A Bride's Tangled Vows

by Dani Wade

  Even more than his freedom.

  Eighteen

  She was crying over shoes. Christina knew she was in a pitiful state, but this was more than even she could condone. Shoes were shoes. And as Christina sat in front of her open closet, she knew she shouldn’t make any decisions in this frame of mind.

  Because choosing which shoes to get rid of should not make her cry.

  In reality, her over-the-top emotions had nothing to do with shoes and everything to do with Aiden. He was always busy, but until today, always within reach. The problem? He treated her like a delicate figurine that would break with a simple touch.

  She missed how he threw himself into everything, right or wrong. She missed arguing and the comfortableness of working together. The connection that she’d felt when they’d talked about his father. The awe she’d felt when he stood up to her father. Above all, she missed the intensity of his passion, and the feel of her soul mingling with his.

  The days were torture. The nights were devastating.

  They went to sleep, each on their respective sides of the bed. Some nights, lying there feeling useless and empty, Christina thought she’d give anything to have him curled against her back like he had that night in the hospital. Sure enough, by morning they would be tangled together, and her heart broke all over again. Something had to give soon because having him close but not having him for real was killing her. If she was braver, she’d ask him to stay. Why didn’t she just ask?

  She couldn’t force herself to face any more rejection in her life.

  Knowing he had left her without trying to understand her fears told her everything. All of those precious memories lay around her, shattered like broken glass. She had to escape, couldn’t stand one more day moping around, wishing for things she couldn’t have. But the inhabitants of Blackstone Manor had become her life; how could she possibly go?

  So here she was, cleaning out her closet and crying.

  As if conjured by her infernal wishing, Aiden slipped through the door. Twisting around, she stared up at him from her seat on the floor. “When did you get back?”

  “Just a few minutes ago.” He hesitated for a moment before speaking again. “The police now have all five of them in custody.”

  Christina grimaced. Just thinking about her glimpse of those men outside the cabin window gave her the shivers. She forced herself to shrug it off. “Will I have to testify?”

  Aiden shook his head. “I doubt it. They have confessions out of four of them. It’s a done deal. They just can’t find anything that ties Balcher to the crime, and they have no other leads to who would have put them up to this. And we’ve found nothing more at the mill that could help.”

  Christina let that pass, not wanting to think about someone who was willing to destroy property to scare people away. Thugs didn’t deserve her attention in any way.

  To her surprise, Aiden approached with measured steps across the carpet, then knelt down beside her. She glanced up at his face but quickly looked away. He was just too beautiful for her to watch without giving away the pain she was feeling.

  “Christina, what’s the matter?”

  Christina could feel herself close down. She wiped the tear trails from her cheeks. Experience had taught her that men didn’t like messy, emotional women.

  When she didn’t move, he joined her on the floor. He turned her as if she were a doll so she was facing him. She couldn’t quite reconcile the sophisticated, sexy businessman she knew with the casually comfortable man before her now. Instead of a T-shirt with his khakis. His hair was still tousled, but more from running his fingers through it than from gel.

  Whether dressed to the nines, sweaty from sex or sitting on her bedroom floor, he was still the most attractive man she’d ever seen.

  And here she was in yoga pants and a tank top, her hair pulled up in a large clip. He’d definitely gotten the raw end of their deal.

  Still, he didn’t move, and that waiting expression told her she better start talking. The last thing she wanted was Aiden prying into her feelings, so she chose the safest topic. “I’m struggling,” she said with a shrug. “I just want things to be normal again.” She gestured to her closet. “This is just so useless.” Pointless. And it was true. Having no real purpose to her days gave her no reason to get up, no reason to do anything. Too much time to think, to mope. To feel unwanted and unneeded.

  “You know we just want you to be able to heal, right?”

  “Yes, Aiden. I know. But I’m fine.” I need to get back to work.

  “You don’t act fine.”

  A quick peek from beneath her eyelashes showed that same searching expression in his eyes that had been there for a week. She didn’t want to be a puzzle he had to figure out. She wanted to be a partner. In a burst of clarity, she realized he was right. She wasn’t acting fine. She was moping around, hoping someone would fix all the problems, instead of taking charge.

  When had waiting for someone else to make the first move done her any good? The only times she’d been happy in her life had been when she stepped up to the plate, taken on the challenge of doing what fulfilled her. Time to make something happen instead of waiting for it to happen. But what was the right step?

  “I’m more than ready to take care of Lily again.” That much she knew for sure. “I can’t lie around here feeling useless while someone else does my job.”

  “Useless?” The disbelief on his face was hard to understand. But he wasted no time enlightening her. “Christina, you go out of your way to help everyone—this town, Nolen, Marie, Nicole. You sacrificed yourself to keep Lily safe—”

  “Stop.” She jerked to her feet. “Don’t do that.”

  He stood, stalking closer. “Christina—”

  “No.” She could feel the trembling start along her nerves, fingertips to shoulders, toes to tummy. Needing to move, she paced past him. Soon she’d be an allover mess, but she had to get this out. “I didn’t sacrifice myself for Lily. I love her, but I volunteered to marry you because of guilt. I owe Lily.”

  That stopped him cold. His voice, when he spoke, was softer than she expected. “What are you talking about?”

  She almost wished she was facing the angry Aiden. This would be so much easier if he wasn’t being so nice. “I caused her accident,” she whispered.

  Aiden shook his head. “No. She was coming home—”

  “Because of me. You’d told her to stay an extra day to wait out the weather. But I’d gotten sick. Really bad appendicitis. I was in the hospital after having my appendix removed. Marie called Lily, told her my mother had left me there alone. Heck, she barely even stayed long enough for me to get out of recovery.”

  She swallowed hard, her stomach churning at the memories. “Lily came home in spite of the weather to be with me. So I wouldn’t be alone. I didn’t find out about the accident until I was released from the hospital.”

  “Oh, my God, Christina.” Aiden’s voice rose. He stalked forward, hands settling on her upper arms to give her a little shake. “Don’t you know Lily would never feel that way? She would never blame you for what was very much an accident.”

  “But I blame myself. Just like I blame myself for you having to come back here, to stay here. You want to be in New York, I understand that. But instead, you’re here, with me.”

  “That is not your fault. That’s James’s doing. He put us in this situation....”

  “But I want you to stay.”

  The silence that filled the room drowned out the pounding of her heart. Had she really just said that out loud? Fear kept her from looking at him for a reaction. There was no going back now.

  “You are only here because you have to be, Aiden, but I want you with me. Permanently.” I’ll make it up to you. His words from the hospital haunted her, but she had to take a risk. Could she re
ally do this?

  A hard swallow helped her continue. “I love you. Whether you’re here or in New York, I will love you. But I’d much rather you be here. I’m sorry if that makes me a clingy, desperate woman. I don’t want you to have to choose between being tied to a place you hate just because you slept with me, and going back to the life you love. I just...want you.”

  “Who says I have to choose?”

  Surprise shot along her nerves.

  “Christina, I’ve been waiting a week for you to reach for me. To need me. But you never did. I thought I made myself clear at the hospital. I’m not here because I have to be. I’m here because I want to be with you, with Mother, with my family.”

  Her brain churned over the words, but comprehension was slow in coming. “What about New York?”

  “Who says it has to be either/or?” His grin was self-deprecating. And charming. Always charming. “Yes, I realize I’ve made it out to be just that. But this trip did teach me something. I can have it all. The business I’ve built. The family I love. And the woman I need.”

  He approached her with measured steps, as if afraid she’d run. He paused near enough for her to feel the warmth of his body, so temptingly close, then threaded his fingers into the hair at her temples. He cupped her face, raising it to his. Lovingly restrained, there was no out. “Christina, you light a passion in me that...well, it’s the only thing that’s ever topped my art.”

  She could feel herself drowning in his touch, in the depths of those dark eyes.

  “Since I came back to Blackstone Manor, I’ve made more than a few mistakes. I didn’t want to be here, so I fought with everything in me to break away. But there was one tie I don’t want to fight. Haven’t been able to since the first moment you challenged me to do what was right.”

  His arm encircled her waist, bringing her body flush against his. The same security she felt every night in his arms immediately flooded over her.

  “You challenged me. You fought with me. And you loved me.”

  Her heartbeat jumped, then resumed at a faster speed. “Aiden—”

  “Let me finish, because I’m not sure if I can keep this up,” he said with a wry twist of his lips. His thumb stroked along the line of her jaw. “I am, beyond a shadow of a doubt, a better man for it. Your warmth reminds me I’m not alone. Your passion ignites my own. Your purpose points me in the right direction. Your forgiveness keeps me sane. I don’t need demands to keep me here. I’m selfish enough to want it all—and I hope that you’ll give it to me.”

  The tears spilled unchecked down her cheeks. Leaning forward, he brushed his lips back and forth over hers before pulling back a finger’s breadth. “Let me stay with you,” he murmured against her lips. “I will make mistakes. I’m just hoping you’ll love me, anyway.”

  Finally, she reached out to him, sliding her arms up over his shoulders, and around the back of his neck. “Oh, Aiden. Don’t you know I love everything about you? You’re passionate. Creative. Hardworking. I’ll take whatever part of you you’ll let me have.”

  “Then you can have it all, too, because I’m not whole without you. I love you. Marry me...again.”

  Her breath catching in her throat, Christina pressed her lips to his, reveling in his quick control of the kiss and breach of her lips.

  Then she knew beyond any doubt that her heart had finally found its home. Not because she was needed. Not because someone demanded it. For the first time in her life, she was wanted for who she truly was inside, flaws and all.

  Just as she wanted Aiden. Forever and always.

  * * * * *

  If you liked this book from Dani Wade, pick up her very first novel!

  HIS BY DESIGN

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  Ten years ago one devastating night changed everything for Austin, Hunter and Alex. Now they must each play their part in the revenge against the one man who ruined it all.

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  One

  “Papa was behind the Van Court emerald theft last week, wasn’t he?” Gianni Coretti kept his voice low as he looked across the table at his brother, Paulo.

  The other man shrugged, took a sip of his scotch and smiled faintly. “You know Papa.”

  Gianni scowled and shoved one hand through his hair. That answer was deliberately vague, he told himself. Yet he hadn’t really expected anything different. Of course Paulo would side with their father.

  Letting his gaze slide from his brother’s, Gianni looked out at the well-lit, exquisitely tended lawns of Vinley Hall. Crouched in the heart of Hampshire, on the southern coast of England, the luxury hotel was always the Coretti family’s inn of choice—not only for its innate elegance, but also for its convenience to Blackthorn private airfield.

  The Corettis never flew commercial.

  Today, Gianni was taking his brother to Blackthorn for a short flight to his home in Paris. On the way, of course, they had stopped for a drink. Paulo had been in London visiting for three days and frankly, to Gianni, it had felt like three years. He didn’t care for visitors, not even family. And Paulo in particular could push Gianni to the ends of his patience faster than anyone else he knew.

  A waitress in a black skirt and smart white shirt made her way across what was once Vinley Hall’s library and now served as an elegant bar. In response to her presence, Gianni switched from English to Italian as he reminded his brother, “You and Papa do remember that just a year ago I bargained with Interpol to get us all immunity for past thefts?”

  Paulo shuddered visibly and took another sip of scotch before replying in Italian. “Being that close to that many police? Don’t know how you managed—or for that matter why you bothered.” He set the heavy crystal tumbler down onto the polished oak table and ran his fingertips around the rim. His gaze locked on his brother’s. “We didn’t ask for immunity.”

  True. They hadn’t asked. But Gianni had secured that promise of safety for them anyway. Unfortunately, his family not only didn’t appreciate it, but they were also appalled at the thought of giving up the “family business.”

  The Corettis had been jewel thieves for centuries. Skills were handed down from one generation to the next. Secrets and tricks of the trade were taught to children who g
rew into adults with quick hands, quicker minds and the ability to slip in and out of locked doors without leaving a trace of their presence.

  There were police on every continent of the globe who would give anything for one iota of evidence against the Corettis. But so far, the family hadn’t just been good, they’d been lucky. And Gianni was convinced their luck, eventually, would run out.

  Try to tell that to a Coretti, though.

  “You’re serious about this, aren’t you?” Paulo asked.

  “About what?” Irritation colored Gianni’s tone.

  Paulo snorted. “This new life of honesty and goodness, of course.”

  That irritation inside him flared brighter. “You make it sound as if I’m becoming a—” he paused to think of the best way to put it “—Boy Scout.”

  Laughing, Paulo asked, “Aren’t you?”

  For a year they had been talking about this and still his brother and father didn’t understand Gianni’s decision. But then, he told himself, it was hardly surprising. A legacy of thievery didn’t usually lend itself to suddenly becoming a law-abiding citizen. But Gianni had had an epiphany of sorts more than a year ago.

  His sister, Teresa, thank the gods, understood, because she had chosen years ago to leave behind their family traditions. But Teresa was the only one to understand, because the changes he had made to his life had not only perplexed most of his family, but also, at times, himself.

  “You have a job now, Gianni.” Paulo gave a dramatic shudder again as if the very thought of being employed shook him to his soul. “Corettis do not have jobs. We go on jobs. There is a difference.”

  Across the room, a fire burned in a stone hearth, casting flickering shadows on the oak-paneled walls. Outside the casement windows, stately trees rattled their leaves in the near constant English wind. It was a perfectly pleasant room that normally he would have enjoyed. If he weren’t faced with talking to his hardheaded brother.