20. Lars
I know I’m drunk. No, I know I’m gone.
The moment we spill out of the casino and into the heat, the Las Vegas night hits me like a fever, neon and noise crashing straight into my bloodstream.
The Strip hums under my skin, inside my skull, and in my pulse.
It feels like I swallowed electricity and Neomi is the fuse burning fast and bright in my chest.
With fingers threaded tight, I lock her hand in mine and refuse to let go. Not now, maybe not ever again.
She laughs—open and reckless—and it tears through places I sealed off years ago. I should be thinking about Chicago, about Maravilla and Falco closing ranks, about the fault lines in my world shifting under my feet.
Instead, all I can think is that I would burn this city to the ground if it meant she’d keep looking at me like that.
We hit the sidewalk still kissing between breaths, my hands in her hair, her body pressed to mine like we were built to collide. Cars streak past and music spills out of clubs. Drunk strangers shout congratulations or something filthier, but I barely see anything that isn’t her.
She pants against my mouth, lipstick smeared, eyes dark and wild. “Lars,” she whispers, like she’s naming a sin she intends to repeat.
“Yeah, Bella?” I taste tequila and heat and every poor decision waiting to happen.
“Marry me.”
Something deep in my chest fractures—and God help me, I like the way it feels. In this moment, it feels like she’s breaking me free of every past mistake I’ve lived through and guiding me toward something brighter. And all I can imagine is my ring on her finger.
I flag down a rideshare. The car barely stops before I pull her inside. Her thigh slides over mine, her dress riding up, and my vision goes black around the edges because I want her—against leather, against glass, against whatever will hold us upright.
The driver glances back. “Where to?”
I don’t look away from her mouth when I answer. “We want to get married.”
The driver laughs. “Do you have a license?”
Neomi shakes her head. “No.”
“That’s your first step. We’ll have to hurry, they close at midnight.”
Her breath catches, sharp and delighted. I drag my thumb across her lower lip, wiping away what’s left of her lipstick. Her eyes shine like I’m about to give her the world. Or destroy it. Hard to tell—but right now, I don’t care.
Vegas blurs past the windows. She curls into me, fingers sliding up my chest, brushing my open collar.
I know better than this. I know better than to let anyone this close. But the alcohol has stripped me down to instinct, and every instinct I have is screaming the same thing.
Jump.
She brushes her mouth against my jaw. “Fuck, Lars. This is the hottest thing that’s ever happened to me.”
I turn my head, my lips grazing hers. “You’re a menace.”
The driver stops in front of a building and promises to wait for us after I hand him a few hundred-dollar bills from my pocket.
When we step inside, I find it difficult to adjust to the brightness of the fluorescent lighting in the Marriage Bureau.
It’s government efficiency wrapped in twenty-four-hour chaos.
People are everywhere, even at this hour of the night.
We stumble through the process with IDs in hand, the clerk barely blinking at us as she issues the license.
“Good luck,” she says flatly, sliding it across the counter.
Neomi beams at me, and it hits me square in the chest.
Back in the car, license in hand, she holds it up between us, her eyes struggling to focus. “Your last name is Marchetti?”
“Yeah,” I say, steady despite the spin in my head. “It is.”
“Mar-chetti,” she repeats, testing it. Then her eyebrows lift, eyes going sharp and amused. “Lars Marchetti.” She tries the name again, but this time adds, “Neomi Marchetti. Lars and Neomi Marchetti. We sound like a mob couple.”
I chuckle. “Not far from the truth.”
Her mouth opens, brow knotted in confusion, but before she can ask anything further, the car stops, and the driver puts the car in park, waiting for us to get out.
“Come on, Bella. We’re making this official.”
The chapel glows like every bad idea Las Vegas ever sold. Pink and blue neon lights. Plastic roses. Velvet curtains. An Elvis track playing in the background.
Neomi stumbles at the threshold, and I lock an arm around her waist, pulling her in close. She laughs into my chest.
An attendant looks up from the desk. “License?”
I hand it over.
He grins. “Right this way. Elvis is ready.”
We’re ushered into a small ceremony room draped in lace and fake foliage. A man in a white jumpsuit with glittered shoulders steps forward, pompadour wig standing three inches high.
“Well now,” he drawls, “you two look ready to make a questionable lifetime commitment in the city of sin.”
Neomi snorts. I can’t stop staring at her—the flush in her cheeks, the way she leans toward me like her body already knows it belongs to me.
We face each other, and the room falls away.
She whispers, barely audible, “Last chance to bolt, Lover Boy.”
I brush my knuckles along her jaw. “Not a chance, Bella.”
Elvis clears his throat. “Look into each other’s eyes and repeat after me.”
We do just that. Slurred vows about burning love, never folding, and riding our luck until it runs out are spoken. Tequila weaved into every syllable, fate into every breath.
The attendant hands us rings—cheap, gold-plated, less than what this woman deserves. I slide hers onto her finger. She slides one onto mine. Her hands are shaking. So are mine.
For a heartbeat, the world goes quiet. There are no guns, no intel, no enemies. Just this beautiful, intelligent woman with red lips and a promise that makes her mine.
When the vows are done, and Elvis tells us to kiss, Neomi doesn’t wait. She fists my shirt and drags me to her mouth. The chapel erupts in laughter and cheers. All I taste is her and something terrifyingly close to devotion.
“We’re married,” she breathes.
“Yeah.” I laugh, forehead to hers. “We are.”
“Congratulations,” Elvis says. “You’re officially married in the great state of Nevada. No refunds.”
We kiss again, slower, deeper and fuck, I think I could kiss her for the rest of my life and never tire of it.
I look down at our rings. “These are horrible, let’s go find some proper wedding bands.”
Outside, the desert air hits us as Neomi loops her arm through mine, eyes bright with danger and delight.
“Proof,” she says, waving the certificate. “We need pictures.”
A street photographer appears like a summoned demon. “Newlyweds—fifty bucks.”
“Sold,” Neomi says instantly.
She drags me into pose after pose: kissing beneath the Strip lights; me lifting her off the ground, both of us flipping off a billboard advertising divorce in thirty minutes.
We stagger back onto the sidewalk laughing.
“I want more tequila,” she announces.
“You need water.”
“Water is for wimps.”
Halfway down the Strip, a bachelorette party swarms us. There’s screaming, and more photos. I nearly walk into traffic holding a boa.
I pull her into a jewelry store inside the Bellagio, swapping our cheap bands for platinum.
I order another car, knowing Neomi isn’t going to make it much further in the heels I bought for her.
She looks at me, swaying slightly. “Where are we going now?”
I cup her face and kiss her hard. Once she’s breathless, I pull back and say, “Back to the hotel. I want to fuck my wife.”