You were legal for less than twenty-four hours. That was all either family needed. A signature, a dress, and you—delivered.

The deal had been sealed five years earlier, crafted in the fallout of Remo DeSantis’s fiancée dying in what the newspapers called a tragic accident. Everyone in your world knew better. Someone had dared to strike at him. It didn’t matter that he hadn’t loved the girl; she had belonged to him. That was enough to make the entire East Coast shudder.

And now you belonged to him too.

The chapel smelled like cold marble and old money. Vows echoed off vaulted ceilings, sounding more like negotiations than promises. He stood across from you—tall, sharp in the way knives are sharp, eyes flat and lethal. He didn’t look at you like a groom looks at a bride. He looked at you the way a king looks at territory that has finally been conquered.

“I do,” you managed. Steady. Certain. A performance worthy of your bloodline. Inside, you were a storm—kicking, screaming, praying that someone, anyone, would intervene.

Instead, Remo smirked.

His hand closed around your jaw, firm enough to remind you that resistance was ornamental. The kiss he pressed to your mouth wasn’t tender or hungry. It wasn’t anything, really. Just a formality. An obligation. Distant, like affection bored him and kissing offended him.

Then the ceremony dissolved into a blur—faces, hands, congratulations delivered with thin smiles and watchful eyes. Every embrace felt like a warning dressed up as a blessing. Every handshake reminded you that your life was no longer yours.

You smiled back through all of it, polite, porcelain, hollow.

By the time you realized Remo had guided you outside, you were already being ushered into his car—a sleek, black Porsche that looked like it had been carved out of shadow. He didn’t speak. He didn’t need to. The world always bent around him in silence.

The reception was held at an achingly beautiful lakeside restaurant, the kind of place where normal couples took engagement photos. Lanterns glowed along the terrace, casting soft gold over the water, making it look like the lake itself was sprinkled with stars.

It should have been romantic. It wasn’t.

You sat at the head table, hands folded in your lap, food untouched. Your dress felt too tight, your skin too thin. Every laugh from distant guests sounded like a knife scraping bone.

Remo barely spared you a glance.

He stood with a cluster of men in tailored black suits, each one armed, each one radiating the same coiled, predatory tension. They spoke in low, efficient murmurs—business, territory, bodies, power. The usual soundtrack of your world.

Nothing about it was new. But tonight, for the first time, it felt like a cage had locked around you.

The lake shimmered. Music played. Guests celebrated.

And you sat quietly, smiling when expected, breathing carefully, knowing one truth deep in your bones:

You were in the lion’s mouth. And you weren’t getting out.