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“Sort of. I mean, I barely know you, but I probably should have been a better fiancée and at least pretended to fawn over you.”

He snorted. “You know what, I appreciate your honesty.”

If only you knew… but I flashed a dimple and asked, “Do you need help with anything else?”

He did.

I spent another thirty minutes helping him get dressed in a perfectly tailored, expensive suit. One of the last things I did was tie his tie.

Trying not to linger, I draped the tie around his neck, measuring the ends in front. I refused to meet his eyes. Refused. Then I started tying. Severin must have been as tense as I was; even though I wasn’t touching his muscles, I could feel how rigid they were.

Without realizing it, I’d formed a Trinity knot.

It was his favorite way to tie it, and the way I’d always done it when I could sneak into his rooms before a big event.

“A Trinity knot?” he asked, raising an eyebrow.

I shrugged it off. “I’m Irish.” As if that was an answer. It definitely wasn’t, but admitting it was your favorite certainly wasn’t going to be my answer.

I smiled, averted my gaze again, and moved to his cufflinks and suit jacket, making sure every crease fell exactly as it should.

Every moment my hands were on him was agony. The tension burned between us, radiating heat like his wounds still did.

Thank God Severin didn’t bring up the tie again, because if he had, I might have lost my composure completely.

Relief washed over me when I finished helping him dress because I could finally step away and put some distance between us.

Much-needed distance.

I stepped into the hallway and met his entourage of guards who guided us to the main entrance.

“Well, here we go,” Severin grimaced, clearly hating the paparazzi as much as I did.

Just before we walked through the automatic doors, Maks stopped us. “Sir, there is a podium set up with microphones, and the press would like you to answer a few questions.”

Severin nodded with calculated confidence and turned to me, his voice smooth. “Are you ready for our show, my darling?” The calculated ease of his words reminded me we were playing a game for the cameras.

No. “Of course.” I smiled, and he opened his arm, as if asking me to step up to his left side—the good side.

I did, and he curled it around my waist, guiding me into the lion’s den with an intimacy that felt almost protective.

We stopped in front of the podium, and what felt like thousands of cameras flashed at once. My fake smile slipped for a moment before I forced it back into place.

“How did the fire start?”

“Are you okay?”

“How many burns did you receive?”

“Is this your fiancée?”

“Why were you at your warehouse at night?”

“When is the wedding?”

And on and on it went. Severin fielded the questions like a pro—after all, he’d trained for this as heir to one of the city’s most powerful families.

It was going swimmingly until I started to get questions.