Don't Mess with My Lethal Fiancée novel · Chapter 2 of 24

Chapter 2: The Knife

In the study Vesper puts her blade to Bram's throat, he hands her the handle, and her mentor's call names Bram as the job.

The study was on the second floor, behind a door so thick it shut without a sound.

Bram spoke quietly to the housekeeper, and she left us there.

The room smelled of old leather and wood polish.

A fire burned in the grate, though it was only October.

I stood in the middle of the carpet with my back to the wall, where I could see both doors.

Bram noticed, and said nothing.

He walked to the desk and leaned on it with his arms crossed.

"Dean," I said.

"Bram."

"Jane," I said, and almost smiled.

"Vesper," he said. "I've been practicing it."

I let that sit between us for a moment.

"You knew it was me," I said. "Before tonight."

"Since the fifth."

"The fifth of what?"

"October." He watched my hands. "My uncle sent a photograph with the proposal."

"And you said yes."

"I did."

That did not make sense, and I did not like things that did not make sense.

I crossed the carpet.

The spare blade came out of my thigh strap and went up under his jaw before he blinked.

The point of it rested on the pulse in his neck.

He did not step back.

He did not even lift his hands.

"Tell me why," I said, "or I decide you're a problem."

His eyes dropped to the blade, and came back to my face.

"If you were going to use that," he said, "you'd have done it in the ballroom."

"I wasn't ready in the ballroom."

"You kissed me in the ballroom."

"That was for the guests."

"It was good for the guests."

I pressed a little harder.

A bead of red rose under the point.

He breathed out through his nose, slowly, and I felt the pulse under the steel keep a steady beat.

It was not a man's pulse when he is afraid.

"Drawer," he said. "Top left. Look."

"No."

"Then I'll reach slowly."

He did.

He opened the drawer with two fingers and took out a bone-handled folding knife.

My knife.

The little notch near the hinge was where I had dropped it on stone steps years ago.

He turned it in his hand, so the handle faced me, and held it out.

"Take it," he said.

I stared at him.

Then I took the knife, because it was mine, and he let me.

I stepped back and put my spare away.

His blood was a thin line across his collar.

He touched it, looked at his fingertip, and did not seem bothered.

"Here are the terms," he said.

"I didn't agree to terms."

"You agreed to a ring."

I looked at my hand.

The stone was heavy and cold.

"We marry on the seventh of November," he said. "That's three weeks from today."

"Fine."

"You live with me in the Gold Coast. One bedroom with a door that locks from the inside, if you like."

"I'll take the lock."

"Torben's housekeeper will report to him every evening."

"I know the kind."

"So you'll sleep in my bed anyway."

I raised one eyebrow.

"For the housekeeper," he said gravely.

I tried not to laugh, and I did not quite manage it.

"You're very calm for a man with a cut throat," I said.

"I'm calm for a man who finally knows where you are."

That landed somewhere under my ribs and stayed.

The phone in my clutch buzzed.

It was the burner Pavel had given me, and only one person had that number.

I held up one finger.

Bram nodded and turned toward the sideboard, where a decanter stood with two heavy glasses.

I stepped into the corner by the window and answered quietly.

"You walked in," Pavel said.

His voice was rough as ever, warm underneath, the voice that had fed me when I was seventeen.

"I walked in."

"Pretty ring?"

"Pavel, who is this man?"

"Bram Corwin. Heir. Nice to look at, I hear."

He coughed.

"You said a rich family needed a bride."

"They do. Now here's the rest, kid."

I heard a lighter click on his end.

"The job is Corwin. Wedding night, the seventh. His uncle wants it clean, and the bride gets the blame."

My hand went cold around the phone.

"Do it right, and the bounty is gone. Do it wrong, and the crew finds you before breakfast."

Behind me, glass chimed on glass.

I turned my head.

Bram was pouring whiskey.

He lifted one glass toward me.

I looked at the man I had slept with in a cabin three weeks ago.

I looked at the thin red line on his collar that I had put there.

"I'm not doing it," I said into the phone.

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