I close my eyes, fighting for control of the rioting emotions inside me.
“Regina?” Dominic is watching me. “It’s time to go.”
Nodding, I take the hand he holds out to me. His hand is so big, warm, yet gentle as he holds mine.
“I’ll be looking for my wedding invitation in the mail,” Lydia teases.
“You’ll receive it soon,” Dominic assures her.
Down on the street, Dominic opens the car door for me, but he doesn’t get in. “Marco and Dario will be with you. I have business I have to see to. Be a good girl, Regina.”
It’s a warning. I nod.
At the dressmaker Marco warns me, he’ll be outside of the front door and Dario is going around to the back door.
It’s a nightmare. The dressmaker, Callie, is eager to please. The dresses are gorgeous, frothy, romantic, and I want them all. Callie says it’s cute the way Dominic sent her dresses he liked and envisioned me in. How he told her he wanted me to have the dress of my dreams. She had never spent so long talking to a groom as she had with Dominic. If this were the wedding of my dreams, then this would be a dream come true. It isn’t, I try to tell myself. Until she tells me that Dominic told her on our wedding day, I would go from being his princess to his queen, and he wanted me to feel that way.
Those words stay with me through the long appointment as she tries to incorporate Dominic’s desires as well as my own in a dress. For a long moment I allow myself to forget the reality of how I came to be standing in front of the mirror in a beautiful white wedding dress with actual gold stitching throughout the delicate bodice. It’s a dress fit for a queen, and I feel just as beautiful in it as Dominic told me I was.
14
Regina
After the dressmaker Marco drives me to the wedding planner, Sonya, who tells me the ceremony will take place at the major cathedral downtown with the reception to follow at the Drake Hotel just two blocks away from it. The wedding planner is brash and has a hard edge to her. I’m pretty sure she’s perfect to make everything happen in two weeks. She also tells me that the wives of Dominic’s three cousins will be my matron of honor and bridesmaids. Nice to know, then I remember that without them I wouldn’t have anyone else to do it.
Three hours later my head is spinning, and I have a slight headache but everything that needed to be chosen has been. I hated I was doing it alone.
Yet even though Dominic isn’t here, he’s involved. From his orders to Callie and Lydia and the laundry list he gave to Sonya, he’s exerting his control, and yet...he’s not running me over with what he wants, he’s leaving me options, letting me decide. Sonya had also made that clear: Dominic wanted certain elements, but how that happened was up to me.
Except it’s all an illusion. None of this is how I dreamed—god, I’m such a liar. The big white dress, the over-the-top flowers which are so expensive I couldn’t breathe when Sonya and the florist discussed the prices as if I weren’t even there. It didn’t matter I thought it was too expensive; it was what I wanted, so Dominic decreed it was what I would have.
Yes, I wanted the man I was going to marry to love me enough to grant my every wish. Except this is all wrong because he’s not the man I dreamed of. He carries a gun and he kills people and he threw me into the trunk of a car, and he threatened the life of a man I was foolish enough to believe I loved. How can I think I love him when he is who he is?
No, no, no. You don’t, don’t be stupid. It’s been less than three full days. You do not love him. Focus, Regina, you have to find a way out of this and you have to do it today.
At the doctor’s office I’m given the birth control implant Dominic wanted. The doctor is very obviously a mafia doctor—the office has few supplies except for what was needed likely to give stitches and remove bullets. Neither the nurse or doctor wore anything even resembling scrubs, we could have been in any office. I had been worried about pain, but the shot to numb me is the only thing that hurts. I’m warned it will leave a bruise and be tender for a week or so and to use condoms for at least seven days. I nod, no way is it something I’m going to worry about.
We’re inching closer and closer to the apartment and tension is building within me. If I don’t go now, I know I’ll never get a chance. Out of nowhere Everett slams on the brakes.
“Fuck, Everett,” Marco groans as he pulls his seat belt away from his chest.
“I apologize, there’s a car accident up ahead.”
It’s now or never. I unclip my seat belt, moaning. Marco barely notices as he leans between the two front seats. Slowly, I unlock my door. I sigh as it moves; then I take a deep breath, open the door, and run.
Thank god I’m in flats. Up one side street, down a short alley. I almost cry in relief to see a police car and two cops in uniform, one leaning against the car and the other running his eyes over the street.
“Help me,” I call out.
The words are barely out before a rough hand comes around my arm, yanking me up against a hard chest.
Both cops straighten, neither of them looking at me—their eyes are on Marco.
/> I fight back tears as the larger, bullish cop with a smashed nose and clipped haircut nods. “Evening, Marco. How is Mr. Sabatini doing?”
Marco’s hand squeezes my arm in warning. “Good, this is Regina Conti, Johnny’s daughter. She and Dominic will be getting married soon. Maybe give a call if you’re looking to work security for the big day.”
Both cops nod, and the bullish one touches his cap to me. “Sounds good, congratulations, Ms. Conti.”