Maureen Child - Honour-Bound Groom / Cinderella & the CEO - Honour-Bound Groom

But tonight his wait would be rewarded. Granted, the timing of their union meant that their liaison tonight would not be part of the agreement they’d both signed. It would instead be the consummation of the promises they would make to one another before all these witnesses today.

The importance of those promises settled in his chest like a solid lump of lead, pressing down on his heart, his very honor. It didn’t settle well with him to be pledging to love another for the rest of their days when, in truth, he didn’t love her.

Love. It wasn’t something he and Loren had discussed. Hell, it wasn’t even something Alex had considered until she’d declared her feelings for him the night he’d given her the engagement ring.

When she’d first agreed to marry him back in New Zealand, he had assumed she cared for him, perhaps admired him a little the way she had when she was a child. He’d also known she was attracted to him—just as he was attracted to her. And she’d wanted to honor her father’s memory, in much the same way that he’d wanted to ease his grandfather’s mind. So Alex had been comfortable with the arrangement—with the idea of a marriage based on mutual regard, a healthy dose of desire and shared respect for family. Love had never been part of the plan.

But something about her sweetly serious declaration when she accepted his ring and gave him her heart had moved him unexpectedly, making him feel almost shamed. Was it fair to her to accept her love when he was not yet prepared to return it? A picture of his parents flashed through his memory. He wondered what they’d think of the choice he was making today.

They had known real love. It had been considered only fitting that if their light had to be extinguished so early that they die together. The avalanche that had taken them, while on a romantic skiing holiday together without their sons, had wiped out joy as the boys had known it up until that time. Yet they’d been lucky to have had Abuelo, who’d put his own grief aside to continue to guide and raise the three teenage boys whose anger at their parents’ fate sought many outlets.

It had been Abuelo’s steady love and firm hand that had brought them through. Love they reciprocated. Taking another look at his grandfather’s beaming face, Alex knew that while he would not be telling the truth as he made his vows to Loren today, the gift of hope it would give his grandfather was worth far too much for him to give in to second thoughts now.

“Last chance to back out,” Benedict said under his breath. Before Alex could respond, a sudden hush spread through the cathedral. The centuries-old organ, which had been delivering a steady medley of music, halted. The lump of lead in Alex’s chest shifted, forming a fist around his lungs as all eyes turned to the main doors. They swung slowly open and a burst of sunlight filled the doorway, bathing the vestibule with its golden glow. And then, within the glow of light, a lone figure appeared.

The fist squeezed tighter as Alex realized how difficult this must be for Loren. In the face of her mother’s blank refusal to attend their nuptials, he should have insisted she be accompanied on her journey down the center aisle of the cathedral—past the many assessing eyes of the glitterati and politically powerful. But she’d refused all offers from his brothers and Abuelo.

“My father will be with me in spirit,” she’d said, holding that determined, fine-boned chin of hers firmly in the air, daring him to challenge her wishes. “I need no one else.”

He’d had to accede to her wish. After all, it was the only thing on which she had insisted in all the matters pertaining to the ceremony.

The powerful organ began again and as Loren began to glide down the aisle toward him, Alex realized he’d misjudged his bride’s strength and fortitude.

Pride suffused every cell in his body as she walked toward him with effortless grace—her bare shoulders squared and her spine straight, her slender neck holding her head high. Loren’s skin gleamed against the strapless ivory gown that hugged her torso and exposed the gentle swell of her breasts before spreading into a bloom of fabric around and behind her. For the first time in his memory, Alex was speechless. Beneath the gossamer-fine veil that covered her head and shoulders and drifted down to her waist he caught glimpses of light striking the diamond tiara that had once been his mother’s. The matching necklace, its design the inverted image of the tiara, settled against her luminous skin at the base of her throat and spilled in a gentle V over her collarbone.

Her face was composed behind her veil, her eyes avoiding contact with his, focused instead on the altar behind him. As she drew closer he could hear the swish of the fabric of her gown as it swept across the floor, could see the fine tremors that shook the opulent bouquet of early summer blooms she carried.

“Looks like lanky little Loren Dubois has really grown up, hmm?”

Reynard’s voice in his ear snapped Alex from his trance.

“For once in your life could you just shut up?” he hissed at his brother through teeth clenched so tight his jaw ached, earning a glare of disapproval from the priest in the process.

Reynard’s next words, however, shocked him in a way he never expected.

“Don’t hurt her, Alex. Whatever you do, don’t ever hurt her.”

“Noted,” Alex replied with a swift nod.

He met his brother’s eyes briefly. There was no doubting Reynard meant what he said. For some strange reason it made him feel better that Loren had a champion. That it should have been him was not wasted on him at all, but given what he’d agreed to do to save the del Castillo family and fortunes, it was only fitting it be one of his brothers. Both, if the look on Benedict’s face was any indicator.

A savage rush of possession roared through his veins. They could look, certainly, they could warn him as much as they liked, but essentially, Loren was his. As she joined him on the steps in front of the altar that knowledge gave him the ultimate satisfaction.

When it came time to say their vows, Loren looked at him, truly looked at him, for the first time that day. And as she pledged to love him, he found he had to look away. Her words carried such surety, such conviction. She deserved more than empty promises in return. Her voice wobbled slightly on the last word of the formal ceremony they’d chosen. No, he corrected himself, the ceremony Giselle had chosen. Shame scored him. This was Loren’s wedding day. He should have given her more say in how the day was to go.

He’d approached this all wrong. He already had her love and loyalty and he’d walked roughshod over both in the execution of his goals and his needs. Loren was more than a means to an end, she was a vital, living, breathing woman.

He would make it up to her, he promised himself silently. As soon as they’d fulfilled the first part of the prenuptial agreement, he would definitely make it up to her.

Loren had barely spoken half a dozen words directly to him since they’d exchanged their vows. In the car from the wedding reception it was no different. Alex found the uncharacteristic silence challenging. Normally Loren found something, anything, to talk to him about—it was one of the things he found so engaging about her.

But something had changed inside her today; he could sense it in the way she held herself, the way she’d spoken to others. As if she was playing a part and was not really totally involved in what she was doing.

As their car swung through the gate of the outer wall and drew up to the entrance of the castillo it finally occurred to Alex why she was so quiet. She had to be nervous about tonight. He would make sure their first time was one she would remember forever. A special night. A memory to be treasured.