Page 6 of Love Him Like Water

Reserved the church.

Made sure the bridal suite had anything she might need in it.

Bought the wedding bands.

And ordered a bouquet from a local florist.

But here she was, without it.

It seemed for the best, though, since she had no one to hand it off to when I had to reach for her hand to say my vows.

Only to find her shaking like a goddamn leaf.

Costas.

Fucking animals subjecting this kid to some unknown fate.

But here we were.

It was too late to go back now.

So I slid the ring on her tiny finger as I said my vows, then felt her cold fingers on my hand as she said hers, her voice trembling, barely loud enough for me and the priest to hear, then slid the ring on my finger.

I’d made sure ahead of the time to talk to the priest about not making room for objections, and not including words like ‘love’ in our vows, and also not to declare it was time to kiss the bride.

I was pretty sure Lore’s father and brothers would say Fuck the alliance, charge up to the altar, and skin me alive if they had to sit through that.

As soon it was done, it was time to go.

Before the Costas decided that they didn’t want this alliance after all.

We had to get the hell out of Dodge before shit went down.

In the car, I yanked at my tie and unbuttoned several buttons, unaccustomed to wearing suits, save for funerals.

Sure, the idea of the mob these days was all designer suits, silk ties, and ten-thousand-dollar watches.

But my organization had always been a little more rough around the edges. We hadn’t been raised in cushy brownstones in Manhattan. Most of us crawled out of the cracks of the most dangerous neighborhood in Brooklyn.

The backseat was quiet as we drove from the church to the apartment building, and I didn’t know what the fuck to say, so I said nothing.

“So, are you just not going to talk to your wife?” Rico, my driver, and one of my oldest friends, asked as we stepped onto the sidewalk outside of the building.

“The fuck am I supposed to say?” I asked, shaking my head. “She looks like she’d drop dead if I accidentally talk too fucking loud.”

“I know I’ve said it about fifty times already,” Rico said. “But this was a really bad fucking idea.”

“Yeah yeah yeah. I heard you the last fifty times. You want a war with the Costas?” I asked. “Do I need to remind you that a war with them means one with the Morellis, D’Onofrios, and even the fucking Espositos?”

There were five New York crime families.

All of them had marriage-based alliances now.

Against us.

The only way to ensure equal footing against them was this marriage.

Whether any of us wanted to accept that or not.