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“I’m about to marry your brother, a guy I barely know, and now I’m in a dark room with my ex at my own engagement party. So probably not great.”
“You look good.”
“You told me that already. You still look terrible.”
“Thank you.”
“Why did you want to talk to me, Gian? I can’t stay here for long. I told Sophia that I ate some bad shrimp.”
I grin at her, unable to help it. “Solid cover story. You always were a good liar.”
“I panicked, okay?” She taps a finger against her lower lip. “This is stupid. I shouldn’t have come.” She moves to walk away.
“Wait.” I reach a hand out and let it linger. Her eyebrows arch and her mouth opens. Fuck, that mouth, those lips. That smile, her laugh, everything about her. I’ve needed it so badly, and this is only making me worse.
She’s going to marry Saul in a month, and it’s going to kill me.
“I shouldn’t be here,” she says quietly. “You know people will get the wrong idea, right?”
“I know.” I drop my hand, feeling like an empty shell. “I’d say I’m sorry about this, but I’m not.”
“You never are. What do you want, Gian?”
“I wanted to ask—” My heart’s racing, my throat constricts. This is a horrible, horrible mistake. “Are you sure? Are you really sure you want to marry my brother?”
She stares, her face screwing up, and for a second, I think it’s the old Allegra. The girl I spent every waking moment with for one perfect week, and the girl I’ve obsessed about for the ten years since. The Allegra I’ve dreamed about. The Allegra I swore I’d never speak to again.
“No, I’m not sure, but we both know I don’t have much of a choice.” And then that Allegra is gone. Her face shuts down, her arms cross over her chest, and she looks at me like I’m a stranger. “But that’s how things work in our families, right? Saul won’t be so bad. Put a good word in for me, okay?”
“Yeah. Sure. I can do that.”
I’d rather strangle a puppy. And I really like dogs.
“Great. It’s been nice catching up.” She turns to go again, but pauses in the doorway. “Go back to Vegas, Gian. If you came back because of me—just go back to Vegas, okay? I’m marrying Saul. You don’t need to be here.”
“I’m not going back,” I say, staring at her, my eyes roaming down her arms to the curve of her spine. “Not while you’re going through with this joke.”
“You don’t know me anymore. Please, just leave me alone, okay?”
She turns to leave again, but the words that have been bubbling up the back of my neck all night finally reach my lips. They’re horrible words, the worst words I could ever speak, but I can’t stop them anymore. I’ve been thinking them, feeling them, living them for almost a decade. They’re a curse, a horror, my biggest mistake. I want them badly enough to ruin my life.
I tell her: “Marry me instead.”
Chapter 7
Allegra
Idon’t move. I can’t move.Marry me instead.
It makes no sense.
I haven’t seen Gian since college. Back then, he was in my sociology class. He was filling an elective and I was taking it as part of my degree. I wanted to be a guidance counselor—which clearly hasn’t happened yet and probably never will—and he just wanted to pass. I let him cheat off my midterm when he leaned over and asked nicely. It was the dumbest thing I’ve ever done.
We spent a week together after that. I couldn’t get him out of my head. We had to sneak around—I was living with Sophia at the time, and she would’ve freaked out if she knew I was involved with a Rossi brother—but I was addicted to him. Every day I woke up and thought about Gian. Every night I went to sleep happy, sated, dizzy, with his taste still on my tongue.
One blissful week. Then he disappeared.
“Why would you say that?” I stare at him, a headache coming on. A freaking tension migraine now of all times. I can feel it building in my neck.
