A Sinner’s Truth: Chapter 7

The woman who looks like a fucking angel frowns at me. If I were a different person, I’d almost believe she was sent from the heavens. I know better, though. There is no God, but there sure as fuck is a devil. I see him every morning when I look in the mirror.

“Why would you think you’re not needed?” she asks me.

Aria. I roll her name around in my head. Long, strawberry-blonde hair that reaches her waist, big green eyes that scream innocence, and skin so pale it’s almost translucent. She’s gorgeous. It’s not her looks that have me captivated, though. It’s this foreign feeling I got when I touched her.

When she fell into my lap, my first reaction was to shove her off, but then my hands closed around her tiny waist, and something happened. Something that’s never happened to me before. I didn’t want to let her go. So I held her there until she moved herself.

My skin prickles with awareness, my heart picks up, and then an extreme wave of guilt washes over me. I quickly shove it down. I’ll let myself drown in it later. I shouldn’t be having a reaction to a woman who’s not my fiancée. Even if Shelli has been gone for well over a year and a half now.

“Aria, you got a last name, darling?” I ask, needing to know more about this creature in front of me.

Her teeth dig into her bottom lip. She doesn’t want to tell me. Interesting. “Do you?” she counters.

“De Bellis. Santo De Bellis,” I say, and wait for the recognition to set in.

Her eyes widen briefly before her smile does the same. “Well, Santo De Bellis, I think you are exactly the man for the job I have in mind.”

“I have a job. A couple actually.” I don’t know if this is her way of being flirty or not, but I need to squash it. Whatever it is. I have no plans of leaving here with this woman. Or any woman. I can’t do that.

“Okay, hear me out. Just listen, and if you’re really not interested in the position, then I’ll get up and walk away,” Aria says.

Curiosity more than anything else has me staying put and nodding in agreement. What could a woman like her possibly want with someone like me? Unless she’s trying to hire a hitman. “Okay, I’ll listen to your proposal,” I tell her.

“Funny choice of words, because that’s exactly what this is. A proposal. I need a husband for twelve months. One year, just in name. I don’t need an actual husband. I just need someone who will fake a marriage with me for a year,” she tries to explain.

I blink. Did she literally just ask me to marry her for a year? That was not what I was expecting. “Why?” I can’t be the guy she needs, but I want to know why she thinks she has to enter into a fake marriage.

“My name is Aria Swan. My father is Ronald Swan and unless I marry someone within the next couple of days, he’s going to marry me off to Oliver Densper,” she says in one breath.

“You can say no. It’s not the fifteenth century, darling. You have a choice in what you do,” I remind her.

“I can’t. If I don’t go along with whatever he wants, he’s going to take the one thing that means the most to me in the world. Which I will get access to when I turn twenty-five, in a year. He can’t marry me off to suit his business deal with the Denspers if I’m already married. And if I’m married to you, well, my father’s not stupid enough to challenge your family.”

There’s a desperation in her voice. She really thinks entering into a fake marriage is the answer to her problems. “Well, Aria Swan, I really am sorry, but I can’t marry you—real or fake.”

Her face drops. “Are you already married? Oh god, I just proposed to a married man. Just my luck,” she says. “Forget it. Please. I can’t have word of this conversation getting back to my father.” She goes to stand up.

“Wait! I’m not married. I’m very single actually. But I can’t marry anyone, and you marrying into the De Bellis family is definitely not what you need.” I can’t bring another innocent soul into the dark web that is this bloodline. I won’t have another woman die because of me.

“It can’t be any worse than marrying Oliver Densper,” she says before walking away. I pull my phone out of my pocket and fire off a text to Marcel.

Sometimes I think little brothers are put on this earth purely to annoy the fuck out of you. I don’t bother replying, because as much shit as Marcel might give me, I know my brother and he’ll have the information to me by morning.

I push off my seat, throw down a hundred-dollar bill, and stride out of the bar. I came here to drown myself in whiskey. And now, after that little encounter with Miss Aria Swan, I don’t feel like drinking myself until I see Shelli tonight.

It’s probably the guilt. I felt something. A spark. A small ember. Whatever it was, it was something for someone who wasn’t my fiancée. And that doesn’t sit well with me.

Opting to walk down the street, I find myself standing outside the bar that Kristen owns. I haven’t seen Shelli’s sister since that day at the cemetery a year ago. I’m not welcomed but I push inside anyway.

She clocks me the moment I sit down. “What are you doing here, Santo?” she asks me.

“I needed someone to remind me of what a shitty human being I am, and I thought you’d be up for the task,” I tell her.

“Why?” Kristen sighs. “What happened?”

“I met someone tonight,” I admit, feeling like I’m going to be sick.

“Okay, I meet people every night. What’s the big deal?” she asks.

“I met a woman. And I didn’t hate her.”

Kristen blinks at me. Once, twice, three times. “Santo, have you not… been with anyone since Shelli?”

My face screws up. “Fuck no, I would never betray her like that.”

“She’s dead, Santo. It’s not betraying her and you really don’t deserve to be putting yourself through all this bullshit. Look, I know you thought the sun shone out of my sister’s ass, but she had her faults too. Shelli wasn’t perfect. You were just too blind or ignorant to see her flaws. You can move on. You should move on,” Kristen says.

“I can’t,” I admit. My sisters-in-law are champing at the bit to set me up on dates, to have me get back out into the world. Well, all of them except Cammi. My brothers are married, living their best lives. Even the youngest of us. Vin just got hitched. Cammi’s secretly my favourite. I love all of my new sisters, but Cammi is different.

I don’t know what it is about her, or if it’s just what she does for Vin. She helps him more than she realises. The way she loves him is unique, their connection like something I’ve never seen before. I loved Shelli—I love Shelli. But even I can see that we didn’t have the kind of love that Vin and Cammi have.

“I love her,” I tell Kristen. “I can’t betray her by moving on.”

“I know you love her, but she’s not coming back, Santo. Nothing is going to bring her back and you’re still reasonably young. You should be living your life. Shelli wouldn’t want you wasting away.” Kristen turns around and picks up a bottle of Cinque before sitting a glass in front of me. She fills it to the brim, then slides it closer. “What you and Shelli had isn’t going anywhere. If you move on, it will always be a part of you. She will always be a part of you. And despite what you like to try to put out to the world, you have a big heart and there is room for another love in there.”

Even if Kristen’s right, I don’t want it. I will not make myself that vulnerable again. It’s not better to have loved and lost. It fucking sucks. I wish I’d never fallen in love at all.

“Can’t you just yell at me and tell me what a fuckup I am?” I groan and then swallow the contents of the glass.

“I want to, but I’ve learnt some things over the past year. And, well, it wasn’t your fault, Santo. Honestly, you were too good for Shelli. You deserve better. Go and find better.”

“What?” I’m not even close to drunk. I didn’t mishear her, but why the fuck would she think I’m too good for her sister?

“I didn’t mean that. I just… I’m mad at her. I miss her and I love her, but sometimes I’m just so angry at her for doing what she did,” Kristen says.

“What did she do?”

“You really don’t know, do you?” Kristen asks, shaking her head. “It’s just sister stuff. Go home, Santo. Find a way to forgive yourself so you can move on.”

I want to argue with her, get her to tell me what it is that I don’t know. I gave up trying to figure out what it was that Shelli’s ghost kept telling me to find. I put it down to my own conscience looking for a way to hold on to her, anything to not believe that she was really gone.

I’ve accepted that she’s gone and not coming back, though. I haven’t seen her in over a month. I purposely don’t drink as much. It hurts. It’s like letting go of her. But I’ll never be able to let go of her fully. She has my soul with her, buried six feet beneath the ground.

This wasn’t our time, but maybe the next life will be. Maybe in our next life, I won’t be who I am. I’ll come from a normal family. A safe family, one where my own father doesn’t murder my fiancée.