Page 79 of Worth Risking It

“It must be hard. Oh my god, and the honeymoon! How are you going to deal with that?”

I ground my teeth and bowed my chin, pinching the bridge of my nose. “I uh, ahem. I’m not going on the honeymoon with them. Frank is.”

At first, she didn’t respond, probably just as shocked as I was when I was told.

“Oh.”

“Yeah. Apparently, Milo thinks I need to keep my ass in this country since my goddamn girlfriend is knocked up. So, I’m getting left behind.”

She clucked her teeth and sighed. “I, personally, think this is better. I mean, that’s only going to be pure torture for you, watching them on their honeymoon.”

“I reckon.”

I began to traipse aimlessly around the room, unable to watch their wedded bliss anymore. My hand back in my pocket, I went to a window and looked out over the city.

“How’s Jack?” she whispered, her voice shaking.

I bristled and twisted my waist somewhat to look in his direction. “As far as I can tell, no one suspects anything. Milo and the parents are still under the assumption Meyers died in a car accident, and everyone thinks you flipped your lid and miscarried.”

Jack threw his head back and rumbled with laughter, raising a flute of champagne to the man he was talking to, and rage twisted my guts. He didn’t have a goddamn care in the world. My brother was dead because of him. If I hadn’t intervened, his wife and my nephew would also be dead, and he stood over there, laughing and drinking, having a good old time without feeling an ounce of guilt for his choices. If he found Amanda, she and that baby would be dead, as would I, and he would just laugh it off by the next day.

“Is he looking for me?”

Her trembling, fearful voice drew me back to the phone conversation. Coughing, I rocked from heel to toe on my shoes, staring at the floor. “Uh, so my cousin, Bobby, is filling in for Meyers now that he’s gone.”

She scoffed. “I don’t like him. He’s so mean to the kids. He never talks to them. Meyers used to play with them and interact, but Bobby just stands there like a stupid statue, staring through them like they don’t exist.”

“Hm, well, I’ve chatted with him here and there, acting like I was just curious how he was adjusting to being the full-time charge. He says Jack is hoping you don’t come back.”

She sniffled and wept.

Clearing my throat, I said, “I don’t think he has anyone looking for you. He keeps telling people you’re mentally unstable and suicidal, and you’ll probably off yourself somewhere and end up as a Jane Doe in the city morgue.”

“Oh, pleasant.”

“Hm, well, it’s better than him searching for you.”

“I guess so.”

A ruckus had me turning around to face the reception once more. Leaning against the brick wall, the corner of my mouth curled as everyone gathered for the traditional bouquet toss. My head slightly shook, fascinated with just how stunning Chastity was today.

She thought she was weak and couldn’t handle this lifestyle? She was wrong. She was perfect to be a mobster’s wife. To look at her right now, one would never know she was anything but one hundred and fifty percent devoted to her new groom.

No one would know last night, when Milo was in the city with his brother, father, and Frank having a bachelor party that led to him fucking the stripper, that gorgeous woman was sitting on my face, screaming my name, her thighs quivering around my ears.

They wouldn’t know we held one another for over an hour afterward, trying to plot and plan our escape with new identities.

Chastity looked every bit the part of a blushing bride, head over heels in love with her husband. For the first time in my life, I admired someone’s deceitfulness. My kitten was a master at being two-faced, living a double life.

A cheer erupted when one of her friends from the band caught the flowers. Chastity cackled loudly, throwing her head back, her neck arched while pointing at Dave.

“Sucker!” she shouted over everyone to hear while the man squirmed and turned bright red.

I chuckled through my nose, having spent enough time with her friends over the months to know Dave and his girlfriend, the lead singer to their dive band, were struggling because she wanted a commitment, and he was still getting over a nasty divorce last year.

“We weren’t always like this, you know.”

Blinking and looking away, I bowed my chin and roamed further away from the crowd. “Like what?”