34. Bronwyn

34

brONWYN

A few nights later, I was stretched out on my favorite couch, reading. It was past midnight and I’d been promising myself I’d go to bed in a minute for the last four chapters. Then I heard the door to the penthouse unlock. Radimir’s home!

I tried to ignore the lift in my chest. I shouldn’t feel anything. But I did, and it was more than just the animal attraction of that scowly, gorgeous face and big, chiseled body. It was more than just the way he made me feel safe. There was a tension, when he wasn’t there, an ache...

I kept my eyes on my book as Radimir walked into the main room. No. I was not, I was absolutely not falling for him. “Late night,” I said, without looking around. “Want me to fix you a sandwich?”

He grunted. That wasn’t like him: he was cold, but always polite. He moved across the room but that sounded different, too. I’d come to know his heavy, impatient footsteps, like he was crushing his enemies under his expensive shoes. Now his steps were slow and faltering. I finally glanced over my shoulder...and went rigid.

Radimir was stumbling across the room, one hand pressed tight against his upper arm. He slumped against the wall for a second, then pushed off, leaving a bloody handprint.

I moaned in panic, jumped off the couch and ran to him. I hooked an arm around his waist and made him lean on me, even though it made my knees burn. “Come sit down! Come on!” He mumbled protests but I ignored him and hauled him along, groaning under his weight. I finally got him to an armchair and eased him down into it. “There! Hold on, I’ll call an ambulance.”

He shook his head. “ Nyet. No doctors.”

“You’re bleeding!” The arm of his suit was soaked through, and blood was dripping from the cuff. “How much blood have you lost?!”

“I can deal with it,” he panted. “I need the bag...bottom drawer, in my office.”

I ran to his office, pulled open the bottom drawer and found a red bag. I brought it back to him and opened the zipper. It was a full medical kit, with bandages, syringes and bottles of drugs.

“Thank you,” he breathed. He began to take off his jacket but had to stop, wincing in pain. “Go,” he grunted. “I can do this.”

“No you can’t!” I shook my head, staring at the blood in horror. “Jesus. Let me help.” I quickly eased his jacket, waistcoat and shirt off him. There was a four-inch gash down the side of his arm, and I felt my stomach lurch, not at the blood but at the thought of someone hurting him. “Who did this?”

“An Armenian.” He closed his eyes. “He’s dead.”

I shook my head in silent horror. How could mafia wives do this? How could they wait patiently at home every night, knowing their husbands were out there getting knifed and shot and killed? I pressed a pad of gauze against the wound. It instantly soaked through.

“Pressure,” he rasped.

I pressed down on the gauze. He grimaced in pain, and I almost stopped, but he laid his hand on mine. First reassuringly...and then he squeezed my hand a little as if touching me helped.

The bleeding slowed. Radimir opened his eyes. “It’s too big to close on its own,” he told me. “It will need stitches.” He nodded at the first aid bag. “The suture kit, please.”

I picked it up and stared at the needle and thread. “You’re going to sew your— No, you’re about to pass out! I’ll do it.”

He shook his head.

“You looked after me,” I told him firmly. “I’m going to look after you.” I tried to think calmly. “What can I give you for the pain?”

“A drink.”

I ran over to the kitchen and brought a bottle of vodka. He spun the cap off one-handed and took a big slug. I threaded a needle and then, wincing, I slid the needle in and began my first stitch. “Why?!” I wanted to know. “Why did this guy stab you?”

“The Armenians are new in town. Young, flush with money, trying to make a name for themselves. They think being a gangster is all about looking cool, like in a video game. They even bought a fancy bar as a base, a place called Worship. They’ve been trying to take over our territory and that led to...a disagreement.”

My stomach flipped. A disagreement that ended with a guy dead. But at least it was him and not Radimir. I fell silent and began the next stitch.

Radimir winced in pain. “Talk to me,” he grunted. “It helps.”

I pulled the thread slowly through. “Talk about what?”

“How is the wedding planning going?”

My stomach went heavy. I focused on suturing, not meeting his eyes. “There’s nothing to plan.”

“What about the dress?” I could hear the frown in his voice. “And the band? And the cake?”

I slid the needle through again. “There is no dress. There is no band. There is no cake. It’s just to get a marriage certificate. We don’t need all that stuff.”

“Look at me,” he said quietly. Then, when I carried on suturing, “Bronwyn, look at me.”

I grudgingly looked at him.

“This is the only wedding you’ll ever have.” He managed to make his voice gentle, despite the pain. “I want it to be special for you. You can have anything you want.”

I did another stitch. “What makes you think I even want a big wedding?” I asked sullenly.

Without warning, he stood up, thread and needle still dangling from his arm. I yelped at him to sit down but he ignored me, stumbled over to a drawer and pulled it open. Inside was the bag of wedding expo stuff.

He dropped back into the armchair, panting. “Listen to me, Krasavitsa .” Between the blood loss and the vodka, he was slurring. “I’ve already ruined your life. I’m not going to spoil your wedding dreams too. Let me do this one thing for you. Have whatever you want. The cost doesn’t matter.”

Something swelled in my chest, and suddenly I couldn’t speak. He did care. And he wanted me to be happy. I mechanically did the last few stitches, then bandaged the whole thing up. “There,” I told him. “You’re done.”

He thanked me and talked me through giving him a shot of antibiotics. Then I got him up, through to the bedroom and onto the bed. He passed out almost immediately. But I sat there watching him for a long time.

The next morning, I changed the dressing for him. Despite the wound, he insisted that he had to go meet with his brothers, so I helped him put on a shirt. As I stood in front of him doing up the buttons, my knuckles brushing his abs, he said, “I meant what I said last night. About the wedding.”

I looked up at him, then away. “It’s irrelevant anyway. People book weddings a year in advance. Ours is a week away. Everything will be booked up.”

He shook his head. “You forget who you’re marrying.”

Later that day, when things were quiet at the bookstore, I tried to sort through my feelings about the wedding. Ever since I was a little kid, I’d dreamed of this magical day, with a big dress and my friends there and me feeling like a princess. It felt wrong to do it with Radimir, when the whole thing was fake. But...he was right, this was the only chance I’d ever have, and throwing away all those childhood dreams felt wrong, too.

And there was something else, something I didn’t want to admit to. A fragile silvery butterfly in my chest that made a functional, courthouse wedding feel...wrong.

I decided to make a few phone calls. At least then I could tell Radimir I’d tried. I started with my dream venue, the mansion I’d seen at the wedding expo. “Hi! I was wondering if you had any availability for, um...one week from today?” I asked.

There was a stunned pause. Then the woman burst out laughing. “Oh, darling,” she said, syrupy-sweet and just a little patronizing. “Our first free date is two years from now.”

I sighed, feeling dumb. “Yeah, I figured.”

“Can I ask your names, for our records?” she asked. “And how you heard about us?”

I closed my eyes and rubbed at my forehead. “I picked up one of your brochures at a wedding expo. And the names are Bronwyn Hanford and Radimir Aristov.”

She went dead silent. Then, “Just a minute.” I heard frantic whispering: all I could make out was the name Aristov. Then she came back on the line. “We’d be honored to accommodate you next week, Miss Hanford.”

I opened my eyes and blinked in disbelief. What? That’s fantastic! Then I had a sudden, horrible thought. “I don’t want you to cancel someone else’s wedding for me!”

“We don’t have a booking that day,” she reassured me. “We’re closed for staff training. I mean, we were closed. We’ll reschedule it.”

I could hear the fear in her voice. And when I called caterers, florists and bands, the same thing happened. Radimir had been right: these people’s customer base were Chicago’s rich and famous, of course they’d heard the name Aristov and they were all ready to bend over backwards to avoid offending him...and by extension, me. Is this what life’s going to be like? I knew some people would relish being feared, but I’d always just wanted to be liked, however pathetic that made me.

I’d absently doodled Bronwyn Hanford and Radimir Aristov on a sheet of paper while I’d been giving our names for the bookings. Now, for the first time, I tried combining them. Bronwyn Aristov.

My stomach dropped. It suddenly felt so permanent. In a week’s time, I’d be married to a man I didn’t love.

That silvery butterfly in my chest, again. I didn’t love him. Couldn’t love him. Right?