Page 45 of The Rise of Saint (The Sins of Saint 1)

He held his hand out toward me, and I hesitated. For a second, I thought there might still be a way out of this, that this couldn’t be the only way. My only option. But then I heard his warning, the ultimatum.Wife, or whore?

My decision?

Wife.

A tear slipped free as I reached out and placed a trembling hand in his. Surprisingly, his touch wasn’t cold, but rather warm. Welcoming. The heat from his palm spread up my arm, down my chest, and settled in my gut. But I didn’t trust it. I couldn’t.

“You look beautiful, Mila.” His voice dipped low, a murmur of words that held no meaning. I would rather be called ugly by God than beautiful by the devil.

I didn’t respond, and I refused to look him in the eye. I couldn’t, not with so many unshed tears on the verge of overflowing my defenses. With my hand in his, I stared out over the ocean wishing the current could carry me away from here. Help me escape. Take me to a place where this nightmare couldn’t reach me, couldn’t taint me.

In the distance, I could hear a voice uttering words of promises and love, of man and wife together until death did they part. Until deathwedid part. It was words everyone had heard before. It was words known throughout the world. Words people read in fairy tales, heard in romantic movies, but never in nightmares. Ever.

“I do.”

I closed my eyes when I heard him say those words. It cut through my skin, the sharp blade of his voice tearing my soul to shreds, every little girl’s dream crushed within a single nightmare.

“Do you, Milana Katerina Torres, take this man to be your lawfully wedded husband, to have and to hold from this day forward, for better, for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health, until death do you part?”

My bottom lip trembled, my body numb and legs weak. Two words. All I had to do was say those two words, yet I couldn’t. It was stuck in my throat next to my dying heart clawing its way out.

I reached up, the breeze blowing through my loose curls that hung down my shoulders. I wanted to touch my scar while tucking strands of hair behind my ear, but the bouquet was too heavy in my hand, Saint clutching the other.

“Mila,” he snapped with a whisper. “Look at me.”

I opened my eyes and looked straight into his. The moonlight teased the blue of his irises with swirls of silver, yet I saw nothing but pools of greed in its depths.

“Say the words.” He squeezed my hand with the intention of hurting me, almost crushing my bones. “Say it.”

Wife, or whore?

Decide.

Six months.

Do it for her.

The little red-haired girl.

So many thoughts, so many voices, it was impossible to hear my own.

I took a deep breath, inhaling the ocean’s salty scent—the fresh air doing nothing to calm my wildly beating heart or the fear that pulverized me from the inside.

Saint tightened his fingers around my hand some more, urging me to say it. To speak the words that would bind me to him in a way only two lovers should be. Not us. Not like this. It was wrong, but it was a wrong I couldn’t run from.

A single tear lapped down my cheek, spilling from my soul and onto the ground beneath my feet. The fiery pits of hell had been ignited in my gut, and my throat burned as the poisonous words lay on my tongue—a serpent ready to strike.

I once again closed my eyes, unable to look at him as I handed my soul over to the devil. “I do.”

“You may kiss the bride.”

The dam broke, and my tears ran freely as I closed my eyes. Every corner of my insides ached as if my flesh had been torn from my bones.

A gentle hand touched my cheek, wiping at the wet trace my sorrow left behind. My eyes remained closed. I was too much of a coward to open them, to look into the eyes of my tormentor.

“Bellissimo segreto,” he whispered before touching his lips to mine. Instinct had me drop the bouquet so I could push against his chest, a meek attempt to stop what I thought would be a cruel kiss meant to dominate. To take. But instead, it was tender, soft, and unrushed. The way his mouth lingered on mine was like a man trying to subtly coax the lips of his lover to open for him. A silent plea for permission.

Rejection turned into acceptance as my hands relaxed against the crisp fabric of his dress shirt, heat gradually thawing the ice in my veins. The cold fingers of fear that had held me prisoner tore from my bones one by one, a single moment at a time.

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