Page 65 of The Mafia's Bride
I don’t want to share, to bring up those old memories. To taint this easy truce we’ve seemed to develop.
“No,” I say quickly. “We didn’t really do traditions.”
“Ah.” He nods, face lightening with understanding. “Holidays? Family celebrations?”
I shake my head. “Nope. We didn’t really do the family thing.”
If I thought he was capable of it, I’d say he looks almost sympathetic.
“Why do you want to know?”
“Because…” He licks a drop of red from his lips and I’m drawn to the slip of tongue. I know how wicked that thing is. “This is your family now, Sloane. We’re your family. Our traditions are yours and you’ll always belong.”
“If we’re still married by the end of the year, sure,” I retort, dropping a few more tomatoes into the press. There I am—typical Sloane trying to put up walls, remind him that I’m leaving, that this is all a farce. Because I can’t let myself think that I actually have a family, that Lex actually wants me to stay.
A gloved hand grabs my chin, forcing me to meet his eyes.
Copper orbs, with flecks of dark brown glare into my face and my pulse jumps in anticipation.
“Remember, little menace,” he breathes into my face, smelling like wine, sauce, and smoke. “You agreed to stay. I own you, every fucking bit of you. Your soul is mine, your heart is mine. We’ll still be married by the end of the year because I’m not letting you go.”
“You seem so sure,” I say, hands curling into the top of his pants to hold still.
“Oh, I am. You’re not going anywhere. I won’t allow it.”
Dom makes a gagging noise, taking his half of the tomatoes away. His interruption breaks our connection, Lex’s hand falling to loosely hold my face.
“Christmas eve.” I sigh, enjoying his touch. “Collins and I would stay up late, watching old Christmas movies, drinking hot chocolate and playing board games. As we got older it became about watching the Hallmark movies. That’s the only holiday tradition we really have.”
He scans my face, reading every emotion written plainly there. I’ve never been good at hiding my emotions. “That’s it?”
I shrug. “My mother died when I was young, Pops was always off taking care of the clan with Maeve, and when Collins got sick, everything just stopped.”
His forehead crinkles. “But she recovered.”
I nod, understanding his confusion. “Well, yeah, but by that point Pops had his new faux bittie.” He tilts his head, trying to understand. “His fake wife. I don’t even know her name, never bothered to learn it. She never interacted with us, just kind of showed up one day and never left. By then, he didn’t really care about us kids. He had the new girl on his arm, the clan was taking off. So we were kind of left to our own devices.”
Holding up my hand, stained red and sticky from tomatoes, Lex brushes lips to my knuckles.
“Believe it or not, Sloane, but you’ll never be left to your own devices again. Never.”
26
SLOANE
Itap my toes on to the sidewalk, waiting for the light to change on the crosswalk, enjoying warm breeze of summer taking over the city.
Collins moves beside me, holding a few shopping bags while I balance two of my own.
Lex gave me his credit card, so I definitely plan on using it. After the confusing but nice sauce night, the way my heart stuttered as he played with his little cousins, and another night falling asleep in his arms without any sexual advances or demands, I needed some retail therapy to clear my head.
Collins was willing to assist me. She said things at home were tense and she needed a day out too. Now that I wasn’t there, it didn’t occur to me that my perfect older sister would have a hard time handling our oldest moody sibling.
When she told me today would be her only day off, between rotations and classes, I jumped at the chance. My sister just started her residency for medical school, the youngest accepted to the program, due to her intelligence.
I never got to see her, not before the wedding and not now. Iwanted a day to just be Sloane again, not worrying about Lex or sabotaging a marriage.
This is something we did during our teen years. When I needed retail therapy to burn off the numbness and remember who I could be, or Collins needed shopping to escape the overprotectiveness of our father, we shopped.
