pull something like this on me.

I lift my hands to cup Andie’s face in mine, and she gazes up at me, those bright eyes filled with a million emotions that I’m not sure even she can make sense of right now. But we have to seal this. Have to make certain that this looks real in every way everyone expects of us. So, after a moment, I lean forward and I plant my lips against hers.

It’s just a brief kiss, as much a performance as the rest of this day has been, but the moment our mouths meet, I feel something shift inside of me. As though all the falsehoods and fakery have burned away in a matter of seconds, and now there’s something else here between us.

Something real.

Her lips part slightly, and she reaches up to put a hand on my chest. It could just be part of the performance, but I get the feeling there’s more to it than that.

For just a second, the entire room falls away around me, and I’m not thinking about the people watching us, the weight on my shoulders, the fact that the woman I was meant to marry has made a break for it and left me here to marry the fucking wedding planner in her place. No, as the scent of Andie’s perfume swirls around me, all I can think about is how her mouth feels on mine, the brush of her soft skin against my own, her cheeks like satin under my thumbs.

When I pull back, I notice that her cheeks are flushed. She slips her hand into mine without prompting, and the officiant steps forward, past the baffled bridal party, and claps his hand together.

“I am pleased to announce you husband and wife,” he exclaims, and there is an edge of panic to his tone, like he knows he has just been involved in something mad. “And to introduce you to Nikolai and Andrea Artesco!”

There’s a pause before the applause starts, but a second later, the room is filled with it. I’m not sure how much stock I should put in it, how much these people actually believe what they have just seen unfold before them, but I’m not sure it really matters.

I am married.

I set out today knowing that I would end it as a husband, and I have done just that. As labyrinthine a task as it has been to actually get down the aisle today, I have done it, and I’m not going to let anything get in the way of that.

With Andie’s hand in mine, I stride down the aisle, putting a smile on my face that I hope passes for anticipation of a lifetime of wedded bliss. She has to rush to keep up with me, and I can feel her ring pressing into my hand, not yet warmed by her skin, cold with an odd clarity that underlines the enormity of what I’ve just done.

“Where are we going?” she whispers to me above the sound of the applause around us.

“To the car.”

“The car?” she hisses back. “But there’s a whole reception⁠—”

“Do you really want to stick around and give everyone a chance to ask why I swapped out brides at the last minute?” I retort, and she falls silent.

She knows I have a point. I can only imagine the gossip that will swirl at the after-party, but that’s for them to handle, not me. I’m going to get the hell out of this city, and by the time I come back, the heat will have died down enough that they will have moved on to the next scandal.

As I walk out of the hall with my new wife at my side, I wonder if I made the right call. I wonder just what my father is going to say when he meets her for the first time.

And I wonder whether Andie is going to be able to keep her mouth shut about the mess that brought her to my side in the first place.

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