Bad Bishop by L.J. Shen - 7

The next time I saw my fiancé was at our wedding. By then, I had fully digested what was happening, and I was ready for a fight.

It was just my luck the Valium my mother crushed and slipped into my pink lemonade wore off when the priest informed my now-husband he may kiss the bride.

I pressed my lips into a firm line, holding my breath. There were eight hundred guests at our wedding. Not one of them raised concerns about the bride being allegedly not of sound mind, and no one objected to this farce.

I hated the Camorra. The Irish. The world .

My husband’s eye—shamrock green, with golden speckles swimming inside it—twinkled with malice, reminding me its twin had been excised by my brother, and it was now time to take revenge. Through me . The black eye patch made his face ruggedly handsome. He looked like a well-scrubbed pirate. One who wouldn’t mind tossing me off the ship.

A possessive hand snatched my waist, and he leaned in, tilting me down to the cheers and claps of our audience. Any hope his disastrous reputation was exaggerated snuffed like a brittle candlewick in the wind. His lips crushed against mine, spreading into a spiteful smile.

“ So fucking sweet. ” His mouth moved over my own. Even though I couldn’t see it, I could feel his words digging into my skin like the tip of a knife. “ I can’t wait to corrupt you. ”

A whisper of heat teased my stomach. Something I’d never felt before. It felt like someone spilled syrup inside me.

The guests went wild. Whistling, clapping, and cheering.

My father had insisted the wedding take place on Crimson Key. He wanted to show everyone it was business as usual. Signal nothing bad had happened here. But the fact our wedding took place only two weeks after the emergency meeting with the Callaghans spoke volumes. It was enough to raise suspicion among his soldiers. They were obedient, not stupid.

My father swore up and down Tiernan Callaghan had insisted. How he swore to fight the Camorra’s wars for a chance to make me happy. Lies dipped in folly.

Everything about the manor made my skin crawl now. Every inch of it was soaked with the memory of my brothers carrying me back at dawn, muddied and bloodied, a torn rag doll.

Was my rapist in the crowd tonight? Was he watching? Basking in my misfortune? Laughing at the turn of events? Did he put two and two together? After all, this wedding was me paying for the consequences of his actions.

I couldn’t remember his face. Only the evil glint in his eyes. But I wanted to. Oh, I wanted to remember, to tell my brothers, to give him the painful death he deserved.

What I did remember was the once-white tiara of roses. How the petals turned red when he’d split my lip, cheek, and forehead. I couldn’t stomach seeing roses from that day forward. My wedding was decorated with lilacs only.

Tiernan released me from his hold. I nearly collapsed on my ass but managed to grab onto the wedding arch. When I looked up to see if my husband noticed, I saw his broad back striding into the enthusiastic crowd, like a titan rising from the ocean.

After the official ceremony, Mama and Imma rushed me upstairs, away from prying eyes. They gave me water and dry crackers. Imma knew the secret of my pregnancy. She was like my second mama. An ample, tanned woman with silver hair, kind eyes, and drab gray dresses.

I placed my hands on the marbled banisters of the second floor, the ballroom stretching below me like a naked woman on canvas. White colosseum columns arched upward, onto a round ceiling painted with Raphael’s Transfiguration . Clouds of pink and purple lilacs sailed from every corner of the room, and the golden glow of a thousand candles licked the muraled walls.

It was different from Luca’s wedding, where everybody mingled and danced together. The Irish and Italians didn’t mix. They sat at different tables on different sides of the room, drinking different liquor, eating different dishes.

“You should let her watch the wedding, Lady Chiara. It’s hers, after all.” Imma pushed away flaxen locks from my eyes, dabbing my face with powder. “And make sure one of the boys warns Callaghan to be gentle with her.”

I put my hand to my lips. They still stung where Tiernan’s mouth touched, the ghost of that ravenous, greedy kiss that took but didn’t give.

I turned to Mama so I could see her answer.

“Luca assured me it’s taken care of.” She popped another pill and tossed it down her throat without water, refusing eye contact with me. Her third Valium today.

Apparently, Luca squeezed some kind of promise from Tiernan not to touch me on our wedding night. That should put me at ease, but I oversaw Luca telling Enzo how Tiernan’s promises were worth less than a three-dollar bill. He wasn’t a Camorrista. He didn’t abide by the Omertà. The code of silence and honor.

“ He gave Blackthorn his word he wouldn’t kidnap his wife, and ten days later, the woman was tied inside his van, tranquilized to her fucking eyeballs, roughened by his soldiers, ” Enzo had spat out.

“He’s hurting her before he even laid a finger on her.” Imma’s eyes tapered. “He’s disrespecting her in public.” Her gaze traveled down below, and I followed it.

My husband’s copper-haired head, rising at least three inches above the heads of everyone else in the room, sliced through the parting crowd of well-wishers. He had an aura, a pull about him that made people clear the way, stop, and stare.

A brunette bombshell was at his heel. Big, puffy hair, scarlet lips, and generous cleavage. They weren’t walking side by side, but she was chasing him around in a tiny beige cocktail dress and red-soled heels, touching his wrist, her smile triumphant.

“ Che baldracca ,” Mama hissed, white knuckling the banisters. “Send Enzo up. Now.”

My brother showed up immediately, flush-faced and clearly drunk. “Mama?”

“Who’s the stronzo parading around at his own wedding?”

“A Dallas Cowboys cheerleader.” He ran his knuckles over his jawline. “Don’t worry. It’s all a part of the plan.”

“Is the plan to make us look like weaklings?” she sneered. “Because it’s working.”

“The plan is he comes to his wedding suite well sated and… satisfied .” Enzo cleared his throat.

My mother’s face relaxed somewhat. “Make sure the whore gets fired.”

“Yes, Mama.”

The women who raised me had a very specific idea for what constituted a good woman.

A good woman dressed modestly, spoke quietly, and didn’t hold a job. Much less a job that required showing off her body.

“Also, she’s wearing white head to toe. Bad luck for the couple. Tear that dress and put her in something drab.”

“On it.”

Leave it to my mother to be angry at the woman for breaking the dress code, rather than sleeping with the groom.

But Enzo was onto something. Maybe the cheerleader was going to satisfy my husband’s needs for tonight. I sure as hell wasn’t going to let him touch me.

Who said he’ll ask for your permission?

I was going to fight. Consequences be damned. I didn’t care that I wasn’t supposed to understand what was happening. The jig was up. I had nothing left to pretend for.

Tiernan and his companion disappeared from view. Mild relief and acidic irritation swirled in my gut.

It was common practice for a man to take a mistress or two in our world. But it was courtesy to conceal her from view. If not from your associates, then at least from your wife.

About an hour later, a Camorra soldier gingerly knocked on the door of the honeymoon suite, where Mama and her friends gathered around me. Little girls in bridesmaid dresses jumped up and down on the bed. Italian tradition, to invite fertility to the newlyweds’ bed.

The married ladies, Mama included, sat on chairs. It was custom that only virgins were allowed on these sheets. It didn’t stop my mama from letting me sit on the edge of the bed.

“Lady Ferrante.” He bowed his head. “Raffaella is being called for the speeches. They’re wheeling in the cake.”

“Oh, Fabio, she’s too tired.” She waved him off. “Leave us. But do send over some food and a hamper of tea.”

He didn’t move.

Her eyes narrowed. “Yes?”

“Her husband wants her there.”

Silence. Dark, ominous energy poisoned the air.

“Speeches?” Mama huffed sarcastically, keeping her poise. “They don’t even know each other. What is there to say? Besides, I do not take orders from peasants, and neither does my daughter.”

“The don asked to relay the message.” The soldier bowed his head lower, switching from Italian to Neapolitan. “He thinks it shows strength through unity. I’m sorry.” His throat bobbed. “She needs to come.”

And come, I did. I was ushered back downstairs, where my mother reluctantly disposed of me next to my new husband. He was surrounded by his father, brother, sister, and Irish soldiers, and spared me no look.

I noticed all three of the siblings had the same, impossibly rare hair. Blood-red burgundy, rich and dark like aged wine. Their father had ordinary, dark brown hair. They must have taken after their mother.

Was she here? If so, how come I hadn’t met her?

I knew nothing about my groom.

Only that he was wild and exquisitely violent.

That the men in my family found him incontrollable and infuriating because he didn’t fear them.

A few minutes later, Tiernan’s brother stood up and clinked a fork to his champagne flute. He made a speech I couldn’t lip-read, since his back was to me. He looked remarkably like my husband, and yet nothing like him at all. The same ruby hair and green eyes, athletic build, and aristocratic strong features.

But this was where the similarities ended. Whereas Tiernan dripped power and cruelty, his brother looked like a well-groomed accountant, one of the many you could find on Wall Street. He lacked that devil-may-care air, the easygoing charisma.

Since I couldn’t read Fintan’s lips, I turned to look at my family’s table. My mother’s face was gray and lifeless. My father and brothers’ masks of indifference were on, but I could see through their cracks. The throbbing vein in Luca’s forehead. The strain in Papa’s neck. Enzo’s slight scowl. Achilles’s insatiable thirst for revenge and gore.

Then it was my husband’s turn to deliver his words. He stood, grabbing me by the waist and yanking me up with him. I gasped at the sudden invasion. He wrapped his arm around my neck, tucking me under his armpit like I was his captive.

The crowd shifted uncomfortably.

He studied the room, his silence somehow louder than everyone else’s.

His lips moved, and my eyes clung to them.

“Look at her.” He snatched my jaw, tilting my face upward, exhibiting his trophy. “So clean. So pure. So innocent ,” he taunted.

He smelled…warm. Alive … Like sex and violence and something else, not entirely terrible, but nevertheless catastrophic.

“The most beautiful woman on the continent. No close seconds. They call her a vision, a masterpiece, a myth. From now on, she only has one name— mine ,” he growled, twisting my face by my chin to look him in the eye. A sadistic smirk touched his lips. “I cannot wait to devour my little forbidden fruit tonight. Touch the untouchable. Sully the pristine. Turn the elegant Ferrante princess into a Callaghan delinquent.”

The raucous laughter quaked the walls and settled in my stomach. My father choked on his glass of brandy, nostrils flaring. Luca’s hand settled on his gun in his holster, flicking his gaze to my father for the okay to start a war.

But it was my mother who threw me into a state of pure panic. She stood up and stalked outside, a veil of Camorra wives trailing behind to comfort her.

Crying wasn’t an option. I wasn’t going to give the bastard the satisfaction of seeing me break.

Mama and I had carefully made sure I didn’t show emotions, but our plan had backfired. Being allegedly a person with intellectual disabilities didn’t matter anymore. I was pregnant and wed. My walls of protection had shattered one after the other. I was unraveling like a loose thread in a sweater. I knew Tiernan would pull and tug until I was completely bare.

My husband dropped my chin. “Consider this your first and last warning.” He spoke to the room, but stared only at me. “Raffaella Callaghan is mine. Nobody is to look at my wife, speak about my wife, or breathe in her direction. She’s under my protection now. The first to cross the line will be the last. They’ll be made an example.” His gaze dragged across the room, which collectively held its breath. “There will be no body to bury, no ashes to spread, no memory to spare if you’re stupid enough to disrespect her. Us . Understood?”

They all did, judging by the horrified looks in their faces. Tiernan’s attention halted on Angelo Bandini, and a chill chased across my spine. The dread that slowly dripped into my gut all day turned into a tidal wave.

Why did Angelo unsettle me so much?

Why was the sight of my brother-in-law so distressing to me?

“You know, I never was a fan of Italian weddings.” Tiernan dragged his thumb across my lower lip, parting it to reveal my white teeth. “Too much pathos for my liking. Now, blood? Big fan of that. I think it’s time I shed some tonight.”

There’d be no blood on the sheets, as he very well knew.

Unless he draws it some other way.

The men in the room stood up. Cheered, clapped, whistled.

It was time.

“Move,” Tiernan ordered. One word. Yet, my entire universe shriveled into it.

When I didn’t, he gave my back a push.

I stumbled forward, and my legs did the rest, automatically carrying me toward the foyer. He glided behind me, his gaze searing the back of my neck. I tried to go as slow as humanly possible to prolong the inevitable.

When I wasn’t fast enough for the stronzo ’s liking, he bypassed me and tossed me across his shoulder.

The crowd followed us up the curved stairway, hooting and throwing rice at us.

Tiernan took the curved hallway to the honeymoon suite. The one Luca and Sofia had stayed in weeks ago. And my cousins before them. Achilles and Enzo would too, once it was their time to wed.

The last thing I saw before he kicked the door shut behind us was my mother’s face peering from beyond the crowd.

Her hands moved quickly as she signaled me in ASL.

One word.

“ Fight. ”