Page 74 of Married With Lies

“Always look after your brother. And Cale, there’s one more thing I want you to know…”

Luca beats me to it when my name is called at the counter. He retrieves our sandwiches. His is chicken salad and mine is corned beef on a poppyseed roll, just like our father used to order.

“What time do you have to drive out to the wedding?” Luca asks while adding two packets of mayo to his sandwich.

“I should start heading out in about an hour. I want to get there in plenty of time in case Sadie needs the moral support.”

Luca takes a huge bite of his sandwich and watches me as he chews. There’s an unmistakable gleam in his eye by the time he’s finished swallowing. “You know what? When you first told me about this whole sudden marriage thing, to Mercedes Wingate no less, I thought there had to be a screwy angle. Running off and marrying on romantic impulse doesn’t seem to fit with you. And I never would have picked our perky former next door neighbor as your type. But I’ve gotten a real kick out of seeing the two of you together. You definitely belong with her.”

Luca chomps down on his sandwich again and gets distracted by the sight of a cute college age girl walking by in tight jeans. Meanwhile, my conscience is putting up a fight on multiple fronts.

My marriage to Sadie is a lie. It occurred to me to tell Luca the truth early on but I didn’t want to involve him in my mess. Now it’s too late to come clean.

There’s also the matter of Sadie herself. We barely knew each other and we made a business deal. Feelings never factored in. Yet every minute I spend with her makes life better. Sadie is like the light to my darkness. She’s sexy and she’s funny and she wouldn’t hurt a fly. If I had any honor I’d pay her enough to keep Bright Hearts running indefinitely and then I’d end this charade.

Unfortunately, my honor was exchanged long ago for a place at Richie Amato’s side. And I’m too selfish to let Sadie go. Even if I’m not quite selfish enough to touch her.

Luca is unaware of the war inside my head. He’s saying how glad he is that he decided to come up for a visit this weekend. Aunt Donna has always treated him like a son, making sure his favorite foods are in the house and making a huge fuss every time he walks into a room. While I’m not too close to Richie and Donna’s two daughters, Luca thinks of them as sisters. He misses being home. He misses the family. If Richie wasn’t salivating over the chance to enroll my brother in his empire, I wouldn’t be so hell bent on chasing my brother back to Florida.

“When does your flight leave in the morning?” I ask.

“It’s an early one. I’ll be going to LaGuardia at six a.m.”

“I can take you.”

“Nah, you ought to hang out with your wife. Richie said he’d drive me personally.”

My jaw tightens. Then I figure Luca will be out of here by this time tomorrow so there’s not much damage Richie can do.

By the time we’re done eating and shooting the shit, I’ve got to move along. Luca is in great spirits when I drop him off at Richie’s house. He tells me to say hello to Sadie and drops the hint that he’d like to fly out west and see the ranch sometime.

I wait in my car as my brother trots up the flagstone path to Richie’s mansion. My uncle knows I’m off the clock tonight. Although I’m expected to walk inside with Luca and pay Richie some respect, I don’t fucking feel like it.

While I’m still watching, Luca fist bumps Vinny Tello right outside the front door. Vinny says something that makes Luca bust out laughing and they go back and forth for a minute before Luca goes to the front door. He takes one last look over his shoulder and surprise registers in his raised eyebrows when he finds me still sitting there with the engine idling. Maybe I looked pissed off. I am kind of pissed off. Luca shouldn’t be hanging around these guys.

I raise my hand in a halfhearted wave. Luca copies the move. Vinny stares at me with his hands in his pockets and his puffy, thick-jawed face unreadable.

The late May weather is perfect for keeping the top down in the Porsche. I zoom down the Long Island Expressway at maximum speed, risking a ticket.

Miraculously, I reach the Hamptons wedding beach house without collecting any fines. Since I dropped Sadie off last night, the place has transformed. Even I’m impressed and I couldn’t give a shit about orchid flower arrangements and twinkling lights. I’m forced to submit to the valet parking or else make a scene. About half the white chairs assembled at the ceremony site are already occupied. I take an aisle seat and hope no one tries to strike up a conversation.

To appear even less approachable, I become engrossed in my phone. Being in the middle of this wedding atmosphere reminds me that I too had a wedding. All the photos are saved to my phone, just in case I need to show them off to prove a point. And then there are times when I break them out for a good long look just for the hell of it, like I’m doing right now.

As usual, I linger on the kiss photo. Sadie’s eyes are closed and my hands are all over her. Last night when we were saying our goodbyes, her tipsy stepmother wanted to see us kiss. I didn’t hesitate to capitalize. When I finally returned to my own place in the city I took the liberty of jerking off like the future of my cock was at stake.

Better that than the alternative. No matter what kind of thoughts about Sadie are simmering in my brain, a deal is a deal.

More guests are filling the chairs. A woman tries to squeeze past and her heel stabs my foot. She introduces herself as the groom’s cousin. I tell her I’m part of the cleanup crew. She leaves me alone.

A string quartet has begun playing soft music to yawn over and the sun is just about to touch the horizon. Before I throw my phone back in the pocket of my blazer, I take a peek at my last text from Sadie. This morning she sent a selfie with no comment. In the photo, Sadie has a wide-eyed ‘Help Me Please’ look on her face and Hadley can be seen yelling in the background.

With a smile, I put the phone away and then I look up in time to catch Baylor, three rows up, giving me a death glare over his shoulder. Ordinarily I’d flip him off but this is a wedding and he’s (sort of) my brother-in-law.

Instead, I widen my grin and stare back at him. He’s the first to flinch, turning around and openly whining to his wife, sitting right beside him. I wish I’d grabbed one of the wedding programs on the way in here so I’d have a way to make spitballs.

The music changes and people take this as a cue to look behind them and stand up. I follow the trend because otherwise I can’t see a thing. A wide aisle made of distressed wooden planks stretches between the chairs. Since I’m on the end I have a decent view of the first members of the bridal party.

The girl wears a peach-colored gown and looks plastic and forgettable, a close replica of the bride herself. Cameras snap and she stares straight ahead, not blinking, showing a terrifying number of teeth in her smile. Her arm is linked with a dude who missed his calling as a tech bro avatar. Together, they could make a convincing horror movie poster.

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