“Oh, she is good. She even has me fooled,” Bunny says.
My lips harden. She really does think she can make a fool of me, doesn’t she?
“I’m not going to fall for the act,” I tell her, reaching out and grabbing a hunk of her silky, red hair and giving it a yank. “You’ve earned this and so much more. Be grateful that I’m only going to marry you as punishment for tricking all of us.”
Her top lip curls into a little snarl. “I thought you were different,” she hisses at me.
I wing my eyebrows in surprise. “Different than whom? All the thugs in my employ? All the bad men that you served in my club? Did you think I was a knight in shining armor despite my black suit, and dangerous friends?”
The anger in her expression softens, and she shakes her head a little. I feel the movement in the fingers that are still holding her long hair. “I should have known better,” she says quietly.
“Bunny, start recording,” I say, and I turn to the bald officiant. “Start the marriage,” I say to him.
The man wipes his hands on his jeans and starts stuttering out the marriage ceremony from memory.
I turn to Alyssa and smile. “Aren’t you special? By the time this is over, you’ll be Mrs. Russo,” I say as Bunny hovers between both of us with his camera.
A tear slips down her cheek, but when I wipe it away, her jaw is firm.
“Why are you doing this to me?” she says through gritted teeth.
I lean over to her and whisper, “Because you have made me look foolish, and I always get even with people who try to harm me.”
I lift her face and smile down at her.
“Now smile. It’s your wedding day,” I say.
Chapter Seven
Alyssa
With shaky hands, I sign the papers that legally make him my husband. My signature is greeted with a mocking round of applause.
Bunny leans towards me and points to the camera. “Give the camera a big ol’ smile, honey,” he says to me.
I stare at the camera, and that seems to be enough for him because he grins.
Antonio signs the paperwork and then clasps his hands. “I guess I’m a married man now,” he says to the camera. He winks at it. “How does that feel, Giovanni? I know you wanted her delicious body and possibly her virginity, as well as her intel, but they all belong to me now.”
My body is quaking violently with emotions that I can’t contain. I don’t understand why this is happening to me, and I’m angry, as well as strangely aroused. He might be forcing me to marry him, and he might be planning to hurt me because of what he thinks I did to him, but he still makes my heart race and my core clench.
“I think that’s enough now,” the man who brought me out says. He is the only one who seems unhappy with the charade.
“You’re no fun,” the man holding the camera says.
“I have a hockey game to watch. She’s married to you now or whatever. Can I take her back to the house?” he asks, looking at Antonio.
“Not until we exchange rings,” he says.
The man holding the camera hoots in excitement. The other man rolls his eyes and mumbles something under his breath.
Antonio looks at me. “I guess I have to untie you now,” he says.
He cuts the zip ties around my wrists. I have been so tied up for so long that my hands have become numb. I want to cry at the pain lancing through my fingers as the circulation returns to them.
Antonio motions for me to hold out my hands. I slowly hold them out, and he produces a ring that he slides onto my ring finger. I don’t even feel the ring as it slides onto my hand because my fingers are so numb.
“Your turn,” he says as the man holding the camera zooms in on our hands.