The Understudy Bride

CHAPTERTWO

The ballroom doors opened, and the noise engulfed her first — three hundred souls rising to their feet, music swelling, someone’s mother already crying two rows back. Her father’s arm was stiff beneath her hand. It was the first time in his life he’d ever walked her anywhere.

Through the veil, the ballroom swam in colors that made no sense — pale suits, orchids she couldn’t name, a swath of white silk lying in wait on her feet, certain to cost more than her monthly rent.

At the far end of the aisle, a man stood without moving. The rest of the room couldn't manage that kind of stillness — glancing at phones, leaning toward each other, murmuring. He just looked at the doors. Mia's shoes were the only sound she could hear over her own pulse, and she had no idea, later, how long that walk had actually taken. It couldn't have been more than a heartbeat. A flash of a camera went off twice, three times, from somewhere to her left. Up close, she could see Damian Cole’s face through the lace — a strong jaw, dark hair slicked back, eyes the pale color of the light catching on the silk. He looked young in the photograph, or perhaps she simply felt this one held more of him, somehow. More real.

Her father’s hands were on her shoulders. Damian’s grip was steady — no trembling at all, not that she could see, as he took her other hand in his. He held her gaze for a moment, close enough that she could hear him over the music, and nodded.

“You’re not smiling like the pictures.”

Mia’s stomach twisted.

Of course, he’d studied the damn pictures. A man like Damian Cole prepared himself in whatever ways he felt were necessary, just as he prepared himself to run his empire — and in the few months since Bianca had disappeared, he’d no doubt poured over every image of his soon-to-be-wife he could find. This was the first time he'd pointed that out, and she knew it wasn't going to be even the last time she would hear such. She felt sick in her stomach at his words. Perhaps it would never cease, this feeling of dread that came over her whenever she thought of Bianca Alvarez, her sister, the woman supposed to have walked down this aisle in her place.

He hadn't stopped the ceremony, not when it should have been obvious. Now he simply noted it and moved on, as if she had done something wrong, as she always suspected he'd do. She didn't answer him, because her voice would shake, and because a shaking voice would say something that might give him exactly what he wanted to hear.

"... Witnessed, honored," the officiant droned on, words dissolving into the swell of the music. Damian's hands remained on hers, but rather than prying away, she found herself gripping to his with surprising strength.

"Do you take this woman," the officiant intoned. Mia stiffened, bracing herself, because the words were coming, and then it would all be over. "to be your lawfully wedded wife?"

There was a pause. It was barely that, in fact — a flicker of something behind his eyes as he looked down into hers.

"I do," Damian said, his voice even, his gaze locked on her face. The officiant turned to her, and she found herself giving an answer, a flat, emotionless monotone that wasn't really hers. Somewhere in the middle of it all, she realized that there would be no more pretending, no more smiling through the tears, because there was no damned choice about it. Whatever came next — rings, papers, a signature that would legally bind her to this man on some contract that didn't bear either of their names — it was going to happen, and she would have to accept it however it came.

"You may kiss the bride."

Damian lifted the veil. He looked at her for a beat too long, jaw tight, before he kissed her — short, controlled, over before the applause even started.

He leaned in again as the room clapped around them.

"We're going to have a very interesting conversation later, Miss Alvarez."

Nothing about his tone was warm. Nothing about it needed to be. She heard exactly what he meant.

His voice was a rough caress, his words a promise. Not a promise of anything good, she thought bitterly, recognizing the name he used. She didn't know why it struck her so sharply, but it did, that he'd used her surname, rarely employed, not at all during their few conversations, and certainly not during the service itself.

People snapped photos. Somewhere behind her, her father's voice grew louder, telling a story to whoever might hear, certain to have already spun some tall tale for the nearest guests. Mia smiled, politely, beautifully for the cameras. To her right, Damian Cole smiled, an expression carefully crafted for the cameras, for the guests, for everyone who thought this was real. And no one, least of all herself, seemed to notice that he'd known from the very beginning. That he'd married her, in a real way, and that whatever came next would be on his terms.

The reception pressed on for three hours, and Mia would remember very little of it afterward, save for flashes of light, disjointed images.

A string quartet playing some music she couldn't identify, her father’s hand on her shoulder, guiding her from one group of guests to the next before she could finish telling the same story twice. A woman in emerald green clinging to her wrist, saying something about how she looked radiant up there, how she told Doreen she’d be a stunning bride, and she hadn’t believed her, and Mia smiled and saying thank you and thought nothing of it, because she had no idea who this woman named Doreen was, or what she’d supposedly said.

Damian remained close throughout the night, a hand at the small of her back as they moved from one part of the ballroom to the next. It had the appearance of affection, of companionship. From where Mia stood, it was more akin to a leash, keeping her from wandering anywhere he couldn't follow. He kept the distance between them short, never allowing her to be more than a few feet from him at a time, and never allowing her to walk away from him, period. The reason, when she thought of it, was nerves. His nerves, she told herself, rather than her own, though she'd come to understand, later, that it was more of his doing. He was watching her, testing her. Waiting, as she was, for the next piece of information to come to light.

He was good at it. That was the worst part. He looked, to everyone in that ballroom, like a man happy to be here, enjoying his wedding day, chatting easily, hands finding her at all the right moments for the cameras to catch, for the magazines to print. Only Mia, close enough to see the tension in his neck as he turned his head away, knew he was simply acting. He'd no doubt staged hundreds of weddings like this one in his own hotels, and knew precisely what to do in order to make them look as natural as possible. He made sure the hands touched in all the right places, sure the toast after the ceremony had the right laugh at the right moment. He had no reason to suspect she'd see through him. In fact, he was certain she wouldn't, and that was why he did it.

Twice that night, she caught herself actually enjoying his company instead of just surviving it. Once during the best man's speech, when Damian murmured a joke under his breath — low, quick, meant only for her — and she laughed before she remembered she wasn't supposed to. Once again during their first dance. His movements were confident at first, leading her with little hitch, with the assured competence that she was used to seeing from the paid professionals who worked at the weddings she organized. She was caught in his arms, facing three hundred strangers, and for a few minutes, she forgot exactly what was happening.

Then he looked at her, truly looked at her, and it was like waking from a dream. He wasn't falling in love with her. He was cataloging her, as she suspected he'd done with Bianca as well, and she'd soon find out what it was he intended to do with that information.

Her father found her at one point, near the dessert table, already half-drunk on champagne and something else, something called relief, perhaps. He grasped both of her hands in his.

"You did it," he whispered, his voice thick with emotion. "You actually did it. I owe you everything, sweetheart, everything, "he halted, his grip on her fingers loosening as he caught sight of her expression; or, rather, as he caught sight of something behind it. A flicker of something that wasn't shocking, not quite, but something close enough that it gave him pause. It would have been enough to make someone stop and reconsider. A man who knew what to do in a situation like this — when his younger daughter had vanished on her wedding day, would have known to call in favors, to find her, to do whatever it took to ensure she was safe. That he hadn't done so should have been more worrisome than it was.

"She'll turn up," he said, finally, voice quiet. "She always does." And then he was gone, pulled away by someone congratulating him on the business merger, and Mia stood alone by the dessert table, a cold, unfamiliar taste of something that wasn't worried in her mouth, and the growing certainty that she was rapidly losing control of this day that was supposed to belong to Bianca.