Page 4 of Keeping My Bride

And with that, he leaves me alone in my room. I flop back on my bed and stare up at the ceiling as I wonder aloud, “What does my grandfather’s will have to do with me?”

* * *

After I’m showeredand dressed in my usual attire – a tailored and expensive black suit with a black button-up shirt underneath, I meet my father downstairs in the lobby of my condo building. The car ride to his mansion is quiet and filled with tension. I try to pry into his reasoning for bringing me back home to discuss my grandfather’s will, but my father refuses to budge.

And by the time we reach my childhood home, I know something isn’t right.

We walk into the house and go straight to my father’s study on the first floor. He motions for me to take a seat as he goes to stand over papers spread out over his large, mahogany desk.

“What the fuck is that?” I ask him, curiosity getting the better of me. “A new contract?”

“Something like that,” he mutters in annoyance. My father never had any patience when it came to anyone or anything, especially me. “I need you to read over this and sign it right away.”

I notice the bold heading on the first page, Last Will and Testament, and cock a brow. “This is my grandfather’s will?”

He nods once.

Intrigued, I sit down in a chair and begin to read the paperwork. At first, it’s all the usual legalese. But then the terms and conditions start coming to light, and my fingers tighten around the papers, clenching them tightly as I read what can only be described as archaic bullshit.

“He can’t fucking do this!” I exclaim, rising out of my seat.

My father shrugs nonchalantly. “But he did.”

“I am not going to marry a Moretti!” I spit out, cursing the name on my tongue.

“Both of the grandfathers agreed to this bullshit clause in their wills.”

Valerius Vitale and Marcello Moretti died within a few weeks of each other. And this is what they agreed to?

“This can’t hold up in court. This is ridiculous!” I yell, my voice rising to dangerous levels.

“We need to honor their wishes,” my father simply says.

Banging my fist on my desk, rattling everything on top of it, I tell him, “No. No, I will not agree to this. I haven’t even seen Verona Moretti in years.” Slamming the papers down on the desk, I say, “There’s no way she will agree to this.”

“She’s already signed the necessary paperwork. Her father faxed me the copy this morning,” he tells me, causing my world to come to a complete stop.

Shaking my head in disbelief, I walk away from my desk and pace the room. “There has to be another way.”

“None of us get the money, the estates, the properties, the mansions, the cars, anything unless this comes to fruition.”

“Why would they decide this? This is some kind of sick joke!” Valerius Vitale and Marcello Moretti were adversaries, some say from birth. Our families feuded over land, territory, everything for years. And then, when my mother was murdered, everything came to a head. Rivals soon turned into sworn enemies willing to go to war with each other.

And now my grandfather is requesting that I marry one of them?

“I suppose the old men reached a point of peace and agreement in their final days. I just wish my father would have told me about his plans, because I most certainly would have talked him out of it,” my father explains.

“This is about peace? There will be no peace if I’m intertwined with the Morettis!”

My father considers this for a moment, but then says, “Maybe this will be the end of the war. We can’t continue to go to war if we’re family. And I think that’s what your grandfather was trying to resolve before he died. He didn’t want us fighting anymore or tearing each other down at every turn.”

A dark chuckle releases from my mouth. “If I have to marry her so that we don’t lose everything we worked so hard for, then so be it. But I won’t be faithful. I won’t ever love her.”

“No one said anything about love, my dear boy. We are talking about marriage after all.”

I scoff at his words. He can say what he wants, but I know he loved my mother. And the day she was murdered, I saw my father cry for the first and only time in that kitchen while he held her lifeless body in his arms. Sure, their marriage had its ups and downs, like all marriages tend to do, but he loved my mother. And he also had the privilege of knowing his bride before their wedding day. They met in high school, dated, got to know each other, had a chance to fall in love.

Me, on the other hand, I have to marry a girl I haven’t seen since I was a kid. There will be no courtship, no easing into this. “How long do I have?” I ask my father.

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