Chapter 27
Roxy
A few days later
"I'm pretty sure your brain cells are are still taking a nap, otherwise I can't explain how you managed to screw up such a simple cake order," I snap at the girl staring at me like I've grown two heads.
How hard is it to write down vanilla sponge cake with apricot jam? How difficult is it to follow two simple instructions? Two-tier cake with the correct filling. Nobody can do their damn job.
"I'm sorry, it was a last-minute request..."
Her stammering makes me suck in a breath.
"Go get me some apricot preserves—I don't care where from—but every slice of cake needs a teaspoon of preserves next to it, clear?"
She nods frantically before fleeing the room.
I press my hand to my temple, reminding myself that incompetent people are everywhere.
"You can't do anything right." Ivette's voice makes me shudder. Because I'm starting to become her. Because instantly I'm drowning in regret for how I spoke to that girl, just because that damn voice in my head won't shut up when something isn't perfect.
The next second, Luna pokes her head through the door.
"Roxy, you look absolutely stunning," my friend's voice calls from behind me as my eyes find my reflection in the mirror.
I look... I don't even have words. The A-line wedding dress has lace attached to the bodice. The sleeves drape softly off my shoulders, the sweetheart neckline frames my chest, and a slit in the skirt reveals my bronzed legs.
The final detail is my shoes, but I figured I'd take advantage of these last moments to let my feet breathe.
Luna comes up behind me and pulls me gently into her arms, and for a fraction of a second, I feel tears gathering in my eyes. What the hell is wrong with me that I'm this emotional? This is not real.
"No sentimentality, okay? We both know why this event is happening, and there's nothing romantic about it," I tell her plainly, though her expression disagrees.
Why am I being such a bitch?
"Whatever you say, but you're still fabulous. Damien's going to need open-heart surgery when he sees you," she finishes with a laugh.
"With my luck, I'd be the one operating on him, so he'd better stay healthy," I say, trying to put a smile on my face.
After she helps me pin a clasp in my hair, the only one I have from my mother, she leaves to check the rest of the garden details.
When I hear a knock at the door, I'm almost certain someone mixed up the floral arrangements, so I find myself saying, "I swear if you put the white roses instead of the..."
But when I turn around, I'm met with two hazel eyes that look hypnotized.
"DAMIEN! It's bad luck to see the bride before the wedding. If I end up with years of bad luck because of you, I'm going to want significant material compensation." While I'm ranting, he remains completely still. And it’s making me nervous.
I have a shoe in my hand, ready to throw it at his head, but when I see his expression, I lower my arm. Which makes me blush. Why the hell am I blushing?
"You look…," he starts, but his lips press together, at a loss for words.
"I'm sorry if I don’t meet your expectations or if your guests will think I'm too plain," I respond, feeling a trace of heat staining my cheeks.
I hate feeling this vulnerable. Who cares if he doesn't like the dress? Who cares if they don't like you? Your own family doesn't like you—how could strangers who don't even know you?
"Like the only star in the sky," I hear him finally say, and I turn to him with a frown.
"You look...fuck, Roxanne, I don't have words in my vocabulary that can convey how beautiful you are.
Name the rarest things on earth, put them all together, and you'll know what I feel right now looking at you. "
Something in my bristling energy softens when I allow myself to look at him.
He's wearing a black suit with a burgundy bow tie.
Those damn dimples are present in his cheeks, the earring in his ear, and the tattoos create such a stark contrast with his white shirt that I find myself whispering, "You don't look half bad yourself. "
That stupid grin spreads across his face, and I can’t help staring. He looks younger, lighter somehow, and those damn butterflies start fluttering in my stomach again.
"I know you're probably barely restraining yourself from jumping me, but you have to resist until tonight. I just hope I don't get stage fright."
And I can't help the laugh that escapes.
"Don't hold your breath waiting for the big night together," I tell him, but there's a bit too much affection in my voice, and his smile falters slightly.
He takes a few steps toward me, and I wish I could stop these emotions when I catch his scent of leather and musk.
He sits down on one of the armchairs near me and picks up a shoe from the floor, gesturing with his palm to his knee.
"I'm perfectly capable of fastening my own shoe strap, Damien." But my voice trembles slightly at the end because he has such an intense look that he doesn't seem to register anything I'm saying.
"Give me your foot, Roxanne. Now."
I lift my foot slightly, right where his knee ends, and my dress, with its slit, exposes my leg almost to my thigh. I forget to breathe when his fingers brush the skin of my calf—slowly, delicately, as if he's afraid to stain my skin with his touch.
The way my body reacts to his simple touch should raise warning flags, but all I have in my head is how erotic his hands look on my leg.
The smile spreading across his face tells me my thoughts are written all over my face, so I try to mask my lack of reason and stare at the ceiling.
When he places my foot in the shoe and fastens the strap, I breathe in relief and try to pull it back gently when, suddenly, I feel his hands lift the shoe slightly, and his lips make contact with the only visible patch of skin.
"Damien..." But my voice comes out too raspy, too affected, and then I can't stop my eyes from looking down at him.
"Say my name like that again and I promise we won't make it to the wedding night."
I believe him. Worse, I think I'd be the one tearing the clothes off him. Why does he have to be exactly my type? Why do I feel this damn attraction raising my blood pressure at the slightest hint of affection from him?
After he puts on my second shoe, he rises from the armchair and positions himself an inch from me.
His hand finds the slit in the dress, and with his eyes fixed on mine, he whispers, "Tell me to get the hell out of this room."
Except I don't want to. Because when he's near me, I don't feel any trace of the bitterness poisoning my blood.
I don't hear Ivette's words telling me I'm disgusting.
I don't feel the sting of all those nights I waited for someone to ask how my day was.
The memory of being forced to eat what was put in front of me, even with tears in my eyes and a knot in my throat, doesn't burn as badly.
It doesn't hurt as much to breathe when I think about finding one of my exes in my own bed with another woman because I'm "cold" and "uninvolved. "
The words are somehow stuck in my throat because I want him to touch me. I want a moment where I forget everything waiting for me beyond these walls, so I find myself murmuring, "Stay."
Four letters. One word. And his mouth instantly finds mine. I don't need to think because my body knows his and surrenders without any rational influence from me.
His hand travels up to where I know what he'll find when he makes contact with the piece of lace I'm wearing as underwear. This dress can't be worn with anything ordinary, so I made sure to have something worthy of it underneath.
When his hand makes contact with damp material, a sound like a growl escapes him, and I bite my lower lip. I don't know at what point I positioned my hands at the base of his neck, but I pull him closer to me, pressing my entire body against him. Why do I feel like he's not close enough?
"Tell me who you're this wet for, s?onko. If the answer isn't my name, we're having a funeral today too."
My smile is almost instant because he's so quick to jump to conclusions that I want to tease him, play with him more.
As if reading my mind, his fingers push the fabric aside and slide into me, unhurried, deliberate, teasing.
“You were saying something, baby?”
His touch works me open, and yet it’s not enough. Reason whispers that this is wrong, that we’ve torn past every line we shouldn’t cross, but the thought fades as he takes over my senses. All I can feel is him, this man who looks at me like I’m the only light in his universe.
He swallows hard and only slightly increases the pace. My hand moves to his forearm, and I squeeze gently.
Until a few days ago when he laid me on the bed, months had passed since I'd been intimate with a man, and my body seems to remember this desperately, making me forget who he really is.
Forget that this man is the head of the Polish mafia.
That his touches, however tender they are now, come from hands stained with blood.
And yet, when he touches me, when his lips explore my skin, I forget all of that. I forget that he's just another layer of danger I'm adding to my already complicated life. That this closeness to him is like dancing on the edge of a cliff, knowing I'll fall but unable to stop.
"I love how your mind tries to push me away while your body knows who you belong to," he says through clenched teeth, his gaze taking on a dangerous edge.
I'm pressed so tightly against him that it's impossible not to feel his erection touching my abdomen, and I have to swallow a gasp at how badly it affects me to see him like this.
"Damien, we don't have time." But my voice is weak.
Far too weak.
"Then come for me, Roxanne. Come for your husband. It's that simple."