CHAPTER 1: THE WEDDING

I knew I should be in the wedding hall by now.

Standing there. Waiting. Smiling like I wanted this. But instead I'm staring at myself in my mother's bedroom mirror, and I'm asking myself the same question I've been asking for the past three days: Am I actually going to do this?

The girl looking back at me is someone I don't recognize. The white dress is too perfect. My hair is too curled. My makeup is too done. I look like a girl who's excited to marry a stranger. I look like a liar.

"Aria?" My mother's voice comes from down the hall. "It's time."

I didn't move.

She appears in the doorway a second later. She's wearing the blue dress that's been in her closet for years. The one she saves for important moments. Her eyes are red but she's fixed her makeup so you can barely tell.

"You look beautiful," she says, and she means it. I can hear it in her voice even though she's been crying.

"Mom, what if...."

"What if nothing," she says. She walks over and stands behind me in the mirror. We look at each other's reflections. "Your father made mistakes, Bad ones with very bad people and now they want money we don't have. This man, he's powerful. He can fix this. He can save us."

"What if he's cruel?" I ask.

"Then you survive," she says. She puts her hands on my shoulders and squeezes. "You're stronger than you think."

I don't feel strong. I feel like I'm disappearing.

She takes my hand and leads me into the hallway. We walk toward the main staircase where my father is waiting in a suit that's too tight. He looks like he hasn't slept in days. When he sees me, something in his face shifts. Relief maybe. Or guilt.

"You look nice," he says. It's the nicest thing he's said to me all week.

He takes my hand and we walk toward the reception hall. The doors are closed. I can hear people talking behind us. My mother's friends are gossiping. The groom's family sitting in silence.

"Thank you," my father whispers. He squeezes my hand once.

Then the doors open.

The walk down the aisle feels like it takes forever. My heart is beating so hard I'm sure everyone can hear it. I keep my eyes down, focusing on my feet. Don't trip, Don't cry, Don't run.

And then I see him.

He's standing at the altar in a black suit. His hair is dark. Really dark. His eyes are darker. He's beautiful but not in a way that makes sense. Not like the guys in movies. Beautiful like... dangerous. Like something you shouldn't be looking at for too long. His jaw is sharp. His face is all angles and hard lines. He has this look like he's bored. Like he's somewhere else and this is just something he has to get through.

He watches me walk toward him without smiling.

My father puts my hand in his and goes back to sit down.

The groom's hand is ice cold. Actually ice cold. I almost pull away but I don't. I keep the fake smile on.

The priest says words I didn't really pay attention to. All I said was "I do" even though every part of me is screaming not to.

He says "I do" like he didn't really care either.

The priest tells him to kiss me and he leans down and kisses my forehead. Not my lips. Just my forehead. Like I wasn't he's already.

Everyone applauds.

We walk back down the aisle and I'm officially married to a stranger.

We're in the reception hall for maybe five minutes.

I'm holding a glass of champagne I haven't touched, standing next to my husband who hasn't said a single word to me, when the doors explode inward.

Some man walks in. They were all dressed in black like it was some kind of funeral. I turned to look at my husband but he looked still and too controlled.

There was lot of them.

The whole room goes quiet.

My husband stands up slowly.

"What the fuck are you doing?" he asked one of them who looked like the leader. His voice is so quiet I can barely hear it, but the way he says it makes everyone freeze.

The other man smiles. It's cruel.

"Cleaning up, boss sent us," he says.

Then he raises his hand like he had some kind of powers and my mother was already hanging in the air screaming.

Her entire body goes stiff. I watch the veins in her neck turn black. Actual black. Like poison is running through her, under her skin. She tries to stand but she can't. Her legs just collapse. She's trying to say something but blood is coming out of her mouth.

My father tries to run. But he didn't make it far.

The same black veins spread through his body. The same horrible sound coming from his throat. He looks at me once, with eyes that are already going dark, and then he just... falls.

Seeing this everyone is scattered in the hall.... running for their lives.

I couldn't move.

I can't breathe…..I stood so still

My mother's hand twitches. Once. Then it's still.

"No," I whisper. "No, no, no..."

I'm trying to move toward them but my husband grabs my arm. His grip is so tight it hurts.

"Don't," he says.

The man who killed them is now walking toward us, moving through the crowd like everyone is invisible.

"We need to go," my husband says. He pulls me away from the altar, away from the bodies, toward a door at the back of the hall.

"She needs to know," the man said.

"Not yet," my husband says.

Now I looked at both of them confused...know what?

He's dragging me through the hallway and I sob so hard I couldn't breathe. My legs barely work. We get to a car parked in the back and he opens the door and pushes me inside.

"Sit," he says.

I fell onto the back seat. I'm shaking so badly I think I'm going to throw up. I keep seeing my mother's eyes. I keep seeing my father falling.

He gets in the front seat and turns around to face me.

His expression is completely cold.

"Stop sobbing," he says quietly. "They're not even your real parents anyway. They made a deal with the mafia to sell you to Us. And my twin brother will not be happy knowing that his bride is a pathetic weakling who cries over people who never loved her.”