I fell into a bit of darkness after that, and together we tried to break me out, but it was no use. I was smirking on the outside, drowning from within.
And then Jameson Filano came along and every nerve in my body sparked. She lit my ass on fire.
She was a tempest, a gorgeous fucking hailstorm that beat down on my senses until they snapped. She woke me from the nightmare my life shoved me into without trying and completely unaware.
But she was a flame, and I was less than ash.
Once again, that nasty little whisper crept into the back of my mind and screamed I was a fool, that it was a long shot, that a girl like her could never want a guy like me, not for more than a night’s play.
That if I wasn’t enough for my parents, I could never be enough for her.
I knew the score, understood my place in the world, but I wouldn’t let that stop me from trying... and then I looked into her hazel eyes.
All it took was that one time, right there in the dressing room of a store I couldn’t afford to piss in.
In her gaze, I didn’t find heated intrigue of a society girl faced with a dirty little secret she wanted to cash in on.
I saw a layer of life tacked tight along every edge, a mirage she held high and strong to ensure not a soul could see what was on the other side, but I saw it.
I saw because it mirrored my own.
A desperate need to fucking breathe.
To scream, to be selfish and senseless, and to do it with her middle fingers held high.
To do all she wanted or do nothing at all and it be okay.
The girl was tired, bored.
Bold.
But she was holding back because the world around her wasn’t ready for what she had in her, and she’d repressed life for so long, even she was clueless.
I was not.
I knew what she was capable of and I wanted every bit of it.
I needed to know her, to be hers, and she sure as fuck had to be mine.
It was a slow process, but every time her eyes found mine, I saw a little more, a bit deeper.
And then I had her, tasted her, slid inside her, and if I had a single doubt before, it died that night.
She said she didn’t feel, when really, she felt so much she hid it away in fear.
She said she didn’t believe in love, yet she fucked like she was made of it.
She loved; she just didn’t know it because she had no one to show her what it meant.
I had my sister, my two best friends, so in some ways, I was richer than my little rich girl, but even so, she fell. She loved me long before she realized it.
But my baby knows it now, and I sure as hell will never let her forget it.
“Mr. Rossi.”
My head snaps to the priest and across from me, a raspy little chuckle fills the air.
“Your vows, son,” he prompts.
The man nods encouragingly, but I shake my head and my girl laughs a little louder, my boys doing the same from my left. They know I don’t want to share what’s going on inside my head with anyone else.
I squeeze Jameson’s hands, my eyes landing on hers again. “Skip to the end,” I say to the man.
Jameson’s lips curl up high, the red painted along them testing my patience.
She knew what she was doing when she put it on, same as she did when she slid into her dress, a form-fitting thing the exact shade of those perfectly pouty lips.
The devilish piece hides every bit of her skin from me with the exception of her hands and neck, but while I can’t say for sure from where I’m standing, I’ve got a feeling her back might be bare.
My eyes cut over her shoulder, meeting Sienna’s as if she’ll reveal the answer, but my sister only smiles.
Next thing I know, a matte black band is being slid over my finger and the man at my side says I get to kiss my bride, so I fucking kiss her.
I kiss her like no one is watching when, in fact, they are.
I kiss her like she’s mine, because she is, has been, and always will be. The piece of paper we’ll get after today makes no difference, she’d have been forever mine without it, but I want it all the same.
I want everything I never thought I’d have, and I want it the way we decide is right. Fuck everyone else and what they think, like, or believe.
This is about us, and yeah, we wanted to get married in the middle of our new club, at the stroke of fucking midnight as a way to rewrite the night our worlds officially crashed five years ago today.