Chapter 441

Date = 15 August

A little later in the day.

Place = San Francisco (Inferno)

POV - Enrique

I touch my crotch with a groan.

Abstinence from Aria is a crime against nature. Against art. Against manhood.

She said we should not have sex before the wedding. She said it was symbolic. Romantic. Something about craving each other spiritually.

I crave her, alright — like a man lost in the desert craves water. With the kind of need that dries your mouth and steals your sleep. Like fire craves oxygen. I want her like a man whose restraint has finally snapped.

And it’s only been a few days. A week at most. But it’s been excruciating.

I’ve been hard more often than I pee. I tried everything — cold showers, yoga, working at the club, choking the chicken. Nothing works.

She sent me a photo. Just now. Right before the ceremony.

A close-up of her feet. Toenails painted in the same peach-pink shade as the flowers.

Minimalist. Bare. Innocent.

And I? I ache.

“You’re killing me,” I text.

Her response — a photo of her backside — her perfectly shaped ass, kissed by the tiniest string of peach lace. Her skin curves softly under the strap. And right there, on her left butt cheek, just above the fabric … a tattoo.

A peach.

My peach. Dripping with ink and mischief. The one I have tattooed on my butt, hidden from everyone, visible only to the woman I love.

She stole my design.

She made it hers.

Aria: Surprise.

I drop the phone on the bed and stare at myself in the mirror, grinning like a dumbass. I look like a villain trying to cosplay a groom — tan tux, white shirt, peach tie. A peach-flower boutonniere is pinned onto the left lapel of my blazer, just above my heart. Which makes sense, since it symbolizes the connection of the heart between you and your partner on your wedding day. Mine is more like an apology on my chest for all the chaos I’ve caused in life.

Me. Enrique Can’t-say-I-love-you Blackburn. Getting married.

And not just to anyone.

To the most beautiful girl in the world.

The woman I contracted. The woman who healed me. The one person who never asked me to be anyone other than exactly who I am.

I smile like an idiot. A scared, horny, lovesick idiot.

The door slams open. Axel stumbles in, wide-eyed and pale, as if he saw Jackson naked again. Logan follows, shaking a bottle of champagne like it’s a stress toy.

“I can’t breathe,” Logan mutters, dropping onto the couch. “Why am I nervous?”

“Because you’re the emotional one,” Axel replies, flopping beside him. “And weddings are sappy. Even Enrique’s.”

“I’m fine,” I say calmly, though my dick is doing pirouettes. “You guys seen Jackson?”

Ilkay leans against the doorframe. “He’s outside. Pacing. Might be reprogramming the security grid to shoot the groom if he screws this up.”

“Fair,” I mutter.

Speak of the fucking devil, and he will appear.

“You’re sweating,” Jackson says, walking in while adjusting his collar.

“Thanks, bro. Always an ego boost.”

Jackson steps up beside me — his usual smirk softens just a fraction. He reaches into his jacket pocket and pulls out a small envelope — peach-colored, like the wedding theme, but somehow more personal.

“Surprise.” He holds it out. “Thought I’d color coordinate,” he says with a teasing glance.

I raise an eyebrow, taking it. The paper is thicker than expected. Heavier. Like it knows what it’s about to do to me. “What is it? Another one of your riddles?”

Jackson shrugs, eyes flickering with something I rarely see — that rare, uncomfortable seriousness slipping through the cracks. “It’s a name. One less secret I’m keeping from you.”

The word hits like a cold draft down the spine. My chest tightens reflexively. Instinctive.

A name.

My mind races — our father.

I stare at the envelope as if it might bite.

I slide a finger under the flap. The paper makes a soft shhhk sound as it opens — absurdly loud in my head. I pull the card out slowly, like time might stretch if I let it.

My hands are steady. My stomach is not.

There it is.

It lands with a dull thud instead of a bang.

Just ink. Just letters. A first name. A surname. Clean. Ordinary. Almost disappointing in how … normal it looks.

I read it once.

Then again.

Waiting for something to happen.

Nothing does.

No lightning strike. No punch to the gut. No sudden clarity about who I am or where I come from. No cinematic moment where the world tilts and rearranges itself around this new truth.

Just a dull, distant awareness — like reading a stranger’s name on a mailbox without knowing who he is.

“That’s him?” I ask finally.

Jackson nods. “Biological unknowing sperm donor.”

I snort under my breath, more air than laughter. “Huh.”

I turn the card over, half-expecting more. A clue. A personality. A reason. A picture.

There’s nothing. Just the name.

However, familiar in some way. Like a word I’ve passed on the street a hundred times without ever stopping to look at it properly. My brain scrambles, rifling through old files, half-buried memories, things I never bothered to connect because I didn’t need to.

Then it clicks.

“Like the restaurant?” I ask.

The Italian restaurant. The one that went up in flames. The one our enemies favored — not for the pasta, not for the wine. The one tied to the messages, the attacks, the kidnappings. To Graham. To everything that’s been poisoning our lives for months.

“Exactly.”

I let out a breath that almost sounds like a laugh. Of course. Of fucking course.

“He sounds like a guy who probably scares his own reflection,” I add.

Jackson lets out a quiet sigh — relief, I think. “I wasn’t sure how you’d take it.”

I stare at the name again, waiting for it to do something — hurt more, mean more, change me somehow. “That’s the thing,” I say slowly. “I don’t feel anything.”

It’s just ink on paper. A surname with a body count attached. A ghost I’ve never met.

The man who raised me — who taught me how to throw a punch, how to stand my ground, how to be a man — that man was my dad. This? This is just a name. And knowing it doesn’t fill a hole.

Jackson watches me like he expects fallout.

But all I feel is a strange, hollow calm.

Turns out some truths don’t explode. They just quietly confirm what you already suspected.

I slide the card back into the envelope and tuck it into my jacket. “Guess knowing doesn’t change much,” I say.

Jackson smirks, knowing he was right all along. And seems he was. “You okay?”

I nod. And I mean it. “Yeah. Turns out a name’s just a name.” I glance at him, smirk returning. “If anything, I feel cheated. Was hoping for something more dramatic.”

He huffs a laugh. “Sorry to disappoint.”

I tap the envelope once against my chest. “Our real dad’s probably offended somewhere in the afterlife that this even needed explaining.”

Jackson’s smile turns soft. “He’d still claim you.”

“Damn right he would,” I say.

And for the first time since opening that envelope, I feel it — not loss, not anger, but certainty. Some things aren’t written on paper. Some things are earned.

This man … he doesn’t even know we exist. And maybe it’s better that way.

“You ready?”

I meet his eyes. The brother I’ve fought beside, bled beside, and cried beside. “As I’ll ever be.” He puts an arm around my shoulder, and we all walk to the bar that today plays the part of the ceremony table or altar.

Ilkay, Jackson, Logan, Alejandro, Axel … and me. Missing the new daddy.

The San Francisco Boys. My true family.

The VIP area of the club is unrecognizable. Pink and peach flowers flood every corner — on tables, twined around the railings, even tucked into the jackets of my uncles, who look like two confused flamenco dancers in their tailored suits. Fairy lights drip from the ceiling like stars melted into a string. The place smells like heaven and a florist had a glitter stroke.

Jesse starts playing the intro to a string-and-piano version of some soppy song on the newly acquired grand piano that, since yesterday, has adorned the VIP section of the club. The lights dim. Fairy lights warm up overhead. The small crowd shifts as the bridal party lines up in the hallway.

Luke walks in like he’s just won an Oscar. Ring box in hand. Chest puffed out. Smug as hell. He’s wearing tan pants and suspenders with high tops. You know. To keep it authentic. He flashes me a wink like he knows how hard I’m sweating.

Behind him, the little girls float down the aisle. River, Lili, and Leyla — a trio of pink chaos. All in tutu-style dresses, fluffed to oblivion. All of them masked up to fit in with Leyla—pink ones, which they insisted on decorating with tiny stick-on rhinestones. Leyla’s here on loan from the hospital … only a few hours, and then they want her back. But she’s here. She throws her petals like she’s making a political statement, strutting like she owns the place, mask and all. Lili follows, twirling every two steps. River throws petals directly at Luke’s face.

Ava walks out next, elegant and composed in her soft silk dress, holding Sky’s hand as if they’ve always belonged together. But the miss is obvious … Sky steps in for Kiara today. And Mel is in the hospital. Sky’s eyes meet Jackson’s for a moment, and her chin lifts like she’s carrying the spirits with her. The whole damn club stands a little taller just watching her. She sure is something different.

Jesse’s on the piano, now playing some dramatic romantic version of Fire on Fire, that sounds like it belongs in a French film where someone’s about to die and fall in love at the same time. He blows me a kiss mid-chord and mouths, “Don’t cry, bitch.”

I’m not. Yet.

Finally. A bunch of hours late due to the little wedding crusher, but who gives a damn anymore … because there she is.

Walking in next to her brother, Noah, like a goddamn dream dipped in sex and cotton candy, fitted into a lacy white dress that shouldn’t be legal in seventeen states. It’s sheer in all the right places, dangerous in all the wrong ones, and hugging every inch of her body like it’s peaching her too. And me? I’m a fucking goner. My dick has no decorum — it stiffens immediately.

God help me, this is it.

And everything. Just. Stops.

No music. No people. No fairy lights or impossible choices or dirty jokes or haunting ghosts. Just her.

She’s sunlight in lace. Fire and frosting. Her hair’s curled like poetry. Her eyes are locked on me like I’m home.

I forget how to breathe.

I think I might throw up.

Or cry.

Or laugh.

Maybe all three.

She glides down the aisle like a goddess who’s finally come to ruin me. Her smile is soft, but her eyes keep looking into mine. My breath catches.

Fuck, she’s beautiful. My bones hurt from wanting her.

Noah looks tense. I know he’s trying not to cry.

So am I.

As they reach the end of the line, Noah kisses her temple and hands her over.

To me.

“You’d better treat her right,” he sneers earnestly. I can only nod, my voice is stuck in my throat.

Garcia stands behind the bar with a crooked grin and a dusty leather book that looks ridiculously close to the club’s general ledger. But I don’t care about sales and profits. Hell, I can go bankrupt right now, and I wouldn’t care.

“Dearly beloved and legally skeptical,” he begins, “we are gathered in this very extra, highly secretive nightclub setup to witness the union of Enrique and Aria. Two beautiful disasters.”

The crowd laughs.

“Marriage is not about perfection. It’s about finding someone you can annoy for the rest of your life, while looking hot doing it. If these two can survive fake contracts, secret relationships, kidnappings, midnight attacks, falling overboard, and getting arrested at the airport … they can survive this.”

Aria squeezes my hand. She’s trembling. So am I.

We say our vows. I try to speak, but I choke halfway through, only barely managing to tell her that I fell for her the first time I saw her … with a black batty face in a unicorn shirt. And no matter how many walls I built around my heart, she manages to break them each time, like a wrecking ball. And I will always want her. There’s nobody else in this world for me.

I promise to be faithful, to protect her, and to choose her — every day, even when it’s hard.

She chokes on a laugh. Then a tear slips down her cheek.

Garcia gives me a thumbs-up. “Now we’re cooking.”

We slip on the rings. Garcia nods.

“By the power vested in me by a very sketchy online certificate and a belief in drama, I now pronounce you husband and wife. You may —”

I don’t wait.

I kiss her.

She kisses me back harder.

Leyla cheers. “Kiss her again!”

Luke yells, “Gross!”

River whistles. Lili shrieks.

But all I see is her.

She leans in and whispers, “I peach you, Sport.”

“Aria Blackburn,” I whisper with a lump in my throat, “I don’t peach you …”

I revel in the shock on her face, knowing an even bigger shock is coming.

“I love you.”

The end.

Enrique's story came to an end. Next up - Axel.