Page 58 of Should Have Been Me

“It’s time for you to leave.”

My heart sank down into the pit of my stomach as his mother’s expression turned smug. “You heard him. You need to go.”

I lifted my chin and squared my shoulders, fighting back the burn behind my eyes. I refused to cry in front of her. I wouldn’t give her the satisfaction. But before I could so much as take a step, Vaughn spoke again.

“Not her. You.”

Estelle rocked back on one foot. “Excuse me?”

“I want you out. I heard everything that was said and you are no longer welcome here.” Vaughn’s gorgeous eyes moved to me, locking on and growing soft in a way that untangled all the knots twisted up inside me. One look and he eased all my anxieties, because the emotion shining in those deep, beautiful pools was so clear I couldn’t believe I hadn’t recognized it right away. It was love. Pure and unfiltered.

Estelle’s harsh voice was like the crack of a whip. “You can’t possibly mean that.”

“Oh, I mean it. I won’t tolerate anyone coming in here and insulting her.”

“But—that’s—” She sputtered indignantly.

When Vaughn looked back at her, that icy version I recognized from when we first met had taken control. “You can either leave of your own accord, or I’ll have you removed for trespassing. Make no mistake, Mother, I’m done being your puppet. Unless you decide you want to change every aspect of your personality and suddenly become a mother who puts the wellbeing of her child above her own, I have no desire to ever see or speak to you again.”

She visibly shook off her son’s words, pasting that unaffected mask of hers back into place. “You’re confused. We’ll speak again when you return to the city. And I’ll be expecting an apology.”

“I’m not going back. My home is here. With her.”

His mother let out a huff of outrage. “You’re going to regret this. You’ll see.”

“The only thing I regret is allowing myself to stay under your thumb for so long. But that’s a mistake I’m rectifying right now.”

I vaguely heard the angry click of her kitten heels on the floor as she stomped off, but I was too consumed with Vaughn to register his witch of a mother had left, slamming the door behind her. At his declaration, all the air had rushed from my lungs on a giant gushing exhale. My heart skipped a beat before starting back up even faster than before. “Do you really mean that?” I whispered, my words drowning in hope. “You’re staying?”

He moved closer, reaching up and taking my face in his large, strong hands. Every lingering worry, every dull pain that had been coursing through me eased the moment he touched me. “More than I’ve ever meant anything in my life. You are my home. I love you, Calamity. How could I possibly leave when you’re here?”

My eyes welled as a smile stretched across my face so wide it made my cheeks ache. “I-I love you too.” A bubble of excited laughter slid up my throat. “So much.”

His hands traveled down the sides of my neck, his thumbs tracing my jaw as he brought his forehead to rest against mine. “So you’re saying you’re mine?” he asked against my lips.

“I’m yours. And you’re mine. Even when you’re a grumpy jerk that drives me crazy.”

He graced me with that smile that made my heart flip. “Even when you’re being a giant pain in my ass who keeps spilling coffee all over me.”

“That’s who we are. And I wouldn’t have it any other way.”

EPILOGUE

VAUGHN

Two months later

I loved my girl, and I felt like I’d done a pretty good job of learning to tolerate her friends over the past couple months, but this was getting fucking ridiculous.

I might have changed for Jolie, but I was still the same grumpy bastard I’d always been, the one who wasn’t a fan of most people, and that probably wouldn’t change. Not that it mattered, because she loved me and accepted me exactly how I was. She didn’t want to change me or turn me into a different man. When I pushed her buttons, she pushed back. We fought, we annoyed each other, but we loved twice as hard.

Currently, I was sitting at the bar at The Drunken Moose, watching as Jolie and her partners, Ryan and Tarryn, along with two other friends, Eliza and a woman named Lilly, sang and danced along drunkenly to the music coming from the jukebox. And it had to be said that if I never heard another Taylor Swift song for as long as I lived it would be too damn soon.

“Christ. How many songs did they queue up in that damn thing?” Ethan grumbled from beside me. We’d come along as designated drivers, knowing the women wanted to tie one on, but had kept our distance, letting them do their thing while we had a couple beers at the bar. Ethan had brought his buddy Quinn along, Lilly’s husband and a local firefighter, and so far he’d turned out to be a pretty cool dude.

Quinn lifted his glass to his mouth and drank. “I think they put the entire album on.”

Jesus Christ.

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