Page 42 of Wishing Upon a Monster
“I would feel more comfortable in paying for things myself,” Olan replied.
“I would prefer that no one pay for anything at all!” I criedout. “Honestly, I’m happy where we are at, Momma. Do we have to talk about this right now? You haven’t even tried to get to know him yet, and you are talking about a wedding ceremony?”
We walked into Spellbinder’s café, bypassing the hostess stand completely and going out back to their charming patio where, to my growing horror, the rest of my family sat.
Like my mother, they were dressed in pale shades for their dress shirts paired with khaki-colored slacks, and leather dress shoes––except for Adriel, who was wearing Toms.
I reached out and pulled a strand of Anna’s hair. “You, Ainsley, and Momma, huh?”
She hissed, whipping her head around and glaring at me.
“Oh, don't go blaming your sister,” my dad said as he stood, extending his hand to Olan, who shook it. My brothers each gave Olan nods.
Male posturing bullshit.
“We bullied your sisters into letting us all join your luncheon last minute,” he said, gesturing for us to sit.
Olan looked at the small wrought iron chairs in front of us and waved his hand at them. Black smoke and gold shimmering magic surrounded the tiny seats, transforming them into a larger bench seat with a back tall enough for him to lean back, and plenty of room for me to join him.
We sat, with me purposefully sitting on the bench andnotOlan’s lap.
I could feel the mental pouting from him.
“Hush, you.”I situated myself, putting a napkin in my lap.
“What has my daughter all in a snit?” My father asked, passing us menus.
“Momma and Ainsley are planning my wedding without consulting me and are trying to manipulate Olan into agreeingto things before they even asked him how he was doing today!” I growled.
Olan put a hand on my knee,“Min skat, I was not trying to upset you.”
"Ladies,” My father tsked, “I thought we were going to let them lead when it came to how they wanted to publicly announce their relationship? If you keep pushing your wants on her, she will leave. Remember what happened last time.”
"Last time wasn’t good enough for her,” Aiden said, with the rest of my brothers echoing similar sentiments.
I sighed, “So you’re just excited, Lee?” I leaned back on my seat, looking up at the blue spring sky.
“Yeah,” she said quietly.
I turned to her, my head still resting on the back of my chair. “Kenton was a tool,” I said.
Antiono, snorted, which set off Aiden and Adriel. Then we were all laughing.
After the laughter naturally died down, I let out a breath. Sitting up and facing my family, “I’m sorry I let Kenton treat me badly enough to give Lee trauma.”
“Hey!” Lee protested, “that’s not why I have trauma!”
My father cut her off. “We overstepped with the Hemlock boy. We forbade you from being with him, your brothers gave him a hard time, and we created this Romeo and Juliet type situation when there didn't need to be one.”
“Thankfully, you didn’t use his family’s potions to fake your own deaths to escape us,” Antiono said.
“No, but to be fair, he encouraged the separation, though.” I played with my napkin, twisting it in my lap. “Then we broke up, and I kind of threw myself into work hardcore...”
“So hardcore that one night you came home with a husband?” my father asked. “We’d like to hear about that, if y'all'd tell us?”
“Sure,” I said, looking to Olan, “it all started with some red caps...”
I told my parents and siblings about almost dying, and Olan saving my life. He added in how I had woken him up from his almost permanent slumber, which made my mother teary-eyed, to how I realized we were in a life debt marriage contract, but how that seemed less of an issue, now, because––
