Page 53 of Vicious Betrayal

"Trust me, it's all happening fast for me, too." I take another drink. "But I'm glad it is."

"I know it is." Rian reaches across the table and claps his hand over mine, squeezing with the unshakable affection of a brother. "And I’m happy for you. You deserve something good. You’ve taken enough hits for the rest of us."

"Thanks, brother."

We drink in silence for a minute, and I watch Rian as he traces the wet ring his glass left on the wood. The boyish grin is gone now, replaced by a quiet, wistful look that I’ve never seen on him before. I think of the envy I heard a moment ago, and I know I wasn't imagining it.

We've both been bachelors for a long time, and the closest of friends. Brothers, really. Some of the other guys have gotten married, even had kids, but I abandoned ideas about any of that, and it seems like Rian has followed in my footsteps. Over the last ten years, I never knew him to have a girlfriend all through his twenties. He fucked enough women that he started having to give up his rule about never sleeping with the same one twice, but it never lasted for more than a few nights. And his family is long gone. His father abandoned him when he was a kid, and his mother died before he was even a legal adult.

"Don't worry, I'll still come out and drink with you from time to time," I tease him lightly, trying to lift the sudden heavy quiet between the two of us.

Rian lets out a dry, self-deprecating chuckle, looking up from his glass. "I hope so. It'll be awfully lonely, if not." He pauses, swirling the beer in his glass, his voice dropping. "It’s going to be strange. Just... watching you have a family. Makes a man realize how empty his own house is at the end of the night."

"Your time will come, Rian. If you want it to."

"Maybe." He shrugs, blinking away the shadows in his eyes, and forces that bright, charming smile back onto his face. "Or maybe I’ll just be the rich, irresponsible uncle who buys the kid their first drum set and teaches them how to hotwire a car."

"You buy my kid a drum set," I warn him, "and I’ll shoot you in the kneecap."

Rian laughs, raising his glass again. "Deal. Now drink up. You’ve got a lot of work to do before that girl walks down the aisle."

14

OKSANA

The emerald-cut diamond catches the morning light streaming through Cormac's bedroom window, throwing rainbows across the white sheets tangled around my bare legs. I hold my left hand up, watching the facets shift and glitter, the band heavy against my finger.

Mrs. Cormac Murphy.

That's what I'm going to be in, just a few weeks.

I can hear the clatter of him making breakfast downstairs, and I bite my lip, curling onto my side in his bed. Our bed, soon. I've barely left his house since he proposed. He went out with Rian last night, and I tried to dig around to find anything I could for the FBI, praying I could somehow get what they need so that I won't have to go through with this.

But his office was locked, and there was nothing lying around that I could find. He came home after his night out, took me into his BDSM room, and drove me wild with pleasure until I fell asleep immediately after from how many times he made me come before he finally fucked me. This morning, he woke me up with his mouth between my thighs, and then went downstairs to make breakfast, saying I need to eat more now that I'm eating for two.

This should be bliss. A gorgeous man that I know I'm falling for, one who wants to protect me and take care of me and fuck me like I've never been fucked before, who says he loves me. Whose child I'm having. I should have everything I could ever want; I should be filled with happiness.

Instead, I feel like I'm being torn in half.

Everything about the night he proposed broke my heart into even smaller pieces than it already was. The ring he chose, the things he said when he asked me, the look on his face, the way he touched me afterward… this man loves me. He thinks I'm giving him everything he'd thought he lost his chance at having. This, to him, is not only real, it's a dream come true.

And I want it to be real. God, I want it so badly it physically hurts. But I know the truth. I'm not marrying Cormac because I love him. I'm only doing it because if I don't, my father and brother will spend the rest of their lives in federal prison, and my family will be destroyed. I'll go to prison and lose years of my life. And now, I'll lose my child, too, if I don't do this. If I fail.

The ring blurs as my eyes fill with tears. I blink them back furiously, swiping at my face with the heel of my hand. I can't fall apart. I could let all the tears out for a moment when he proposed to me, because then at least I had an excuse to cry. But if I keep doing it, he'll start to wonder what's wrong.

So now, I have a few weeks to find something that will satisfy Reyes and keep my family safe.

Or else I'm going to have to stand in front of a priest and lie while I marry the man whose heart I'm going to break.

—

The days blur together for a little while, in a haze of preparations, time spent with my new fiancé, and searching.

Cormac is careful and meticulous about separating his work from his personal life. When he's with me, his phone stays face-down on the counter, and if it rings with a call he needs to take, he steps outside or into another room. If anything, he's gotten more careful about not allowing me to hear anything now that we're engaged, as if he wants to shield me from the life he's marrying me into as much as he can.

His office at the house is locked when he's not in it. I fucked him in the office again, then asked breathlessly afterward for water so I could have a few minutes to snoop, but nothing. The filing cabinets are locked. His computer requires a password I don't have and can't guess at. The papers on his desk that are left out are always innocuous—permit applications, invoices for bar supplies, that kind of thing.

I have nothing more for the FBI, and I'm running out of time to avoid this marriage.