Page 89 of The Secret to a Southern Wedding

The three other women and two men all nodded and waved her on. They really didn’t need her there. She’d been the fill-in for the previous shift when a volunteer was gone and had stuck around afterward.

“Let’s get this over with,” she said to Cyril.

He smiled, despite her words, before motioning for her to walk ahead of him. They left the town square where the food vendors were set up and took the sidewalk toward Main Street.

After a few steps he asked, “Are you and your mom really leaving Peachtree Cove?”

She’d agreed to stay and help her mom cancel everything. That hadn’t taken as long as expected and her plan was to go back after the festival. Her mom wanted to get someone to handle the store before following. Though she’d initially considered closing it, Linda didn’t want to leave her customers with no other options.

“We are,” she said. “I’m going back first. I don’t think I can hold off the calls from the hospital to come back now that there isn’t a wedding.”

“There could still be a wedding.”

She stopped and stared at him. “My mom isn’t changing her mind.”

“You could always marry me,” he said with a straight face.

Imani’s breath caught in her throat. He had to be joking. He would start laughing at any second. But he didn’t start laughing. Her heart rate picked up. Nope, she would not get swept up in his silly fantasy.

“Don’t play with me like that.” She turned and stalked away.

Cyril caught up to her with a few quick steps. “I’m not playing. I really felt like...feel like, you’re the person I could spend the rest of my life with.”

She spun on him and pointed. “Stop that. We can’t do this. Weren’t you the one against us going there in the first place?”

He crossed his arms and nodded. “I was.”

“And now you want to try and make things work when everything is so messed up? When it’s impossible for us to make this work out?”

A group of revelers came down the street. Talking loudly with cups of green beer in their hands. Cyril took her elbow in his hand and pulled her out of the way. He didn’t stop there. He pulled her into the small alley between buildings. He let her go once they were away from the crowd and stared down at her.

“Everything you said before still matters,” he said. “Our parents want us to be happy.”

“But they can’t be near each other.”

He flinched. “Does your mom hate my dad?”

Imani couldn’t say that her mom hated Preston. She was angry about him not trusting her enough to tell her everything, but her mom still cared even though she’d never admit it. “She hates what he put her through. She hates that she’s waiting around for your aunt to drop the bomb and put her in the middle of the gossip mill again.”

“My aunt knows that my dad had nothing to do with what happened. My cousin told me. She was here for days without causing any problems.”

“No problems? Do you think people haven’t told my mom about the woman asking around town about him? No one will say it, but they know she has something to do with it.”

“She’s gone now.”

“My mom and I will be, too.”

She moved to go back to the main road, but he reached out and grasped her elbow. Imani froze and stared up at him.

He stepped closer to her. “You really don’t want to see me again?”

Yes, she did want to see him again. She still regretted not being able to follow through with her feelings for him, but she wouldn’t do that at the expense of her mom’s feelings. Not after what happened with her dad. “Cyril...”

He turned her to face him and pulled her forward until her breasts brushed his chest. “You really want to give up on us?”

Memories flooded her brain. Memories of his body against hers. The way he’d kissed and touched her. The way he’d made her feel. How he’d held her and comforted her. She should pull back, but her body refused to follow her brain’s instructions.

“We have to. This won’t work,” she said to herself as much as she spoke to him. She was wavering and they both needed the reminder of why they couldn’t be foolish in the face of their parents’ imploding relationship. “I can’t hurt my mom and you don’t want to torture your dad by having me around to remind him of everything he lost.”

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