Alec dreamed his wedding day would happen a lot differently.

The first thing to throw him off was the size of the guest list. Once his mother learned of the engagement and the quick wedding, she had managed most everything from her bed—especially spreading the news high and far. She used her clout as an ex-supermodel to lure in the right people.

And by the “right people,” Alec hadn’t realized she meant that paparazzi would be there, their cameras flashing away, their calling questions for Alec and his alpha groom.

“How did you meet? Do you plan to follow in the footsteps of your mother, Alec? What do you do for a living, JT?”

Their names and wedding and all the information they could fabricate would be out there to the world, and Alec couldn’t do anything to stop it. JT stood by his side, and he answered some of the questions, offering not too little and not too much. Unlike Alec, he appeared sure of himself. Confident. Assured. He had no fucking clue what these vultures would do for sales and numbers, and if they didn’t get the optics they wanted, they’d pull them out of their ass.

“Enough,” Alec said, holding up a hand, ushering them back into the house for the last hour before the wedding procession. He locked the patio doors to the backyard, most of the space festooned for the wedding. It looked like someone threw up white everywhere.

The baby’s breath, white roses, and yellow chrysanthemums overflowing the many terracotta pots were overpoweringly strong. Their cloying scent clung onto Alec even as he marched deeper into the house, passing the kitchen through to the living room and then the foyer and the stairs.

“You’re angry,” JT grunted, once he trailed Alec into his bedroom. “Was I not supposed to say anything?”

“No, I’m just ready for this to be over,” Alec said, sighing. He hugged his middle. Meeting JT’s indiscernible stare, he said, “No offense. It’s not you… It’s all of this. I wasn’t expecting the media.”

“That’d make both of us.”

Alec sighed again. “I shouldn’t have left my mom alone with my guest list. She promised to add a few friends—not the fucking world.” Alec sucked in a deep, clearing breath, letting his next exhale out with a shudder. That shudder amplified at JT’s touch.

Standing in front of him now, he gripped Alec’s elbows and hauled him in, until Alec turned his head and rested on JT’s stone-hard chest. Alec leaned on the strength being offered, the tension surely and swiftly departing, leaving him with only curiosity…and a bit of lust. He couldn’t be pressed to JT and not feel anything.

To think they’d soon be married—legally bound to each other, and with nothing to stop the alpha from claiming him on their honeymoon night. They had both decided to spend it at the L’Oiseau Inn, where they first almost consummated their contractual engagement. It would be the perfect setting.

Giddiness crashed with dreaded anticipation.

It was the hot brush of JT’s lips on his hairline that stirred Alec from his prickling panic. Glancing up, he peered into JT’s eyes.

“We don’t have to do this,” he said.

Alec shook his head. “No. I’m good.” Then he swallowed hard, asking, “Are you?”

JT nodded solemnly. “I don’t want you feeling obliged to this…deal of ours. If you want out now—”

“I don’t.” Alec tiptoed then, happy when JT dipped his head and he gave him a hard, bruising kiss. It tortured Alec to move his head back, dropping down on his feet. Before he got ahead of himself and begged JT to lock the door and give him a taste of what surely awaited him tonight, he said, “Let’s do this.”

JT left for his room. Alec dressed alone, changing into the white tuxedo. It was a slim fit that caressed his slight frame. The suit jacket’s black lapels popped out starkly against the white, as did the top lining of the waist flap pockets. Completing the look with a black bowtie, Alec popped in his cufflinks.

Leaving JT to do his thing, Alec forced himself to steer to his mother’s bedroom instead.

She called for his entry, her voice lighter, brighter.

“Alec,” she said, gasping and touching both hands to her open mouth. She lowered them long enough to sniffle loudly. “You look…handsome.” And then her voice broke, and she cried. She cupped her face, allowing Alec to draw her in.

He stroked her back.

She clung to him for a long while, finally raising her head, she cupped his face. She pulled him down, touching her cool, painted lips to his forehead. “Like your father,” she whispered, clearing her throat, her voice strengthening. “Spitting image of him, really.”

It wasn’t necessarily the comparison that bothered him, so much as his mother’s wide, pained eyes, and the tears pouring out freely, even as her smile rivaled the sun tucking itself away for the stars. Not about to upset her, Alec nodded, his ability of speech momentarily deserting him.

Luckily, his mother didn’t sense anything amiss. She dropped her hands from his face to his shoulders, giving him a squeeze. “Are you ready to be married, sweetie?”

“I am,” he said, his tongue thick with the weight of those words, the responsibility falling down over him now. Soon—very fucking soon—he’d be trading vows with JT, and they’d be pronounced husbands, omega and alpha, bonded mates, and in front of more people than Alec would have liked.

“You invited a lot of people,” Alec said, leading his mother to her bed. She hadn’t changed out of her night gown.

“I got carried away,” she said, sliding under the covers, her back propped up by her pillows. “I wish I could go.” She had the veil drawn back, but she pulled it over her face now, reminding Alec why he wasn’t pushing for her presence at the wedding.

“No one knows you’re here.” He tried a smile, feeling it slip a few heartbeats later. “They think you’re still in Dallas.”

“Hiding out,” she filled in, the white netting on the veil not masking the bitter twist of her lips. “That’s what they’re all hoping, of course. But that’s why I invited them. I wanted to see you happy. I wanted you to prove our family wrong.”

Alec bobbed his head again, a jerky action. He didn’t want to prove anything…except what he had to legally do in order to scratch off the clauses holding him back from inheriting two hundred million.

First the alpha, then the male heir. The plan couldn’t get simpler than that.

“You are happy,” she said, holding out a hand for Alec to grasp. Tugging him closer. She stared deep into his eyes, her gaze darting, searching.

Alec hadn’t whispered a word about his contract with JT. Or that all of this, their love, was a sham. A ruse to get them both closer to the money. Then, and only then, could Alec reward JT with his financial compensation. Twelve thousand dollars to be exact. That’s all he had asked of him despite knowing Alec would be inheriting several times that if their plan was successful.

“Alec,” his mother called to him.

Realizing she’d grown more anxious in his lengthy silence, and for her health’s sake, he said, “I’m happy. JT makes me happy.” He nearly choked on that last statement. Not because it was a lie—but because it wasn’t entirely false. The alpha had made him immensely happy since he’d moved in.

Alec didn’t spend his days alone, and not all of his nights either. Occasionally, he couldn’t stop JT from sneaking into his room, or carrying him to his guest room, and sucking his cock to orgasmic completion. They might not have consummated their sexual relationship, but that would be changing tonight Alec suspected, and hoped.

“As long as you’re happy,” his mother said. She let him go then, getting comfortable in bed, sliding down the pillows.

Alec slipped out.

Staring down the hall, he fought the urge to check in on JT.

Instead, he headed downstairs, pacing in the foyer. The guests were rounding to the backyard, following instructions on signs that the event planning team had set out for the evening. It made it easier to keep guests outside, and away from pestering his mother. Isolde needed all the rest she could get, until Alec secured the money to send her to the clinic in Switzerland.

At the sound of footfalls, Alec turned to the staircase and stilled, his mind blanking at the sight of JT filling out his bespoke tuxedo. It molded to him like a second skin, and somehow made him even edgier, the black dragon tattoo matching the black, sheen of his Armani suit jacket and notch lapels and his polished, handmade Italian leather shoes.

Once he managed to unstick his tongue from the roof of his mouth, he said, “You clean up nicely.”

“Fishing for compliments? You chose the suit,” he remarked, a small smile kicking up the corners of his mouth.

Alec watched JT take the final steps down. He’d paused, taking in Alec too, doing a long sweep from head to toe, before he said, “You picked well for yourself too.”

“Thanks! I always wanted to wear a white suit.” Alec touched his cuff, his fingers luxuriating in the Italian classic wool, brushing the cufflinks. He noted JT wore his as well, only the inscriptions were inversed with Alec’s initials and the date today, the date of their marriage. At least the suit worked out all right, even if they were going to be entertaining unwanted guests.

Holding out his arm, JT said, “Let’s get this over with.”

“Wait,” Alec said, watching JT drop his arm and frown. He moved closer to the alpha, embracing him, tiptoeing to wrap his arms over his shoulders and cup the back of his thick, inked neck. “I want to do this before we got out there.” Before they had to pretend for the world…

Realizing what he wanted, JT lowered his head, helping Alec out with their tremendous height difference. They kissed softly this time, their lips caressing each other, stilling, and then increasing in pressure. Alec’s mouth sparked, his tongue pushing out in search of JT, and then dueling with him, their kiss moving out into the open, the wet smacking noises filling the empty, cold foyer.

Breaking apart for air, his heart hammering, Alec cuddled JT, his palm discovering the alpha shared an erratic heartbeat with him. He realized he had care of that heart now. So long as they were together, Alec wanted to remain faithful to this man. JT was his, and he’d be JT’s, at least until their contract was up. Until JT helped him produce a male heir, and Alec scooped the inheritance money out from under his brothers. That promise alone lifted his head, stretched his smile so that his cheeks hurt from the exertion.

“I’m ready now,” Alec said, moving to the alpha’s side and hooking his arm through his.

The flashing from the cameras were even brighter now the sun glowed behind the trees, inflaming the skies and adding streaks of deep red and purple into the midnight blue. Alec smiled for the cameras differently, his heart not entirely in the effort. Clinging to JT tighter, he was glad when they cut a path together down the white carpet strewn with red rose petals, and the hundred or so guests that showed up, to the officiant beaming at them in front of the decorated arbor.

Security meandered around, stationed to keep the guests outside, out of the home, on Alec’s orders. They would see that everyone got off the property, and Isolde wasn’t disturbed or discovered.

A quick glance at their audience revealed no sight of Zander and Drew, or their spouses, Lachlan and Jason. They actually sat out this wedding. Perhaps it was a good thing. Alec’s gut churned nervously, and he didn’t imagine seeing either of his half-brothers would help at this point.

“Are we ready?” the officiant asked, glancing between Alec and JT.

Nodding in unison, the two men faced each other to trade their vows. The officiant kicked off the ceremony, the guests’ heavy whispering falling to silence, the paparazzi clicking away in the background, albeit not as frantically.

As the officiant rattled on about the sanctity of love, and its many pure forms, Alec grew restless puzzling out if JT was having second thoughts…because he was beginning to wonder whether this was how he wanted things going on between them. He couldn’t undo how this would change them both.

And a part of him didn’t want anything changing with JT. He didn’t want JT to have to look at him differently when all this was over. Most especially, Alec wasn’t prepared to confront JT moving on after this was well and truly over. Once his contractual obligation to marry him and produce a male heir for the Edwards line no longer bonded him to Alec, JT could do whatever, and whoever, he liked. Alec wouldn’t have a say.

In all this, Alec almost missed his cue.

It was JT squeezing his hands that brought him around to realize the officiant had asked for Alec’s attention.

“Do you, Alec Shane Edwards, take Jeremy Barry Tucker to be your lawfully wedded husband and alpha?”

“I do,” Alec said thickly, swallowing hard at the promise.

JT cocked his head, his lips pulling up into a smile, a heartbreaking one considering Alec imagined his place being taken by another omega a year from now. Still, after the officiant repeated the same, age-old question to the alpha, he said, “I do.”

“And if anyone disagrees that these two should be married, let them rise now.”

Alec crawled with nerves, keeping his gaze on JT, though he itched to search the crowds for malignant faces…for Zander and Drew, because they’d certainly put a stop to this if they could. On the ground of simply embarrassing Alec, and forcing him to give up on this crazed ruse with JT.

But no one protested, and the officiant declared, “Then I pronounce you, husband and husband, mate and mate, alpha and omega—you may kiss to seal this promise.”

JT moved forward first, leaning down, tucking his fingers under Alec’s chin and lifting his head, angling it for their first kiss as a married couple. He pushed his mouth closer, taking the kiss deeper, the party of their clashing tongues earning them catcalls and whistles from the crowd.

Alec held tighter onto JT’s lapels, clinging desperately even after he lifted his head and probed him with his black-brown eyes, searching for any signs to stop, Alec supposed. And he must not have found any, because he swooped Alec into his arms with a cheer from the crowd and he carried him back down the aisle all the way to the front of the house.

Everyone followed, the paparazzi leading the herd with their cameras.

The stretch hummer out in their driveway waited on them. It wasn’t until they were inside, in the dark hush of the vehicle, did JT kiss him again, this time his big hands yanking at the buttons of Alec’s suit jacket. All while pushing Alec back on the soft leather seat, attacking his throat with his hot mouth, his rough tongue grazing over Alec’s wild pulse, heating his blood to dangerous temperatures.

It was going to be a long drive to the L’Oiseau Inn.