Chapter 1
His tone was controlled, but there was less contempt in it than there had been at the altar.
He set the glass down.
“I said we should establish rules. The first is that whatever arrangement brought us here, you will have privacy in this house. I won’t enter your room without permission. You won’t enter my office without permission. If you want to leave the apartment, tell security where you’re going.”
“There it is.”
His eyebrows lifted slightly. “There what is?”
“The prison part.”
“The security part.”
“I’ve lived in Manhattan for twenty-three years without needing three men to follow me to class.”
“You didn’t have my last name yesterday.”
“I didn’t ask for it today.”
His jaw tightened.
For a moment, the polished restraint disappeared and I saw that he was angry too—not at me exactly, but at circumstances neither of us had chosen.
“Neither did I,” he said.
That stopped me.
“You didn’t?”
“No.”
I laughed once, without humor. “You expect me to believe the terrifying Niko Santoro was marched into a cathedral against his will?”
“I wasn’t marched anywhere.”
“So you agreed.”
“Yes.”
“Then you chose.”
He regarded me quietly.
“There is a difference between choosing an outcome and having good alternatives.”
I folded my arms over the heavy satin dress.
“That sounds like something men say when they want to feel better about making other people miserable.”
Something shifted in his face.
I expected a sharp reply.
Instead he looked toward the windows, where the lights of Manhattan stretched into the night like a thousand small, indifferent promises.
“My mother used to say almost exactly that.”
It was the first personal thing he had told me.
Before I could answer, his gaze returned to my face.
“You’re exhausted.”
“I’m fine.”
“You’ve said that four times today.”
“You counted?”
“I notice things.”
Clearly.
He had noticed my trembling at the altar.
He had apparently noticed it again now.
His attention dropped to my hands.
I had twisted my wedding ring around my finger so many times that the skin beneath it was red.
His expression changed.
Not dramatically. Niko did not seem like a man given to dramatic expressions.
But the cold certainty in his eyes disappeared.
“Did you think,” he began, then stopped.
“What?”
He chose his next words carefully.
“Did you think I expected something from you tonight?”
Heat rose into my face.
I hated it.
I hated that after an entire day of maintaining myself through cameras and whispers and strangers adjusting my veil, one simple question could expose how frightened I had been.
“This is a marriage,” I said.
“On paper.”
“That distinction doesn’t usually concern men like you.”
His eyes narrowed.
“Men like me.”
“You know what I mean.”
“I know what newspapers mean. I know what prosecutors mean. I know what men who want something from my family mean. I’m interested in what you mean.”
I looked away.
The city beyond the glass blurred.
“I mean powerful men who are used to getting whatever they want.”
He was silent for a few seconds.
Then he said, “I won’t touch you unless you ask me to.”
I looked back at him.
He meant it.
The realization should have relaxed me. Instead it loosened something inside my chest that I had been holding together since Thursday morning.
“You don’t have to look so horrified,” he added quietly. “I’m not completely without manners.”
“I’m not horrified.”
“You look horrified.”
“I look tired.”
“That too.”
I almost smiled.
Almost.
Then his attention shifted to the pins in my hair.
“Do you need help with those?”
“No.”
The answer came too quickly.
He lifted both hands slightly. “Understood.”
Embarrassment burned hotter.
I turned toward the mirror and began pulling pins from the complicated twist at the back of my head. My hands would not stop shaking. The first pin fell onto the carpet.
Then another.
I bent to retrieve it and nearly stepped on my dress.
Niko caught the edge of a chair and moved it out of my way but did not touch me.
That simple restraint affected me more than it should have.
“I’ve never done this before,” I blurted.
His eyes met mine in the mirror.
“Taken out your own hairpins?”
I closed my eyes.
There was no dignified way to recover.
“No.”
Understanding arrived slowly.
He became completely still.
I saw the exact instant the assumptions he had made about me began rearranging themselves.
“You mean—”
“Yes.”
His gaze dropped.
Not to my body.
To the floor.
He seemed suddenly uncomfortable, and somehow that made it worse.
“You don’t need to make a ceremony out of it,” I said.
“I wasn’t planning to.”
“You look shocked.”
“I am.”
“Wonderful.”
“I’m trying not to insult you.”
“You were managing that perfectly well all day.”
His mouth tightened.
Fair enough.
I turned away from the mirror.
“Go ahead.”
“Go ahead what?”
May you like
“Ask.”
“I don’t have a question.”
