The Kiss Thief by L.J. Shen

THE REMAINING WEEK BEFORE OUR wedding, Wolfe came to my bedroom every single night.

We did not have sex, but he did lick me down there until I came. Every time I reached a climax, he’d suck my lips—the ones between my legs—and laugh like the devil. Sometimes he would rub himself against my stomach through our clothes, then retire to my bathroom. When he came back to the bedroom to kiss me good night before he left, his cheeks were always tinted pink.

One of the times, he asked if he could come on me. I said yes, mainly because I wasn’t entirely sure if it meant what I think it meant. He rubbed against me, and when he was ready, he took himself out and climaxed between my breasts, all over my nightgown.

A part of me wanted to sleep with him to show him that I forgave him because as much as I hated to admit it—and despite myself—I did forgive him. But another part of me was terrified of having sex again. I was still sore from the incident, and every time he rubbed against me, I remembered the awful night he drove into me in one go. But then I’d push the memory aside and force myself to think happy thoughts.

As much as our relationship had improved after our engagement party night, we still weren’t a real couple. We slept in separate wings of the house, something he’d warn would happen for the rest of our days. He limited his attention toward me to only the nighttime. We would have dinner together, then retire back to our designated rooms. Then, a short hour after I showered and slipped into a sexy nightgown, he would knock on my door, and I’d be ready for him, with my thighs open and the thing between them aching for his touch and tongue and mouth.

I felt dirty for what we did. I’d been taught that sex was a way to get pregnant and please your husband, not something you should desire to do so frequently. Yet having Wolfe lick me there was all I wanted to do, all day, every day. Even now, when I went to college and made a conscious effort to meet new people and get a grip on my class schedule, the only thing I could think about was his nose and mouth buried deep inside me as he mumbled filthy, degrading things about my body that made more and more wetness leak from me.

I didn’t make an effort to make friends, or to open up, or to form a life of my own. I wanted to do my homework, attend all my lectures, and have the Big, Bad Wolfe eat me out.

The day before our wedding, Wolfe was in his home office and I was gardening outside when I heard the doorbell ring. Since I knew Ms. Sterling was upstairs, reading one of her less-than-innocent books (I was no longer in a position to judge her, though), I took off my gardening gloves, rose to my feet, and made my way into the house. Through the peephole, I saw it was my father and his bodyguards. My pulse quickened. Was he trying to make amends?

I flung the front door open and was pushed to the side. My back slammed against the door as he stomped in.

“Where is he?” he clipped. His two bodyguards trailed behind him. I furrowed my brows. He didn’t even say hello to me. After everything he’d done at our engagement party—inviting the dodgiest people the state had to offer to try and hurt Wolfe’s reputation, not to mention throwing Kristen and Angelo into the mix—he didn’t even afford me an offhand pleasantry. What a jerk.

I closed the door behind them, straightening my back. I felt oddly secure in my domain. I had no illusions about Wolfe’s feelings for me, but I did know that he would not have anyone disrespecting me in my own house.

“Is he expecting you?” I drawled, playing dumb. Truly, I was sick of him. Sick of him cheating on my mother and selling his daughter to the highest bidder. My father was selfish, and he allowed it to hurt his family.

My father sneered, “Get him here. Now.”

“Do you or do you not have an appointment with Senator Keaton?” I braved my fear, raising my voice slightly.

I am the wind. Strong and evasive and everywhere. He can’t touch me.

He scanned me head-to-toe. “Who are you?”

“Wolfe Keaton’s future wife,” I answered with faux obedience. “Who are you?”

“Your father. Though you seem to have forgotten that.”

“You haven’t been acting like a father. Maybe that’s why.” I folded my arms over my chest, ignoring the reddening faces of his two guards. He looked intoxicated, swaying a little, his face a shade too red for it just to be the summer weather.

He waved me off impatiently. “I’m not the one who has changed, Francesca. You’re the one going off to college and talking about getting a job.”

“Being independent is not a disease,” I gritted out. “But that’s not your issue with me. Your issue with me is that I now belong to a man who wants to ruin you, and you are no longer sure where my loyalty lies.”

The cat was out of the bag, and even though I stood behind every word, it didn’t make it any less painful. He took a step toward me, and we were nose to nose. We felt different at that moment. Equal.

“Where does your loyalty lie, mascalzone?” Rascal. He used to call me that when I was a kid. It always made me giggle because in Spanish it sounded like más calzones. More underpants.

I stared deep into his icy blue eyes, leaned forward, and whispered into his face.

“Me, Papa. My loyalty will always be with me.”

He sneered, brushing a lock of hair off my forehead gently. Imperial as ever, even drunk. “Tell me, figlia, does it not bother you that your future husband encourages you to get an education and a job? Do you not think perhaps he doesn’t want to keep you long enough to take care of you, so he makes sure you can take care of yourself?”

I opened my mouth, then clamped it shut. When I wanted to marry Angelo, I also knew that my father would always have this power over him. He couldn’t divorce me, toss me aside, or wrong me. Wolfe, however, did not answer to Arthur Rossi. He did not answer to anyone.

“That’s what I thought.” My father laughed. “Take me to see him.”

“I will not…” I started, then stopped when I heard the sound of heavy feet behind me.

“Arthur Rossi. What an unpleasant surprise,” my fiancé said from behind me. I turned around, hating the butterflies that took flight in my chest when he arrived. Hating that the first thing I saw was how much taller and more impressive he was than Papa. And absolutely despising how my thighs clenched and my panties dampened at the sight of him.

Wolfe descended the stairs in leisured steps, passing me by without acknowledging my existence as he came face to face with my father. They stared each other in the eye. I instantly knew that something else had happened. Something much bigger than the stunt my father pulled at the engagement party.

“You raided the pier,” my father hissed, getting in his face. It was the first time I saw my father lose control over his voice. It was brittle around the edges, like a wrinkly piece of paper. His face was so swollen and red, he was barely recognizable. The last few weeks had obviously been eventful between them, but it only showed on one of them. “You sent cops when you knew we’d be there. Thirteen of my men are in jail.”

Wolfe smiled, plucking the handkerchief from my father’s blazer’s pocket and using it to dispose of the gum in his mouth, tucking it back in neatly and patting the pocket. “That’s where they should be. Francesca, leave,” he ordered me, his tone steel. He was a different man from the one who visited my bedroom every night. Not even related to the man who took me to eat waffles in the middle of the night, then came back to lick me again and again until my thighs squeezed his face.

“But…” I started. My father turned around from Wolfe to snap at me.

“I sent you an obedient, well-mannered girl, and look at her now. She’s wild, talks back, and doesn’t even follow your orders. You think you can crush me? You can’t even handle my teenage daughter.”

Wolfe was still staring at him, smirking and not paying any attention to me, when I shook my head and, deflated, made my way outside to the garden. I put my gardening gloves back on, then lit a cigarette. As I crouched down, internally cursing my father and my fiancé for treating me like a dumb kid for the millionth time, I noticed something peculiar peeking from the edge of the vegetable garden. A rusty door leading to what I assumed was the mansion’s pantry. It was laced with ivy, but I could tell that it was recently used since the ivy was torn around the edges. I stood back up and sauntered toward it, yanking the handle. It opened easily. I took a step in, realizing that it did not lead to the pantry, but to the laundry room right next to the foyer. My father and Wolfe no longer had the privacy of the double-glazed balcony doors. I could hear them through the thin, wooden door of the laundry room. I wasn’t supposed to eavesdrop, but I figured they deserved it for keeping so many secrets from me in the first place. I pressed my ear against the door.

“Where I come from, Senator Keaton, words have meanings, and deals are honored,” my father hissed. “I gave you Francesca, yet you seem adamant about ruining what’s mine.”

“We seem to be in the same boat. I have a briefcase missing with your fingerprints all over it.” Wolfe chuckled darkly.

“Not my doing.”

“Aren’t men in the Chicago Outfit supposed to pride themselves in never stabbing a man in the back and always telling the truth?”

“I’ve never stabbed anyone in the back,” my father said cautiously, “and Murphy’s was an unfortunate incident, which I am sure the Irish will benefit from once the insurance kicks in.”

“Let’s talk about the pep rally,” Wolfe continued. The one where there were shootings? I heard about it briefly in the news but knew that nobody got hurt. A deranged kid who played too many violent video games, they said. It was on the same day the stock market fell, and no one made a fuss of it.

“What about it?” My father crushed his teeth together. I could hear it clearly even past the door.

“You’re lucky you’re still out and about, and not locked up with the shooter,” Wolfe said.

“I’m out and about because you have no proof.”

“Neither do you that I had anything to do with the pier. But the cherry on the shit cake wasn’t my attempted assassination. No. That was half-baked and completely amateur. It was the engagement party.”

I choked on my own saliva. My father tried to assassinate my husband. And my husband didn’t even tell me. He hid it from the world, essentially protecting my father. Why?

“Are you seriously comparing sending off my frivolous daughter to flirt with her childhood crush at a party to locking up thirteen of my men?” Arthur Rossi spat out. It was the second time his voice rose. Real rivalry did change him and not for the best.

“Your daughter is neither frivolous, nor is she a flirt. She is, however, my soon-to-be wife, and I’m growing tired of you disrespecting her. I will also not have you push her into anyone’s arms, much less someone she was fond of when she was younger. In fact, for every time you act up concerning Francesca, or put my reputation in jeopardy as you did during the engagement party, I will kill one of your businesses. The pier. A restaurant. Perhaps a poker joint. The list is endless, and I have the means and the time. Get this past that thick skull of yours—she is mine now. I decide if she works, where she studies, and in what positions I want to fuck her. Furthermore, eliminating me from the equation will not work. Not only did I spread the evidence on you in different places, secured by different people, but I also have written letters instructing my trustees what to do in case of my untimely death.”

He talked as though he was going to do terrible things to me. But I didn’t believe him. Not anymore. This past week, he had put my physical needs before his own. He obviously said these words to piss my father off, but I no longer cared why he’d said them. If he truly cared about my pride, he would stop flaunting our sex life like that in front of my father. I heard something smash—a vase or a glass—and Wolfe chuckling enigmatically.

“What makes you think Bishop and White will let you get away with it?”

“The fact that they are letting me get away with it. I have the upper hand in this game of cards. You will play by my rules or lose your hand. There is no other option.”

“I will take Francesca away,” my father threatened, his voice lacking that same icy authority that usually laced his speech. I swallowed back a scream. Now he wanted to take me back? I wasn’t a toy. I was a human being who had grown oddly attached to my future husband. Besides, no one in The Outfit was going to want to have me now, especially after Wolfe had taken my virginity.

Only, my father didn’t know that.

Even if he suspected it—he obviously didn’t care.

Wolfe did. Wolfe had the potential to ruin my life now. He got what he wanted. My virginity and reputation. He could end this today. It would be enough humiliation for my father. Sweat clung to the back of my neck at the thought. It took forever for Wolfe to speak again.

“You will not.”

“How are you so sure?”

“You love The Outfit more than you love your daughter,” he said simply. An arrow of venom pierced my heart. This is why humans invented lies, I thought. No other animal in nature lies. The truth is ruthless. It cuts you open, shoving your face into the mud. It forces you to look reality in the eye and deal with it. To feel the real weight of the world that you live in.

“And you?” Papa asked. “How do you feel about my daughter?”

“I feel positive she will be a delight to fuck and decent arm candy, which I can quietly replace when her expiry date arrives,” Wolfe said good-naturedly. I wanted to throw up. I could feel the acid bubbling in my stomach, making its way to my throat. I was about to open the door and confront them both. How dare they talk about me like this? But the second my hand grasped the door handle, I felt someone clasping my shoulder from behind. I turned around in the darkened room. It was Ms. Sterling. She shook her head, her eyes almost bulging out of their sockets.

“He is aggravating your father,” she enunciated every word, slating her chin down and forcing me into eye contact.

There was a commotion outside the door. My father was shouting, cursing in Italian, as Wolfe laughed, the provocative, throaty tilt of his voice dancing on the walls and ceiling. I heard the screeching of my father’s shoes dragging along the marble floor and knew that his bodyguards pulled him out before he embarrassed himself any further. It was loud enough outside for me to confront Ms. Sterling without them hearing us.

“How do you know that?” I asked, wiping away angry, hot tears from my eyes. I was crying again. I could count on one hand the number of days I hadn’t cried since Wolfe walked into my life.

“Because I know how he feels about your father, and right now, his hatred toward your father trumps his affection for you. But things are shifting, my dear. All the time.”

Ms. Sterling had to drag me back outside, closing the secret door with precise, careful movements so Wolfe wouldn’t hear us. She glanced around to make sure the coast was clear, before grabbing my wrist and ushering me to the pavilion. She parked her wrinkly, bluish hands on her hips, sitting me down in front of her. For the second time that day, I felt like a punished kid.

“How can Wolfe even like me when he hates my family with such passion?” I dragged a hand through my hair, wishing I had a cigarette.

Ms. Sterling looked down, momentarily speechless. I made a good point. Her sheer white bob danced here and there as she scratched her head.

“He is halfway in love, Francesca.”

“He is in hate with my father and in lust with me.”

There was a beat of silence before she spoke again.

“My last name is not Sterling, and I am not who I seem to be. I actually grew up not too many blocks from you in Little Italy.”

I looked up, frowning. Ms. Sterling was Italian? She was strikingly pale. Then again, so was I. So was my father. My mother was darker, but I inherited my father’s looks. Another reason I feared Wolfe hated me. I kept quiet, listening to her.

“Something I did when I was young and confused made me start over. I was to pick a last name, any last name, and I picked Sterling after Wolfe’s eyes. I’m not proud of some of the things I did to young Wolfe Keaton when he was too defenseless to stand up for himself, but he still forgave me. His heart is not as black as you think it is. It beats fiercely for the ones he loves. It just so happens that…” Ms. Sterling blinked, choking on her words, “all the people he loves are dead.”

I began to pace in the pavilion overlooking the garden. The summer flowers burst in purples and pinks. My vegetable garden grew nicely, too. I injected life into this little land, and I hoped—perhaps even foolishly believed—that I could do the same with my future husband. I stopped, kicking a little stone.

“My point is, Francesca, his heart has taken quite a few hits. He is calloused and mean, especially to those who have wronged him, but he is not a monster.”

“Do you think he can love again?” I asked quietly.

“Do you think you can?” Ms. Sterling retorted with a tired smile. I groaned. Of course, I could. But I was also a forlorn dreamer with a lousy reputation of a person who insisted on seeing the good in almost everyone. My father called it naiveté. I called it hope.

“Yes,” I admitted. “My heart has room for him. He just needs to claim it.” My honesty rattled me. I didn’t know why I opened up to Ms. Sterling like this. Maybe because she did the same to me, offering me a clandestine peek into her own life.

“Then, my dear girl”—she cupped my cheeks with her cold, veiny hands—“to answer your question, Wolfe is capable of feeling whatever you feel toward him but much, much stronger. More resilient and more powerful. For everything he does, he does thoroughly and brilliantly. Most of all, love.”

I’d asked Ms. Sterling to tell Wolfe not to come to my bed that night, and he hadn’t. Since it was the night before the wedding, he chalked the fact that I stayed in my room for dinner up to nerves. He did insist that Ms. Sterling bring me my dinner upstairs and made sure that I ate it.

There were waffles drowning in maple syrup and peanut butter straight from the diner down the road. He obviously did not care for a swooning bride tomorrow morning.

I didn’t sleep a wink.

At five in the morning, Ms. Sterling walked into my room, bristling and singing with a herd of stylists at her heels. Clara, Mama, and Andrea also came along, whisking me off the bed like Cinderella waking up with the help of tiny furry creatures and canaries. I decided to push aside the fact that my father was a bastard and my fiancé was a heartless man, determined to enjoy the day. As far as I could tell, I only had one wedding to celebrate in this lifetime. Might as well make the best out of it.

I wore a rose-gold Vera Wang wedding dress with floral lace appliqués and a pleated tulle skirt. My hair flowed down in luscious waves all the way to the small of my back, complete with a Swarovski tiara. My bouquet was simple and contained only white roses. When I arrived at the Little Italy church where we were to get married—honoring my family’s tradition—the place was already swarming with media vans and dozens of local journalists. My heart accelerated. I didn’t even talk to my husband the night before our wedding. Didn’t have the chance to confront him about the horrid things he once again said about me to my father. According to him, he was going to toss me away when I got old. The reality of my situation sank in at that moment.

We hadn’t gone on one date (the diner was an apology, not a date, and the entire time I shoveled food into my mouth, he worked on his phone). We hadn’t texted regularly. We never slept in each other’s bed. We never talked for the sake of talking.

No matter how I tried to spin it, my relationship with Wolfe Keaton was doomed.

I walked down the aisle to find my seamlessly dressed, clean-shaven fiancé waiting for me by the priest with a solemn look on his face. Next to him stood Preston Bishop and Bryan Hatch. It did not escape me that Wolfe Keaton had no real friends. Only work friends he could benefit from. I didn’t have any real friends, either. Clara and Ms. Sterling were triple my age. Andrea, my cousin, was twenty-four, but she was mostly there for me out of pity. She worked in a salon and dated Made Men regularly, though she always said she wouldn’t let them touch her, not even a kiss. My mother was twice my age. This left both Wolfe and me in vulnerable positions. We were both lonely and guarded. Wounded and distrusting.

The ceremony went off without a hitch, and once we were pronounced husband and wife, Wolfe offered me a chaste peck on the lips. He was more concerned about the cameras flashing in front of us, and making sure we looked nice and proper, than our first kiss as a married couple. We still hadn’t spoken one word to each other the entire day, and it was nearly noon.

We drove in silence from the church to my parents’ house. I wasn’t sure this would not escalate into a fight had I confronted him about what I’d heard yesterday, and I didn’t want to kill the already-charged mood. After the engagement incident, Wolfe had sent out a list of demands which were to be met if my father had wanted us to set foot in his house. Sure enough, the house was filled with people who were pre-approved by my husband. Unsurprisingly, Angelo was not there, but his parents arrived, congratulated me curtly, dropped off their gifts, and shot straight for the door. People were talking, laughing, and congratulating us before the grand dinner when I turned to my husband and spoke the first words since we tied the knot and made it official.

“Have you done something to Angelo?”

There was significance in this exchange. Our first conversation was about another man. Another man I’d lusted after not too long ago. He continued shaking hands, nodding and smiling brightly, the public figure that he was.

“I told you I will not be so tolerant toward Angelo should a third incident occur. Though I profoundly apologize for jumping to conclusions about what you did with him, there’s no denying that he tried to cross the line and coax an engaged woman.”

“What did you do?”

He grinned, turning to look at me fully now from the guests fighting for his attention.

“He’s currently under investigation for his involvement in his father’s business. No need to worry, darling. I’m sure he’s found a good lawyer by now. Maybe Kristen hired the same one. I just got her fired from her job for crossing approximately five-hundred red lines and losing all her credibility.”

“You snitched on a family from The Outfit?” I balled my fists, barely containing my rage. He blinked at me as though he had no idea who I was or why I was talking to him.

“I gave them what they deserved to make sure they never get near what’s mine again.”

Me.I was his.

“What will happen to him?” I sucked in a breath.

He shrugged. “They’ll probably scare him to death and let him go. As for Kristen, her career is officially over. Not that you should care.”

“You are despicable.”

“You are delicious,” he whispered under his breath, dismissing my rage, if not enjoying it a little. Ms. Sterling was somewhere in the crowd, probably taking pictures, and I wished she was here to referee the situation and explain his behavior now. “And officially now my wife. You do know we need to soil our sheets with blood, right?”

I shuddered at his words. I was counting on Wolfe to never agree to participate in this tradition, being a senator and all. But I forgot how much joy he’d had torturing my father—and what was more awful than proof he’d slept with his daughter?

“I think I’m all out of blood after the last time.” I smiled against the rim of my wine glass in which I drank orange juice. He didn’t have to know that it was spiked with enough vodka to drown a poodle. Thank you, Clara.

“It’s not in your nature to pledge defeat, my darling wife. I assure you, we can produce blood if we try hard.”

“I want a divorce,” I groaned, not really taking him seriously, but not completely joking, either.

He chuckled. “I’m afraid you’re stuck with me till my last breath.”

Or until you replace me with a newer model.

“Then let’s both hope it will occur soon.”

Two hours into the celebration, Wolfe and I finally parted ways. I went to the bathroom, taking my time with the voluminous tulle as I attempted to pee. I managed it, though it took me a good fifteen minutes to complete the task unscathed. I washed my hands, opened the door and padded outside, back toward the party, when I heard something crashing in the room next door. I stopped in my tracks, turning my head toward one of the guest rooms on the ground floor. Scowling, I made my way to the source of the noise. If someone was drunk and vandalizing my parents’ house, I sure was going to give them a piece of my mind. I stopped in front of the open door of the room, my eyes widening in disbelief as the scene in front of me trickled into my conscience.

My mother was lying on the bed, my father standing above her, roaring at her, flecks of his saliva raining down on her face. Underneath them was a shattered glass of brandy. He stomped on it, thick glass flying under his Oxfords across the carpet.

“What kind of example are you setting for her? Getting her ready for her big day when she neglected her father and talked back to me yesterday? In front of that devil! She made me look like a fool, and you? You make me look like an idiot for marrying you.”

She spat on his face. “Cheater.”

He raised his arm, the back of his hand ready to smack her across the face. I didn’t think. I jumped to Mama’s defense, yelling “No!” as I came between them. I had intended to push my father away, but I wasn’t quick or strong enough. He ended up slapping me across the face, hard. I staggered down, falling next to my mother, elbowing her rib in the process. My cheek burned, and my eyes stung. The pain spread from my neck to my eye, and I felt like my entire face was in flames. I blinked and swayed, righting myself and leaning against the mattress, shaking my head. God, it hurt. How many times had he hit her? Before and after he handed me to Wolfe? Before or after she found out that he was cheating and confronted him?

“Great timing, Francesca.” He chuckled bitterly, kicking a shard of glass my way. “Just in time to see all the mess you’ve created.”

My mother burst into tears on the bed, covering her face in her hands with shame.

She didn’t want to deal with the messy situation, so she disappeared inside herself, tucked under the layers of her sorrow and her grief. After years of playing the dutiful, perfect wife, she finally crumpled. I had to face Arthur myself. Brave whatever he became as a result of Wolfe’s blackmail.

I looked up, my back rod-straight.

“How many times have you hit her?” I felt my nostrils flaring, my mouth thinning with disgust.

“Not enough to teach her to behave properly.” He flashed me a sickening smirk, swaying lightly in place. He was drunk. Hammered, more like. I picked up a large shard of glass for protection, taking a step back and raising it between us to use as a weapon. I knew for a fact that one of the things Wolfe had insisted on before we’d agreed to celebrate our marriage here was absolutely no weapons. There was even a metal detector at the front gate. Even if my father hid a gun somewhere around here, it wasn’t on him.

“Is that true, Mama?” I spoke to her but kept staring at him. She sniffed a weak denial from the bed.

“Leave it, Vita Mia. He is just upset about the wedding, is all.”

“I couldn’t care less if he sold her on the black market after the utter disrespect she exhibited to me since he took her in. The only thing I care about is saving face and making sure the two of them don’t do anything embarrassing.” My father rolled up his sleeves as though he was ready to disarm me.

I knew he spoke the truth.

I pointed the shard at him. “Let Mama go. Let’s settle this alone.”

“There’s nothing to settle, and you are not my peer. I will not discuss my matters with you.”

“You will not raise your hand to my mother,” I said, my voice barely shaking. I wanted to add a request for him to try not to kill my lawful husband, too, but let’s admit it—it wasn’t my job to take care of Wolfe. He made it perfectly clear that he couldn’t care less about me.

“Or…what? You’ll go running to your husband? I’ve eaten bigger, more powerful men than him for breakfast, so don’t think you can talk back to me now. Have you given him the goods, Francesca? Before marriage?” Papa took another menacing step in my direction. I shrank into myself but didn’t cower, waving the glass in his face in warning.

“Did you suck Wolfe Keaton’s cock just as all the other stupid girls in Chicago who were dumb enough to think they were different did? It wouldn’t surprise me in the least. You were always too silly for your own good. Pretty, but silly.”

“Papa!” I yelled, swallowing back a lump of tears. How could he say things that? And how come it still hurt when he said those things even though I knew he did not deserve my love or regard?

“You’re drunk.” I wasn’t sure if I pointed it out to myself or to him. My cheek was still on fire. I wanted to erase the last fifteen minutes from my mind permanently. “And pathetic.”

“I am fed up and on the verge of ruining your lives,” he countered.

“Mama, come,” I urged her.

“I think I’ll stay here and take a nap.” She curled up higher on the bed into a fetal position, still in her pearls and deep green silk dress.

A nap. Right. My mother was still insistent on not defying her husband even after everything he’d done. I shook my head, turned around, and left the room, squeezing the glass so hard inside my hand, I felt the trickle of blood running over my dress. I stopped in the bathroom again, cleaning myself up and making sure there were no visible stains on my dress, then returned to the party, knowing that the combination of my parents and myself both going MIA at the same time was a recipe for gossip disaster. I stumbled into guests, disoriented and woozy, and ignored the worried glances and spearing gazes. I found Ms. Sterling at the bar, trying appetizers. I threw myself between her arms, ignoring the small platter of food she was holding. It dropped, crab cakes and deviled-egg rolls spilling on the floor.

“Can we go upstairs?” I heaved. “I need help reapplying my makeup.”

She opened her mouth when a firm hand grabbed my shoulder and turned me around. I came face to face with my new husband, who stared me down through dark lashes and furrowed brows.

I’d never seen him so angry in my entire life.

“What happened to your face?” he demanded. I immediately brought my hand to my cheek, rubbing it and laughing off the embarrassment. Luckily, his tone was controlled enough that we didn’t have an audience.

“Nothing. Just an accident.”

“Francesca…” His voice softened, and he took me by the hand—not my elbow, which was an improvement—and pulled me under an alcove between the sunroom and the drawing room. I looked down at my huge dress, determined not to cry. I wondered when I would survive an entire twenty-four hours without bawling.

“Did he hit you?” he asked quietly, bending his knees to get on my level. He stared right into my eyes, looking for that something other than the pattern of my father’s hand on my cheek to give him the okay to do what he wanted to do.

“He didn’t mean to. He wanted to slap my mother. I stopped it and got in his way.”

“Jesus.” He shook his head.

I looked sideways, blinking. “Why does it matter, Wolfe? You’re not much better than him. True, you don’t hit me, but you say mean things about me all the time. I heard you telling him that you’re with me just so we can f…have sex, and that you plan to discard me the minute I won’t look so good on your arm.”

From my periphery, I saw him straightening up to his full height, his jaw clenching in annoyance.

“You weren’t supposed to hear that.”

“You weren’t supposed to say it. You say a lot of hurtful things about me to him.”

“I was baiting him.”

“Good job. He got so pissed, he tried to hit my mom. This is partly your doing. My father is a madman, and anyone affiliated with him is a potential victim.”

“I’d never let him lay a hand on you.”

“Never, or until I’m not pretty enough to be Mrs. Keaton?”

“Never,” he enunciated. “And I’d advise you cut the bullshit. You will be Mrs. Keaton until the day you die.”

“It’s not the point!” I shouted, turning around and grabbing a glass of champagne for liquid courage, downing it in one go. He spared me the lecture. I looked around. The crowd was thinning. I’d lost track of time since the incident with my parents.

“What time is it?”

“Time for everyone to leave so we can sort out this mess,” Wolfe replied.

“And in practice?” I huffed. He twisted his wrist and pushed the sleeve of his blazer up, checking his Cartier.

“Eleven o’clock. You know they won’t leave until they escort us to the bedroom.”

I sighed. That was the tradition. He offered me his arm, and I took it. Not because I particularly wanted to spend the night with him, but because I wanted everything to be over.

Five minutes later, Senator Keaton announced that we were retiring to our bedroom. People whistled, clapped, and cupped their mouths with delighted chuckles. He helped me up the stairs to my old bedroom, which my parents had prepared for my wedding night. People followed, throwing candy and singing drunkenly, their voices high pitched and slurred. Wolfe threw his arm over my shoulder protectively, hiding the side of my face that was still red and swelling from my father’s offense earlier that evening. I twisted my head and caught a glimpse of my parents following the crowd. They were clapping along, ducking their heads down to listen to things people shouted in their ears. My mom had a wide smile on her face, and my father had that smirk that suggested he still had the world at his feet. It broke something deep inside me to know that it was all an act.

An act I must’ve bought as a child.

The summer vacations, the beautiful Christmases, their public displays of affection during social functions.

Lies, lies, and more lies.

Wolfe closed the door behind us, locking it twice for good measure. We both looked around the room. There was pristine white linen over the king-size bed that’d been put here, replacing my twin bed especially for the occasion. I wanted to throw up. Not only because we didn’t have anything to show them—I was not going to bleed on my wedding night—but also because the idea that everyone knew we were going to have sex tonight was unsettling. I took a seat on the edge of the bed, my hands tucked under my butt, staring down at my dress.

“Do we have to?” I whispered.

“We don’t have to do anything.” He unscrewed a bottle of water and took a sip, sitting next to me. He handed me the bottle. I put it to my mouth.

“Good. Because I’m still on my period. I started it a day after I took the Plan B.” I didn’t know why I was telling him this. Only I did. And it was time I asked it.

“Why did you make me take it?”

“Are you ready for children?”

“No, but you didn’t know that. And, frankly, many would have guessed the baby was conceived after the wedding. Why did you care so much?”

“I don’t want children, Francesca.” He sighed, rubbing his face. “And I mean…ever.”

“What?” I whispered. I’d been told that big, strong families were what dreams were made of and always wanted one for myself. He stood up and turned me around so my back was to him and began unzipping my dress.

“I didn’t have the best childhood. My birth parents were shitty. My brother practically raised me, but he died when I was thirteen. My adoptive parents died when I was at Harvard. Relationships, as I view them, are messy and redundant. I try my best to avoid them unless they are professional, in which case, I do not have much choice. Kids, by definition, are the messiest, and therefore the lowest on my wish list. However, I do understand your need to reproduce, and I will not stop you if you wish to have children. You will just have to take into consideration two things. One—they will not be mine. You can get pregnant through a sperm donor. And two—I will not play a role in their lives. If you choose to have kids, I will make sure to provide for you and them, and house you somewhere nice and safe. But if you choose to be with me—really be with me—we will never have children, Francesca.”

I bit down on my lower lip. I didn’t know how many heartbreaks I could endure in one day, let alone one month. I still hadn’t opened the wooden box and took out the last note, and I knew exactly why. Every note so far indicated that he was the man for me. But his actions proved he wasn’t. The truth was, I didn’t want to know whether he was the love of my life or not, simply because my heart was undecided, too.

When I said nothing for a while, he walked over to my girly pink closet, returning with a nightgown and a robe. He gave them to me, and I realized in my drunken haze that while I was deep inside my head, pondering our relationship, he had undressed me completely. I was naked, save for my panties.

“I’ll be back in five minutes. Be decent.”

I did as I was told. A part of me—a small part of me—didn’t care anymore. Perhaps not having kids was the right thing to do. We sure didn’t love or respect one another enough to reproduce. He wasn’t going to come to my OB-GYN appointments. He wasn’t going to care if it was a boy or a girl, or pick out furniture for the nursery, or kiss my swollen belly every night like I’d dreamed of Angelo doing.

Angelo.

Nostalgia prickled my heart. Angelo would have given me all those things and more. He came from a huge family and wanted one of his own. We talked about it when I was seventeen with our legs dangling from the dock. I said I wanted four children, and he answered that the lucky man I’d marry would have fun making them with me. Then we both laughed, and I swatted his shoulder. God, why did the notes point to Wolfe? Angelo was the man for me. Always had been.

I decided, as I wrapped my silky robe around my waist, that I would visit the clinic first thing next week and get on the pill. I would adopt Wolfe’s way of life. At least for the time being. Study, and have a career. Go out and work every day, the entire day.

Or maybe we would decide to divorce, and I’d be free. Free to marry Angelo, or anyone else.

I snapped out of my reverie when the door opened, and Wolfe walked in with none other than my father. I lowered myself to the bed, sitting on its edge as I took in the scene. Arthur’s lower lip shook, and he swayed from side to side when he walked. Wolfe held his elbow firmly as though he was a punished child.

“Say it,” my husband spat out, throwing my father to the floor underneath me. He fell on all fours, scrambling up quickly. I sucked in a breath. I’d never seen my father like this. Vulnerable. It was hard to decipher what was happening.

It was even harder to believe what left his mouth.

“Figlia mia, it was never my intention to hurt your pretty face.”

He sounded surprisingly genuine, and what was even more sickening was the way my heart thawed to his voice for the first few seconds. Then I remembered what he did today. How he’d acted the entire month. I stood up and walked over to my window, giving them my back.

“Now let me go or by God…” My father snapped at Wolfe behind me. I heard them shuffling behind my back and smiled grimly to myself. My father stood no chance against my husband. Neither did I.

“Before you go, there’s one matter that needs to be settled,” Wolfe said as I produced a pack of cigarettes from a drawer, flicking my Zippo and inhaling deeply. I cracked the window open, allowing the black night to swallow the blue smoke.

“Save me the riddles,” Dad barked.

“The matter of the bloodied sheets,” Wolfe finished.

“Of course.” My father snorted behind my back. I didn’t have it in me to turn around and watch what was written on his face. “I figured you milked the cow before you bought it.”

I heard a sharp slap and twisted on my heel. My father tumbled backward, holding his cheek, his back hitting my closet. My eyes widened, and my mouth went slack.

“Francesca is not ready yet,” Wolfe announced in his metallic tenor, his brooding, calm movements a sharp contrast to what he just did. He took one step toward him, erasing all the space between them, and yanked him up by his dress shirt. “And, unlike others, I will not touch a woman against her will even if she has my ring on her finger. Which really leaves us with no choice, does it, Arthur?”

My father narrowed his eyes at him, spitting a lump of blood on Wolfe’s loafers. He was a tough man, Arthur Rossi. I’d seen him in some stressful situations but never as out of sorts as he was now. It soothed me to know that I wasn’t the only one helpless against my husband, but it also frightened me that he had that kind of hold on people.

Wolfe strode to a black duffel bag near the foot of the bed and unzipped it, producing a small Swiss knife. He turned around. Papa stood tall and proud despite his dire situation and being completely wasted and in desperate need to support himself. He leaned against my old closet, his nostrils flaring.

“You’re dead. Both of you.”

“Open your hand.” Wolfe ignored the threat, flipping the knife open and producing a sharp edge.

“Are you going to cut me?” my father taunted, his lips twisting in revulsion.

“Unless my bride will do me the honor.” Wolfe turned his head around to look at me. I blinked, puffing off my cigarette to buy time. Perhaps it was true that I no longer felt despair and anger toward these two men. They’d ruined my life, each of them, in his own unique way. And they succeeded in such a way that I had felt positively damaged. Enough to sway my hips nonchalantly on my way to them. Whereas my father looked content with Wolfe cutting him open, when he saw me nearing him, his teeth slammed together and his jaw locked.

“She wouldn’t dare.”

I arched an eyebrow. “The girl you gave away wouldn’t. Me? I might.”

Wolfe handed me the knife, leaning back on the wall as I stood in front of the man who created me holding a weapon in my hand. Could I do it? I stared at my father’s open palm, outreached and staring back at me. The same palm he’d used earlier this evening to slap me in the face. The same palm that was directed at my mother.

But also the same palm that braided my hair during bedtime after Clara washed it. The same hand who patted my own not too long ago at the masquerade, belonging to a man who stared at me as though I was the brightest star in the sky.

I held the Swiss knife with quivering fingers. It nearly slipped from between them. Dammit. I couldn’t do it. I wanted to, but I couldn’t.

I shook my head, handing Wolfe the Swiss knife.

My father clucked his tongue in satisfaction.

“You will always be the Francesca I raised. A spineless little lamb.”

Ignoring him and the churning in my stomach, I took a step back.

Wolfe took the knife from my hand, his face placid, grabbed my father’s hand, and sliced it open vertically, cutting shallow and wide. Blood gushed out, and I winced, looking away. Papa stood there, staring at the blood pouring from his open palm, oddly tranquil. Wolfe turned around and pulled the linen from my bed, then threw it into my father’s hands. His blood soiled the sheets as he clutched them.

“Bastardo,” my father mouthed. “You were born a bastard, and no matter your shoes and suits—you will die one, too.” He stared at my husband with sheer hate in his eyes.

“You were the original bastard.” Wolfe grinned. “Before you became a Made Man.”

Whoa. My eyes ping-ponged between them, shooting to my father.

Instead of gracing the accusation with an answer, my father had told me that his own parents died in a car crash when he was eighteen, but I’d never seen any pictures of them. He pinned me with his narrow, indigo eyes.

“Vendicare me.”

Avenge me.

“Take the sheets and get the hell out. Tomorrow morning, you may present them to your very close family members. No friends. No Made Men. And if this leaks to the media, I will make sure to personally put that knife to your neck…and twist hard,” Wolfe said, unbuttoning the first buttons of his dress shirt.

My father turned his back on us and stalked out of the room, slamming the door in his wake.

The thud of the door banging still rang in my ears when I registered my new reality—married to a man who did not love me but enjoyed my body frequently. Betrothed to a man who did not want to have kids and hated my father with passion.

“I’ll take the couch,” Wolfe said, grabbing a pillow from the bed and throwing it over on a settee by my window. He wasn’t going to share a bed with me. Even on our wedding night.

I scurried into bed and turned off the light.

Neither of us said good night.

We both knew it was just another lie.