Page 23 of For the Gods' Sake

“Well, here we are,” Uma said, opening her arms to the expansive main room of the gallery. It was circular, lined with towering columns and priceless art hangingon the walls of the outer corridor. The inside was lit by a giant skylight nestled into the center of an intricate dome, decorated in geometric shapes that were not only meant to be supportive of the structure but beautiful to stare at. “Enjoy a drink and some food before dinner.”

“Thank you, Uma.” Adrian said graciously, echoed by my own. “Thank you.”

And with that, Uma was off, scurrying against the perimeter of the dome with a clear destination in mind. When a young girl, not more than twenty, saw her approaching and her spine snapped straight with fear, I had to hide my laugh behind my free hand.

And in the absence of Uma’s threatening glare, everyone’s attention turned shamelessly back to me and Adrian, huddled in the corner together.

Adrian carefully released my hand to grab two glasses of wine off a passing tray, swooping them so smoothly the waiter didn’t even notice they were gone until Adrian had them firmly in his grasp.

“Thank you,” I said as he handed me one. He lightly tapped his glass against mine, keeping heavy eye contact as he took his first sip. My own was more of a gurgle, the wine having to fight its way down my throat, tightened by the jolt of Adrian’s hand smoothing down my side to settle high on my hip.

“Who is it?” I asked, assuming the move was an intentional show of intimacy to convince someone of our relationship. If it wasn’t already explicitly obvious from our grand entrance.

Adrian's brow creased as he let out a low hum. But it went away almost as quickly as it appeared, fully gone by the time he looked over my shoulder. “I hope you have your answers prepared. We’re about to gettrampled.”

I turned myself in his hold, his hand smoothly slipping from one hip to the other as I nestled into his side to prepare for the onslaught.

The first brave soul to greet us was one of my father’s friends, an old colleague who ended up leaving my father’s business to start his own. He was in a plain tuxedo, same as everyone in the room, but he had a unique type of cockiness that could only manifest when you ignore all criticism then consider yourself perfect.

“Well, well,” he said as he approached us, swirling his drink in his tumbler. “I must say this is a rather interesting development.”

“Good evening, Carlos,” I said, my tone exposing a sliver of my disbelief at his too-casual tone. There was nothing but an almost grating nonchalance to his tone. I’d never been one to believe in any sort of social hierarchy, but surelygodsdeserved an ounce more respect. “It’s lovely to see you. Especially at an event as important as this.”

Carlos gave me an impressed once over, not letting the fact that he was married and a good thirty-five years older than me hide any of his interest. I held my back straight, not showing my disgust—the only way I’d learned to weather it.

Adrian’s fingers tightened at my hip for a second before releasing.

“Right you are, Reyna,” Carlos said, then turned his wry grin to Adrian, the glint in his eyes dimming. “And Lord Jupiter.”

“Carlos.” Adrian extended his left hand to shake his. Carlos extended his own an inch on instinct before stopping and dropping his eyes to Adrian’s outstretchedhand. Normally, you’d shake hands with your right, but Adrian’s right hand was plastered to my hip.

Carlos blinked once, like he was waiting for Adrian to realize his mistake and correct it.

Instead, Adrian just cocked his head and I tipped up my chin to look at his face, finding him staring at Carlos with an almost provoking expression.

Wisely bowing to Adrian’s authority, Carlos switched to his left hand, shaking Adrian’s in greeting. When he spoke again, there was a lot less scattered cockiness in his tone. “I believe congratulations are in order.”

Remembering the roles we were supposed to be playing, and knowing that Carlos was likely to run directly to my father after this conversation, I leaned into Adrian slightly. “Thank you, Carlos. Your well wishes are appreciated.”

Before Adrian could respond, Carlos’s wife bounded up to the conversation. “Oh my goodness,” she said, clapping her hands together excitedly. “You two are adorable.”

Adrian clearly didn’t have the same shocked reaction I did to her calling himadorablebecause he just chuckled under his breath and said, “Thank you, Helen.”

Helen had her husband’s penchant for boldness, though hers came out as excited questioning. “I must know how you two met. How long have you been together? How serious is it?”

A brief moment of panic hit me, but we’d prepped for this. Not that I had any distinct memories of our dinner on Friday. Just hazy images of Adrian’s hand on my leg, the dark room, the feeling of being sheltered from the outside world and tucked into his potent presence.

“Oh,” I said, hoping my tone came across as bashfullyin love as possible. Especially when this was my first chance to sell it to my father and cement my bargaining chip. “We—”

My response was cut off by the arrival of Chiara Borghese, the matriarch of the family who owned the gallery we were standing in. “I’m sorry to interrupt,” she said, “But I must know the answer. I couldn’t have picked a better pairing for either of you.”

Though I knew Chiara had a habit of matchmaking—and had tried her hand with me a few times—I never imagined she’d turn her energies to Adrian.

But based on the smile I could see from his profile, he seemed familiar enough with her to make it a possibility.

The thought of Chiara parading Adrian around to all the beautiful, successful women in the Mediterranean made something foreign slither through my chest.

“Of course, Chiara,” I said graciously, though I had to consciously push down a bout of nerves lying to this many people. Because it wasn’t just three people I was speaking to. There were at least ten people lingering close, listening to our conversation and eyeing us for an opportunity to jump in.

---