Page 28 of Inconvenient Marriage
Adrian is currently leaning back in the chair opposite Dallas, ankle resting on the other knee, an unlit cigarette tucked behind his ear, nestled in his messy curls. The warm light from overhead winks off of the pair of golden hoops in his left ear as he turns just enough to watch me cross the room, plopping my helmet on top of Dallas’s desk before I drop down into the leather seat next to Adrian’s.
“Hey, fellas.”
Adrian shakes his head, a half-smile tugging his lips. “Dal, you owe me a hundred bucks.”
Dallas reaches up, absently scratching the spade tattooed on the side of his neck as his pale green eyes—the same as his cousin’s—narrow on me. “What did you do?”
I widen my own eyes, going for innocent. That’s one of the perks that come with being born with a face like mine. If you don’t look too closely, don’t pay attention to the imperfections I worked hard to achieve, you’d think I was harmless. So I ride a motorcycle. So I’m never without my leather jacket. I’m a pretty boy who wouldn’t hurt a fly…
Dallas curses under his breath. Lifting his ass off of his seat, he pulls out a wad of cash from his back pocket. He peels off a hundred-dollar bill, slaps it onto the desk, sliding it over to Adrian.
He leans out of his seat, picking it up with two fingers. “Thank you.”
“I should know better than to bet against you.”
“No, you should know better than to underestimate Bas’s tendency to get himself into trouble.”
“Me?” I ask, momentarily forgetting why I’m here. “What about me? What was the bet?”
Adrian disappears the money into his suit jacket. “I bet Dallas that you’d be a sucker for that Bait you met last night. He told me that you sent her home without an Owed of her own. Then you asked me to look into her. When you texted us, I bet him a Benjamin that you came down here to tell us that you’re going to Claim this Annaliese Crawford.”
I cross my arms over my chest. “Give him his money back.”
“Oh?” Adrian makes no move to do that. “So you’renotgoing to Claim her?”
“Nope. No point. I’m not waiting until August to make her mine. We’re already engaged.” I glance at Dallas. “So, technically, you won.”
“No the fuck I didn’t. I told Adrian that there isn’t a woman in Harmony Heights that would ever convince you to settle down. You’ve had most of them already?—”
Can’t deny that. “Guilty as charged.”
“Right. So why would you marry an Offering?”
“She’s not an Offering,” I tell them. “Not anymore. She’s convinced she’s been demoted.”
Dallas frowns. “My dad did the same shit to her that he did to Loni?”
Adrian’s jaw goes tight, though he doesn’t say anything. He was only able to arrange to kill Jack Collins once, but whenever he remembers that he spent ten years separated from Loni because of the former King, you just know he’s imagining resurrecting him if only to watch him suffer and die again.
I shrug. “Don’t know. Someone did, and I know it wasn’t you. It doesn’t matter. She thinks a marriage of convenience is her only way out of it.”
Dallas gives me a pointed look. “And you didn’t tell her that she doesn’t need to go through that?”
I grin, and Dallas groans.
Adrian shakes his head. “I knew it. You agreed to marry her without thinking it through.”
Maybe, but the way he says that… it’s like he thinks this is just another way for me to rebel, to take the Order’s traditions and ideals and wipe my ass with them. And while that’s normally something I would do, I’ve been on my best behavior since Dallas took over for his dead dad.
I hate the Order, but I really do love these guys; Connor, too, even if he has to stay home with Haven. I wouldn’t do anything to fuck up Dallas’s reign now that he’s reluctantly the head of the Order. I know only too well how vindictive and cruel some of the other Owed can be. If he shows any weakness at all, he’s a target, and I would never do something to fuck with him.
This isn’t about the Order. This is about Annaliese and me, and I need my friends to understand that.
“Screw you, Adrian,” I say, though there’s not any heat to my words. “I promise, I thought enough.”
“Sure you did.” Adrian arches an eyebrow. “The question is: with which head?”
That’s easy enough to answer. “If it was just about sex, I already banged her in the bathroom of the Last Prayer.”
