Page 17 of Call You Mine

“Anything,” I mutter a little too enthusiastically.

He chuckles, shaking his head in disbelief, like he’s questioning why the fuck he’s about to agree. “Go put some fucking clothes on. I only have so much restraint, Princess, and if you don’t get out of my sight, I’m not fucking responsible for what I’ll do.”

Chapter Four

WYNTER

Weddings. You either love them or hate them.

I’d like to say I’m indifferent, that they don’t make me tear up, nor do I fantasize about what could have been in another life. I wish I could say they were not only useless but also completely meaningless. Nothing but a piece of paper tying two lives together for eternity, yet it could so easily be torn apart for therightreasons.

In all truth, they’re my one weakness. The idea of them, at least. The one I made up in my head as a little girl, who, like every other naive girl her age, dreamed of the day I would walk down the aisle dressed in a white princess gown toward the hand of my Prince Charming. That was all before reality set in and I discovered it was a lie which only happened in fairytales, and my life was a far cry from ever ending with a happy-ever-after.

I was the villain—the evil queen who ended up alone after betraying her prince and putting herself before her kingdom. I was selfish, some would say narcissistic, and a cold-heartedbitch—a real gem. Though none of it was my fault. That’s what they made me.

Born with a silver spoon in my mouth, my parents raised me to believe all those who weren’t bred the same as I was weren’t my equals. They were beneath me. Squalors who deserved to be punished and treated as such.

It was too late for me when I finally opened my eyes and realized it was all a bunch of bullshit. By then, everyone saw me as a pretentious bitch and hated me just as much as they feared me. Unredeemable. Especially when the people I surrounded myself with were just as hateful and fake as the lies I was told. It’s the role I took on, the person I became.

I know Stella inviting me to her wedding is only a courtesy because our families have known each other for so long, but I can’t imagine she actually expects me to show up. None of them do since I’ve been radio silent for so long.

Honestly, I’m not even sure why I’ve come. I wouldn’t have even considered it if I hadn’t run away.

All that aside, if you’d have told me I would come to this wedding with a plus one I never, in any ill-fated universe, had any intention of speaking to again, let alone bringing as mydate, I’d have called you fucking crazy.

Yet here I am, on the arm of a broody, and frankly dangerous, man. A man who, although I hate to admit it, looks fucking delectable in the all black, three-piece suit. Layer after layer of ink wrapped around his neck like the perfect noose peeking out from under the collar of his dress shirt. He’s always been easy to look at, at least according to the hordes of girls at Servite Academy who were endlessly fantasizing about the notorious bad boy with the sexy tattoos and eyes made of emerald gems.

Dragon, as his friends called him, was not only mysterious because he rarely spoke to anyone outside his small circle of confidants, but he was trouble with a capital T.

And now, this dark and wicked, yet dangerously alluring man is here with me, all because of a secret. Our pact.

Digging my fake white polished fingernails into the palm of my hands, I’m so close to drawing blood from how uneasy this whole thing is making me.

I hear him groan beside me and it only makes me dig them further in. “Stop shaking or they're going to notice something is wrong,” he whispers to me, his lips barely moving as he speaks. I keep my head straight, shoulders back, and eyes towards the altar ahead, but he’s nauseatingly present.

The scent that lingers in the air between us, a mix of bergamot, cedarwood, and smoke, along with the scent of liquor on his lips is tantalizing, intoxicating, and entirely his. It’s unlike anything I’ve ever smelled.

I bite my tongue to keep calm and collected, although inside of me there is a raging storm brewing about to wreak havoc if he so much as speaks again. “I’m not,” I snap back curtly, an uneasy edge to my voice.

But my sharp retort only makes him chuckle as he tightens his grip on my arm tucked in his. I can feel the vibrations of his heart and throaty chortle making a similar noise escape my own lips. “Babe, I can feel you trembling against me,” he groans, and the menacing tone makes me tremble even more. Though this time, it isn’t, because of the horrified looks pointed our way.

No, I want to pull away, take back my stupid idea, and run away—anywhere in the world but here—because of the feelings circling in my stomach and flowing down between my thighs already pressed tightly together.

I recognize it all too well, and I will not be going there. Not with him. Not again.

I push away the memory of his fingers on me from last night.

“Don’t call me that,” I sneer, biting the inside corner of my bottom lip. I make the mistake of looking up at him, hisgreen opaque eyes curiously watching me with unease. They’re watching me intently, alight with so many questions. It’s as if he’s trying to look deep inside my mind to discover what I’m thinking.

It’s useless. He’s never getting in. I won’t allow it.

Of course he doesn’t respond. Nothing but another daunting chuckle leaves his lips. A sound that has me shivering in my five-inch Louboutin heels. I’m the wretchedIce Princess, christened the awful nickname because of my cruel attitude, icy disposition, and condescending nature. Someone as trivial as him shouldn’t be getting this rise out of me.

I drag my feet down the long aisle covered in pink and white rose petals, bouquets of peonies and pink roses pinned to the white tulle draping along the chairs lining the trail, all leading toward the giant wall of flowers behind the altar. And I mean freaking immense wall of flowers. There’s a thirty-foot-long white tent decorated with the same white and light pink draping over the tennis court of the newly remodeled Silver Estate ready for the reception that follows. With the size and ostentatiousness of the festivities, you’d think they’d be expecting over five hundred guests, but only about thirty people are in attendance.

Regardless, it’s breathtaking, the perfect whimsical fairytale wedding Stella Silver has always dreamed of and deserves. Thanks to her cousin Sebastian Silver and his wife, her best friend, today her dreams are coming true.

Two years in the making.

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