Page 90 of Forbidden Dark Vows

Ruby closes her eyes, her lashes thick and damp, and I know that she isn’t crying for herself, she’s crying for her dad.

“Ruby, do you want me to see if I can get your dad transferred to a hospital here in New York?”

“Can you do that?”

“I can try. We’re in this together, remember. I promised to make you happy, Ruby. But I think you should talk to your mom.”

“No.” Her lips pinch together. “She lied to me my whole life. I could never do that to my children.”

“Maybe she thought she was protecting you.”

“You don’t know her like I do, Harry. She was protecting herself. The night I met you, she’d set her sights on Alessandro Russo as her future son-in-law.” A joyless laugh escapes her lips. “Even that was a lie. She wanted me to marry someone rich so that I would take my dad off her hands.”

My heart swells with love for this woman sitting next to me. She’s hurting right now, but I know I can make everything better. I can take her away from all this, build a new life for us on the foundations of love and honesty and trust, now that she has told me the truth.

“Then we’ll give her what she wants.”

Ruby blinks at me as if I’ve grown a second head.

“We’ll take him off her hands, set her free if that’s what she wants. You’re all that matters to me. Your happiness. Your future. Your life.”

“Harry…” Ruby scrunches up her face, psyching herself up for what she has to say next. “Alessandro… The night before…”

“Hey.” I pull her against me and kiss her eyelids, her cheeks, her lips. “It’s okay. I already know.”

“You do? He told you?”

“It doesn’t matter how I know. It will never happen to you again, Ruby. You’re going to get better, I’ll make sure of it, because you have lots to do.”

She smiles then, and I’m reminded all over again of how beautiful she is. “Don’t think I’m running errands for you while you sit in your nice cozy office.”

“I think you might enjoy these errands.”

“Hmm, I reserve the right to pass judgment until I know what they are.”

“Okay, number one, you have a wedding to plan.” I raise a finger in the air, and then a second. “Two, you have a honeymoon to buy clothes for, and three…”

“You haven’t thought of three yet, have you?”

“Three…” I keep her waiting. “You have a new apartment to find.”

Her smile is kind of wistful, not the full-on moonbeam smile I was expecting. “You know I’m not interested in a swanky apartment, right? You know I’ll be happy living anywhere with you.”

“I know. Call it a wedding gift.”

“A wedding gift? You mean there’s going to be more than one?”

“You’ll have to wait and see, won’t you?” I kiss the tip of her nose and go to clear up the cartons when she stops me with a hand on my arm.

“Harry, there’s one more thing I haven’t told you.”

I sit back. “Whose apartment you were in this morning?”

Her eyes widen, and she stares out the window, at the city lights beyond. “No, that was just a friend from college. She works in the hospital. She found me when I was trying to sneak out in the night, took me home, and made me hot chocolate.” She faces me then, not quite meeting my gaze. “She saw my test results.”

My heart skips a beat and starts up again, gathering speed. I can’t speak. I won’t be able to bear it if there’s something seriously wrong with Ruby.

“She said…” Ruby’s bottom lip disappears behind her teeth. “She said I had arsenic poisoning.”