Chapter 8 #5
“Someone want to get me a choke chain for the one that won’t listen?” she murmurs, adding some creamer to her own coffee.
“We all need tuxedos,” I say, changing the subject. “And you’ll need a dress for both the reception and the wedding.”
I study my adorable wife, curvy and dark-haired and clever. She’s sucked her lower lip under her teeth, her hands curled around the edges of her seat, eyes on me.
“We’re in such a hurry, a person could be forgiven for believing this really is a shotgun wedding.
Everyone in Prescott will think it.” Scarlett chuckles and rubs at her forehead, pausing abruptly when her friends waltz in through the side door, rubbing their hands together and cursing about the cold. “Morning ladies and gents.”
“It’s butt-ass freezing out there!” Bastian whines, moving over to the table and getting far too close to me. I would ask him to move, but I don’t want my wife to perceive her new husband as being rude to her friends. I’m sweating and picking at the button of my leather gloves. Agitated.
Scarlett notices and handles the situation for me.
“Basti, get over here and bother Widow. Alexei hates being touched.” She gestures at Widow and he recoils as I laugh.
I fucking laugh, like I’m hanging out with friends.
My hackles are up immediately. I’ve never had a true friend.
You can’t trust people, especially in this sort of life.
Friends are people like Aspen or Cody, searching for a way to manipulate you and take what you have or use you for their own gain.
This is new.
“I don’t like being touched either,” Widow says while Bastian ignores him, crowding in between the pair of them.
“I need a tux, too. As your best friend and mechanic and best man at your wedding, I want to look sharp.”
“Best man?” I repeat, thinking it over.
“We’ll be bridesmaids,” Bohnes says, as if in answer to my unasked question.
“Widow, Ash, and myself.” He tilts his head, peering at me from those intense blue eyes of his.
“Because there’s not a snowball’s chance in Satan’s asshole that we’re not going to be at the altar with the pair of you.
Security reasons, mostly. Jealousy and fairness and all that, too. ”
“See.” Bastian gestures like that proves his point.
“I’ll take a suit as well.” Nisha is frowning, hands tucked into her pockets, glaring at us like we’re intruding on her time with Scarlett.
“Would you two like some omurice?” Ash volunteers, pausing beside the table in his slippers, apron, and sword. He gets odd looks from both of Scarlett’s friends.
“Oh my God, yes.” Basti commandeers Ash’s chair as Nisha sighs.
“None for me, thanks.” She gives Scarlett a look. “When are we bringing your grandma over here? What about Emma Jean? What about Trish?”
Ah, yes. All that, and Ash’s frog, too.
Scarlett stares at me instead of Nisha, acknowledging that this is technically my house. Knowing that I have issues with people and germs and contamination.
“Are you okay if Gram stays here until after Jonas is dealt with? We’ll build her a small house on the property later, so she can have her privacy and we can have ours.
Eventually, it’ll just be the five of us sharing a space.
” This last part is whispered to me as Scarlett leans over, her fresh clean hair spilling across my thigh as she gets close enough to nip the edge of my ear.
Fuck.
Fuck.
“Yes, of course,” I reply, letting it slip out in front of everyone else, “anything for my new bride.”
The room goes silent.
This marriage isn’t just my everything—it’s their everything, too. Nisha and Bastian. Bohnes and Widow and Ash. The Crimson Crew. I’ve married a goddess and I can and will behave like a gentleman outside of the bedroom.
“Shouldn’t have asked,” Nisha mumbles, rubbing at her mouth. “Shoulda just told him how it was gonna be.”
“He might be a man, but he’s also a human, you know?” Scarlett replies, smiling as Nisha gags and Bastian sighs like he finds her adorable.
“Men can be human, too? That’s so sweet of you to say. Never thought I’d hear it.” Bastian rolls his eyes, grinning as he looks between me and her. “Okay, fine, I ship Scalexei, too. I ship it all. Scones (that’s Scar and Kellin). Ash-lett, self explanatory. Scarlow, my personal favorite.”
“Would you stop? Each time you make up a couple name, I have to resist the urge to choke.” Scarlett holds out her hand, and I take off one of my gloves just to hold her with bare skin. We’re fire together. We’re electricity. “No murdering today, okay? Zero. None.”
“No murdering,” Bohnes repeats, like he’s trying to drive the idea into his brain.
“No murdering,” Widow agrees, inclining his chin like he agrees with her.
“No murdering,” Ash mumbles from his position at the stove.
“No murdering,” I agree. The family will clean up loose ends for us if we do this right. If we make a public display out of slaughtering a politician and a CEO, we’ll be in trouble. I can do this. I can suffer the presence of my father’s murderers at my own reception. At my wedding.
“No murdering,” Scarlett says, mostly to herself.
Easier said than done.