His Stand-in Bride

The cathedral doors groaned open, and the world tilted under my feet.

Light spilled in from the stained-glass windows, jeweled colors bleeding across the marble floor in reds and blues. The scent of old wood and candle wax wrapped around me, heavy, suffocating. I clutched the bouquet so tightly the stems bit into my palms, small cuts blooming across my skin.

Every step forward was a drumbeat of dread. My heels clicked against the stone like the ticking of a clock counting down to execution.

The sound of shifting bodies filled the pews. Eyes turned. Hundreds of them. Heavy, piercing, greedy.

A ripple spread through the crowd, hushed but sharp enough to pierce me.

"That's not Amelia."

"Who is she?"

"Another daughter?"

"What is happening?"

Each whisper was a dagger, lodging deep in my chest. My breath stuttered, catching against the veil. I wanted to turn, to run, but my father's hand pressed firmly into my back. His fingers dug in as though he knew exactly what I was thinking.

"Keep walking," he hissed, his voice like a warning.

So I walked.

The organ swelled, hollow and grand, yet each note pounded in my skull like a threat. The aisle stretched endlessly, like a tunnel closing in, and at the far end-waiting-was him.

Nate Reynolds.

I had only ever seen him in photographs, clipped from glossy magazines and business reports. Words like ruthless, brilliant, dangerous always clung to his name. But the man standing before me was more than words.

Tall, broad-shouldered, his presence seemed to command the very air. His suit was black as sin, perfectly cut, the crisp white shirt beneath making his skin seem sharper, more severe. The light from the windows struck his dark hair, and for a second he looked like a statue carved from cold marble. His gaze-black, unreadable-cut through the distance, locking me in place before I could even reach him.

My blood chilled, but something darker thrummed beneath it-a pull, unwanted and undeniable. He was magnetic in the way a storm was magnetic: beautiful, terrifying, a force you couldn't look away from even as it promised destruction.

Step after step, my chest rose and fell too quickly. The veil brushed against my cheeks, soft lace against damp skin. My lips trembled. I wanted to cry, but tears wouldn't come.

I reached the altar, breath tight, bouquet trembling in my grip.

Nate did not extend a hand. He only looked down at me with that frozen expression, as if he were examining an investment he'd been swindled into buying. His jaw shifted once, barely visible, but enough to show a storm gathering behind that calm face.

The priest's voice echoed: "We are gathered here today..."

The words blurred. I caught fragments, the drone of promises, the clink of rosary beads as the priest turned a page, the faint cough of someone in the front pew. But all I felt was Nate's gaze, steady and heavy, pressing against my veil.

When it came time to speak vows, Nate's voice was clipped, precise, devoid of warmth. He didn't speak like a groom. He spoke like a man signing a contract.

"I take you," he said, tone flat, "to be mine."

A shiver ran down my spine. The bouquet slipped slightly in my hands, and I almost dropped it. My knuckles burned from how hard I held it together.

When my turn came, my voice caught in my throat. "I... I take you," I stammered, the words tasting like ashes. My lips quivered around them, my heart hammering so loud I was certain the entire cathedral could hear.

The priest nodded. "You may now lift the veil."

Nate reached out, slow and deliberate. His fingers brushed the lace, grazing the bare skin of my cheek through the delicate fabric. Heat shot across my skin from that light touch, traitorous and sharp. And then the world shifted.

The veil lifted, and his eyes met mine.

Recognition crashed into me like a blow. My breath strangled in my throat.

It was him. The stranger. The man from that reckless night. The one whose touch still haunted my skin, whose lips had burned across my collarbone, whose name I never asked.

The memory surged hot and fast-his mouth on my neck, the taste of whiskey between our kisses, the heat of his body pressing mine into hotel sheets. My nails clawing his back, his low voice in my ear. I had buried it, tried to lock it away in guilt and silence. But standing here, I couldn't escape it.

And his eyes told me he hadn't forgotten either.

No shock flickered across his face. No surprise. Only calculation-cold, deliberate, as if he had already expected this unveiling. His gaze slid down, slow and deliberate, a silent reminder of every inch he had already claimed once before.

My knees almost gave. Heat scorched my cheeks beneath the cathedral lights. My stomach twisted.

He knows.

The priest's voice rang out again, distant and hollow. "You may kiss the bride."

Nate leaned closer, his lips a breath from mine. The air between us was thick, burning, the faint scent of cedar and clean cologne enveloping me. My breath hitched, chest tightening.

But his mouth only brushed the side of my cheek. Cold, perfunctory. Gasps rippled through the pews.

The kiss wasn't passion; it was a transaction. Signed, sealed. Completed.

Applause broke out, but it was brittle, confused. The whispers started again, louder now, a current I couldn't stop.

"That isn't Amelia..."

"Why would he marry the younger one?"

"Did they trick him?"

I swallowed against the rising lump in my throat. My hands trembled as Nate's arm slid around mine, guiding me down the steps with a grip that was too strong to break.

Every eye followed us, every flash of the photographers waiting outside burned like fire across my skin. My gown dragged behind me, heavy and suffocating, each step down the aisle a reminder of the trap closing tighter around me.

Nate leaned in, his breath brushing my ear, warm against my skin. His voice was ice, sharp enough to cut.

"I should have known," he murmured, so low only I could hear, "the Mendes family would send me a liar."

The words lodged deep, colder than the stone beneath my heels. My chest tightened, and for one fleeting moment, I wished I could vanish into the shadows of the cathedral before the storm fully broke.

But Nate's grip on my arm was iron, and there was no escape.