Page 35 of The Price of a Promise

“Oh, is this what you call talking?”I scoffed, fisting the front of my hair.“You used to open up to me, no problem.Do you even still want to marry me?”

She gasped.“Axel!How could you just—” She sighed heatedly.“That’s a leap and you know it.”

“It’s an honest question.Do you want to?”

“You know the answer.”

Her evasiveness was infuriating.My blood pumped faster, hotter, angrier.“Why can’t you give me a yes or a no?”

“Axel,” she started, but nothing else followed.

“Here, let me show you how it sounds.Cora, I am deeply invested in our relationship.I would kill another human being to keep you in my life.Your happiness is literally more important than my own.The only thing I want to do more than launch this business with my brothers is become your husband and have kids with you.”

Silence flooded the line, but it wasn’t long before I caught the muffled hiccup of a sob.

“Cora, what the fuck is going on with you?”I shouted, my voice echoing in the stairwell.The double doors swung open then, two students eyeballing me as they headed downward.

“Things have been weird around here, Axel,” she said, her voice thick with emotion.

“It’s your dad.”

“It’s more than that,” she whispered.

“I can’t help you if you don’t talk to me.Babe, we need a beach session.”

“Now?”

“Yes.Emergency beach meeting.”The beach meetings always put us right.Searching for the beach glass that resembled each other’s eye color calmed in a way nothing else could.I knew that if we had a shot at fixing this, it would happen on the beach.The Hamptons were a trek and a half from where I stood right now, but I’d go, even if it took me until midnight.

“I can’t.”

“What?Then let’s do it tomorrow.”

“No, I…I can’t.”Her voice was thick with tears.

The rejection was so stunning I grappled for air for a moment.“Okay.Then when are you coming home?It’s almost Christmas.Let’s just go together when you’re back.”

“I’m not coming home this year.My parents have already flown out to LA for Christmas.I—” Her voice faltered but she didn’t pick up her train of thought.I mulled over her words.If her parents were out there, then they were probably putting a lot of pressure on her.

“Did they find out about the engagement?”

“Yes.”

“Jesus, Cora, why didn’t you tell me?”I slapped my palm against the smooth wall, creating a loudbang!“That’s news, you know?That’s some fucking news you should share with me.”

“I haven’t had a chance,” she said, her voice watery again.“I-I-I’ve been so busy.”

“Busy?I—” My voice faltered as a tidal wave of emotion swept through me.“Clearly.You’re so busy you can’t even talk to your fiancé.How are we gonna make a marriage work if you can’t even talk to me while we’re engaged?”

“Axel, you’re just…doing itagain,” she hissed.

“Doing what?”

“You’re being overbearing.”

“You think that me wanting to talk to myfiancéeis overbearing?”

“I think you do a lot of things in a really overbearing way,” she snapped.

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