Page 34 of Enemies in Earnest

“I just don’t know why she would.”

“Because I know how much youhateit. And it was fun to watch you get all riled up year after year as you got called to the stage and auctioned off like the prized steer at the 4H.”

The whole room erupted into hysterics at my expense. At least their laughter hid the sound of the storm battering against the walls of Acacia’s building.

“You should have seen how pissed he was,” Acacia tried to tell them through gasping laughter. “He could have spit nails clear across the room had he had them. Stomping up onto the stage, staring down every woman in the room. All those nice old ladies with their fifty-dollar bids were too intimidated to even volley an opening.”

It wasn’t nearly as bad as she made it out to be. I had been annoyed. My mom, naturally, attended the auction as part of all things Candy Cane Key, but I thought I was simply her escort. I’d been totally blindsided on my participation.

“Did anyone bid on you?” Klaus asked, equally invested in the story.

I shrugged, then realized he couldn’t see me in the shadows.

“Someone did. But it was an anonymous bid, and they never even collected on their date.”

Acacia squirmed in my lap. Her ass rubbing against my thighs, as if she anticipated getting a swat across those luscious swells. I’d always suspected. Though everyone had been so tightlipped about the bidder and their donation. They’d told me the bidder didn’t want anything from me. Rather, they saw how uncomfortable I looked onstage and they'd submitted the max bid simply so I’d be freed from being on stage.

At the time I thought nothing of it. I’d simply been grateful to make a quick exit. But now, feeling Acacia in my lap, and knowing she was the one that put me up there—the pieces all fell into place.

“So I owe you a date then, I guess?” I whispered into her ear.

I felt her shoulder tilt up, sensed the smile spreading across her lips.

“We had a pretty great one already. I’d say that your tab is wiped clean.”

“And yet, there is the little issue of evening the score.” I nip at her earlobe. “I’d say that offering me up like a prized side of beef definitely makes youverynaughty. If you were mine…I don’t know if I could let that level of naughtiness go unnoticed.”

I dipped my toe into the waters, hoping she’d take the bait of my little test.

“I’m already yours, Edwin.”

Her arms snaked around my neck, and her lips came down on mine in the most gentle kiss.

“That’s what I’m doing a terrible job trying to tell you. I put you up there because I knew you’d hate it. But then, the more I saw how uncomfortable you were up there, the less I enjoyed making you squirm. I pulled you down because, well, I didn’t like seeing you suffer. It actually really bothered me.

“Yesterday, I was afraid I’d be forced to admit how much I loved you, too. Before I was ready. Because all this time, I didn’t realize that the reason it was so easy for you to get a rise out of me was because I actually cared about what you thought about me. I wanted you to like me, and every time you poked fun at me—it felt like you were rejecting me.”

There were a host of words that she’d said in that monologue while sitting on my lap. But it was a single sentence that replayed in my head on repeat. She loved me? It had to have been intentional. After all the b.s. and the petty back and forth, her coming to that realization while she sat on my lap and listed all the small things she noticed about me—just as I’d done to her a few days prior…it couldn’t be a coincidence.

“Acacia?” I asked. “Do you realize what you just said?”

“I love you, Edwin.” I felt her face directly in front of mine as she said it. “I didn’t realize it. Not right away, anyway. But it’s been there, slowly taking root over the years until I just couldn’t ignore it anymore. And well, since we might be dying tonight,” she learned forward and buried her face in my neck. “I figured I may as well unburden my soul while I still can.”

ChapterTwenty-Two

Intellectually,I knew that we were perfectly safe. Even huddled in that tiny storage closet with the tiniest beams of light, and the shrieks and cries of all of my friends drowning out the noise of the storm, I had zero doubts about our safety.

But damn, high winds, crashing waves, and the incessant drone of emergency sirens did exactly as one would expect– Scared the living shit out of you. Every clank, crash, and boom set my teeth on edge. Even with Edwin cradling me against his chest, whispering comforting words in my ear, I still shook with an excess of adrenaline.

When we heard the power transformer snap, then pop, and sizzle just outside my pub, the images that haunted my imagination had me cowering with consuming fear.

“I want to get married, Klaus,” Felicity called into the darkness; the battery having died on one of three lanterns already. “Right now. I want to know that if anything happens to one of us between now and when the storm ends that we’re married.”

It didn’t seem right to remind them that without a marriage certificate obtained and filed three days prior to the wedding, any vows exchanged wouldn’t be valid.

“I’m ordained!” Asher cried triumphantly. “I can marry you right now if you want.”

I could hear everyone readjusting in their seats around me. Both of the lamps went on, causing all of us to smart against the dim light. Felicity shuffled on her knees over to Klaus, removing every last centimeter of space between the two of them.

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