Page 35 of Just Say When

The hum and clatter promptly ended on an audible whoosh as if they had collectively sucked up all the oxygen in the room. I felt a little lightheaded from it.

And then everyone talked at once.

“Oh, mygod!” James shrieked as she rushed at us. “Congratulations!”

Mom pressed her hands to her cheeks. “My baby. Oh, my goodness.”

Oh, shit. They thought this was real? Never in a million years would that have occurred to me. “Brax,” I hissed.

He lifted our linked hands to his mouth and pressed a kiss to my knuckles, his blue eyes laughing at me. “It was your idea to tell them all together. I suggested a group text from the top of a mountain, remember?”

“Because it never occurred to me they would think it was real.” Panick squeezed my voice into a squeak. How the hell was I supposed to know they’d entertain the possibility we were in love? I tried to reclaim my hand but he held on tight.

“This isn’t real?” Mom demanded. Her hands went to her hips as she split a glare between us. “Is this some kind of joke?”

“Oh, it’s real,” Brax assured her. “We’ll say our vows before a judge. It will be a legally binding marriage.”

“For a few months, at least,” I added.

Mom’s glare intensified. “That’s not funny, young lady.”

Now we were back on familiar ground. My mother loved me with every cell in her body, but she absolutely believed she knew best how my life should be run and wished I would step aside and let her handle it. “Mom—” I started.

But Brax squeezed my hand hard enough to silenceme. “No one is taking this more seriously than Essie. In all fairness, this was my idea, and she took a fair amount of convincing.” He went on to explain the rules of the competition, and what winning would mean to Pirate’s career…and mine. “But even so, Essie had one condition. That if we win, the money goes to you for the purchase of Sweetie Pie.”

My mom made a shocked sound of protest. “I couldn’t?—”

“Let me be clear,” Brax said. “This isn’t a gift. It’s an investment. We believe in you and the restaurant. And, selfishly, I happen to like your pies and don’t want to see it change hands or, god forbid, shut down. This is the chance of a lifetime for Pirate and Essie, but she won’t do it if you don’t agree.”

“Oh, honey.” Mom’s eyes were suspiciously shiny as she pulled me into a hug.

I stared, slack jawed, at Brax’s smirking face over her shoulder. I had been prepared to argue, to fight, to hold my ground. Then he had swept in and made me look like a hero. I didn’t know how to feel about that. Grateful? Annoyed? Both?

“I love you, Mom,” I said. “So much. Please let us do this. For you and for me and for Pirate.”

She pulled back and wiped her eyes. “All right, baby. All right.”

“Essie,” Ted said.

I turned to face Brax’s father with a nervous gulp.But he looked at me with a kind smile and more than a hint of mischief in his bright blue eyes.

“I can’t say I saw this coming.” His large hand engulfed my shoulder and gave it a fatherly squeeze. His gaze shifted to his son over my shoulder and then back to me. “But I can’t say I’m disappointed, either. Welcome to the family, darlin’.”

15

Brax

Essie’s bedroom was like a time capsule. It was the smallest of the three bedrooms in the bungalow she still shared with her mom. Even though Jack was rarely home, she had never swapped to the bigger room. Little of it had changed since I had last set foot here fifteen years ago. Same four-poster, twin-sized bed. Same Ikea dresser. Photos of friends and horses lined the walls, held up with scotch tape. If I looked closely, I could tell which ones she cut me out of.

I wondered what she did with the bodies. Burned them in effigy? Used them for dart practice?

One of them caught my eye and I leaned closer to investigate. I knew that photo, because I was the one who had taken it. We had hiked to a lake the summer before our junior year, Essie, Jack, and me. The water had been freezing, hence Essie’s and Jack’s purple lips asthey grinned for the camera. Behind them, the lake shimmered like Essie’s eyes. And on the left edge, so small a person might not notice it, was a blurry peach half circle. The tip of my index finger over the lens.

I grinned.

She hadn’t cut me out of all of them.

“I don’t have much.” Essie stood at the foot of the bed, hands on hips, and turned in a slow circle, taking stock of it all. “My clothes, of course. The winter stuff, anyway. I’ll probably be back before summer.”

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