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“Is my sister in some kind of trouble?” Ariana asks, still apparently intent on getting to the bottom of this union. And here I’d had the younger one pegged as the inquisitor.
Stella moves to the end of the banister, hesitating on the top step. “Ari,” she whisper-shouts, gesturing for her sister to rejoin her. “Leave him alone.”
Her dark eyes shift down to me, brushing my gaze for a millisecond before quickly sweeping away. She blushes furiously, and I smother a chuckle, not sure why I find her discomfort so amusing.
Maybe it reminds me of someone.
Sighing, I shift on the bench, adjusting the flap of my suit jacket. The tick of my watch falls behind the grandfather clock again like a heart arrhythmia, and I clench my jaw against the sound, trying not to focus on it.
“I just think something weird is going on,” Ariana says. “Can you see Elena marrying… him?”
“I don’t know,” Stella grumbles. “I couldn’t really see her wanting to marry Mateo, either.”
“Yeah, but that at least made sense. They’d been together forever.”
“Were they, though? I mean, he was definitely into her, but it always seemed like she was just going through the motions.” Stella pauses, seeming to reflect on something. “I think this makes more sense than Mateo.”
Ariana makes a weird noise in the back of her throat. “But he loved her—”
“Enough, ladies.”
My voice is low, the strain from their bickering and the barely audible ticking stretching my nerves until they’re almost ready to snap. Curling my fingers over the edge of the wooden bench, I can feel the old material splinter beneath my grip, anger a red-hot tidal wave crashing along my insides.
“I appreciate your concern, because I know it comes from a good place,” I say, focusing on breathing evenly. “But do not ever speak of my wife and her former fiancé, unless it’s to say what a good pair we make in comparison. I don’t want his name associated with hers ever again.”
Ariana’s mouth falls open, her tongue darting across her lips, and I can see she wants to spite me. There’s a fire in her eyes, defiance threaded through her slender form, and I can tell it won’t take much to ignite it.
Maybe she’s more like her sister than I realized.
My phone buzzes in my pocket, drawing my attention; I take it out and scan the screen, exhaling slowly when I read the name that pops up. Pushing to my feet, I nod at the sisters, aware that I’m leaving my threat open-ended if I leave without another word.
That’s not a hit my reputation can take right now.
So, instead of trying to convince them of the point more, I take the Rolex, drop it to the floor, and let my irritation spike from the ticking; like any other trigger, the sound builds until it’s like a waterfall rushing between my ears, drowning out every other noise around me.
Episodes like this are suffocating, all-consuming in the rage they provoke. It vibrates along my spine, knotting in my chest until it peaks, exploding like a volcanic eruption. Usually, I avoid the violent outbursts my thoughts conjure, but now, I draw the gun from my waist and aim it right at the watch face.
A bullet pops free from the chamber, embedding bits of glass and shrapnel and leather into the floor where it ripples from the impact.
Somehow, like a phantom limb, the ticking remains.
Chest heaving, electricity zinging through my veins, I stare at the hole and replay the gunshot over and over in my head, my shoulders tense and heavy.
I don’t—can’t—move until the ticking stops.
Finally, the silence floating in the air around us permeates my hazed brain, and I feel like I can breathe again. I see the girls wince from the corner of my eye, and clear my throat, returning the pistol to its spot on my hip.
When I breeze from the room, hitting accept on the incoming call, temporary relief floods through me as my body struggles to go back to normal.
* * *
My associate’sutter bewilderment at the prospect of me getting married starts to give me a complex, the longer he drones on about how he “bloody can’t believe it.”
Standing in the hall outside Elena’s childhood bedroom, I pace back and forth with my phone pressed to my ear, regretting having given Jonas Wolfe my cell number.
“These are some pretty extreme measures you’re going to here, Anderson,” he says, his British accent thickening the more he talks. “Are you sure she’s worth it?”
“Only one way to find out.”
