Page 24 of Savage Love

The charade that is going to be the rest of my life begins now—and there’s an entire party to get through.

One that I can’t even drink during to take the edge off.

Elena

I’m glad that I told Isabella that I wanted a small wedding and reception. Even so, there are enough guests milling in the reception space as Levin and I get ready to make our entrance to make me feel anxious all over again at the idea of talking to them, making conversation, and pretending to be an overjoyed, happy bride for most of the night.

As if he can hear my thoughts, Levin squeezes my hand lightly, leaning in to murmur in my ear. “Everyone here is accustomed to arranged marriages, Elena. No one expects you to be the absolute picture of happiness.”

A part of me softens at the idea that he knows me well enough to know what I was thinking—and another part aches at hearing him call it a marriage of convenience, that heexpectsme to be unhappy.

“Well, I’ll just have to do my best,” I tell him tightly as the music increases in volume, and I hear our names announced as the new bride and groom, telling us that it’s time to walk in.

Levin doesn’t let go of my hand. His fingers stay threaded through mine as we walk in to the sound of our guests clapping for us, all the way to the sweetheart table at the head of the room. The space is beautifully decorated in pinks and deep reds and cream, greenery scattered throughout and a dance floor in front of where the musicians are set up. It’s all gorgeous, everything I could have ever hoped for—and I don’t remember planning any of it. It all feels like a daze, and I’m fairly sure that Isabella handled most of it, because I wasn’t in any state to decide what I wanted for a wedding that felt like it was occurring in a fever dream.

It still doesn’t entirely feel real. I sit down next to him, nudging the bustled skirt to one side, and look out over the ballroom filled with guests taking their seats for the meal, too. A server comes around, pouring Levin a glass of wine and then swapping it for sparkling cider for my glass–another reminder of why we’re here.

“I’ve never been much for wine,” he says in a low voice to me with a hint of a grin, taking a sip. “I’d prefer vodka, but that’s for later tonight.”

I know it’s not what he means, butlater tonightsends my stomach into knots, wondering what’s going to happen. He was so clear that night when I walked in on him that this marriage isn’t going to be a physical one—that he had no intention of touching me again—but I can’t help but wonder if that’s changed now. If anything at all has changed.

A part of me wants him to be so overcome by desire for me that he can’t help it—and the rest of me knows that we can’t do what we did in Rio forever. Our whole lives can’t be that back and forth, that tug of war between desire and guilt. It will tear us both to pieces—and I can’t bear it.

The food is delicious, but I barely taste it. It’s a trio of entrees, a small portion of each—a duck thigh in a berry sauce, a filet medallion with some sort of red wine glaze, and delicately cooked salmon with lemon. There are whipped potatoes with crumbled Gorgonzola sprinkled over the top, a salad with berries and vinaigrette, and roasted vegetables, but it all might as well have been microwaved pizza. It feels like dust in my mouth, because all I can think about are the rest of the motions that Levin and I have to go through tonight—and then what happens, or doesn’t happen, after we leave.

Dinner is over before I know it, and then it’s time to cut the cake, a towering confection of creamy frosting with fondant flowers and greenery that match the decor of the ballroom perfectly cascading down it. Levin stands next to me, his hand over mine as the knife slides through to reveal a soft white cake with a raspberry cream filling. As I lay a piece on the small china plate in front of me and reach numbly for a piece to feed to him, he does the same.

Am I going to have to fight tears all night tonight?I can feel them burning against my eyelids as his fingers brush against my lips, vanilla cake and raspberry exploding over my tongue. I bite back a small moan of pleasure—the cake is absolutely delicious—feeding Levin his bite. His tongue brushes against my fingertips as I nudge the cake into his mouth, and I feel a shiver of desire go all the way down to my toes.

I wish that I didn’t want him as much as I do. I wish that he didn’t make me feel like this—and I wouldn’t give up knowing what it felt like for anything.

Not even if I knew that we’d end up here from the start.

We return to our table as the servers pass out the cake, and I nibble at mine, wishing with every sip of sparkling cider that it were actually wine and looking enviously at the glass of expensive red sitting next to Levin’s plate. He finishes his cake, glancing over at me as the dinner comes to a close, and the guests start to get up and move about for mingling and dancing.

“I’m going to have to go and make my rounds,” Levin says quietly. “But I won’t be gone too long. I don’t want to leave you alone if you won’t be alright—”

“I’ll be fine,” I tell him, a little more sharply than I intended to. I want to remind him of everything we did in Rio, everythingIdid—that I think I can handle being left alone at a dinner table for a little while, even at my own wedding reception, but I bite it back. “Just come find me when it’s time for our first dance.”

Levin hesitates, as if he’s thinking of saying something, but nods. I wait for him to lean in, to kiss me even on the cheek, but he doesn’t. He pauses almost awkwardly for a moment, then backs away and walks towards where Connor and Liam are standing near the bar. I see who I assume must be Connor’s wife standing near him—a tall, beautiful red-haired woman in an emerald silk dress, with the elegant bearing of a queen. She glances at Levin and at me, murmuring something to Connor, and he says something back before she shrugs, kisses him lightly on the cheek, and trails off toward another table.

I feel my face flush, wondering what she said. Isabella has mentioned her to me before—her name is Saoirse, if I remember correctly. She and Isabella don’t get along all that well. According to Isabella, they’ve learned to bury their differences, but the fact that Isabella married the man Saorise once wanted is never entirely gone. I can’t help but wonder what she thinks of me now that I’m here.

Most of the wives are a mystery to me. Isabella doesn’t spend as much time with them as they do with each other. I get the impression she’s not overly fond of most of them, although she’s only had good things to say about Liam’s wife, Ana. I feel another knot in my stomach, wondering if I’ll have to make friends with them. Levin is Viktor’s right hand in New York, but here he’s not a man of any high ranking in these organizations. I have a small flicker of hope that, like Isabella, I won’t be expected to be one of them all that often.

As promised, Levin comes back to the table in time for our first dance. He holds out his arm for me as I get up, the perfect gentleman, and escorts me towards the dance floor as the music starts, a pretty instrumental song heavy on the strings. I hadn’t picked out a specific song for our first dance—I couldn’t think of what I would possibly find that would fit our relationship. The thought of choosing a song for Levin and me in our current circumstances hurt too much. Isabella had told me she’d pick something instead, and I’m happy with the choice. It’s beautiful and easy to dance to. As Levin puts one hand on the small of my back and the other on my arm, I’m glad that it is, because I can’t focus on the steps beyond the muscle memory of all the dance lessons I’ve had, not with him touching me again.

The pressure of his hand on my back feels hot, like it’s searing through the lace, my entire body flushing with being so close to him again. We’re nearly brushing against each other as we move through the steps, his hand sliding down my arm as his fingers interlace with mine and spin me, bringing me back in, and when the front of my body brushes against him from chest to thighs as we start to move again, it takes my breath away.

I want him so much it hurts. He looks so handsome in his charcoal suit, perfectly tailored to every inch of his muscular body, his tattoos peeking above the collar on his neck and out from the wrists of his shirtsleeves and jacket, the ink covering the backs of his hands. Most of the Irishmen and Kings here have similar tattoos, as do the Bratva members in attendance—although Viktor is notably not as inked as many of his men—but on Levin, they seem particularly sexy to me. Maybe it’s because I’m so intimately familiar with them, because I’ve traced so many of the patterns with my fingers and lips, and the thought sends another flush of heat through me, my heart beating rapidly in my throat as Levin and I move across the dance floor.

It’s finished all too soon. I hear, faintly, cheering from the guests as the music slows, and Levin pulls me in, the pressure of his hand on my back and his body suddenly fully against mine making me feel dizzy as he leans down, his lips brushing over mine.

I hadn’t expected a kiss. I know he’s playing to the guests, and it’s no more of a kiss than the one at the altar was—the faintest graze of his mouth over mine, but it makes my knees go weak. I want to hold onto him, to deepen it, but I know I can’t. I let go as he breaks the contact, and I see a flicker of what looks like regret in his eyes as he takes my arm and leads me away from the dance floor.

What he’s regretting—the end of the dance, the kiss, the marriage itself—I don’t know, and I’m not sure if I want to. But I don’t have time to consider it, because he’s leading me towards Viktor, who I haven’t formally met before.

He’s sitting at a table with a tall, slender, dark-haired woman who is leaning close to him. He looks at her with the same kind of adoration that I saw on Niall’s face when he looked at Isabella during the ceremony. It makes my heart ache all over again, to see a man with so much power who looks so obviously in love with his wife.

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