Page 16 of The Wedding Hoax

He paused for a moment before he went on. “Simone and I are engaged. And we’ll be getting married. Soon.”

Grace gasped and placed a hand over her heart. “How soon?”

“Not so soon that we won’t be able to send out invitations, I hope,” Jonah said. “I do have a few colleagues who’d love to attend, but they’d need more notice than this.”

“I’m sorry if my relationship doesn’t take into account your work colleagues, Dad.”

“Do you already have a dress picked out?” Ruby interrupted, her gaze landing on mine. “Wait. Do you already have a venue picked out?”

“I—um—” I started to sweat under the pressure. I was also out of answers since Harry and I hadn’t gone over any wedding day specifics.

Fuck.

The jig was up.

I began rehearsing an apology in my head for when Harry’s family called us out.

“Simone is probably just as surprised as the rest of you,” he continued. “In the past, I’ve been reluctant to commit to an actual wedding date but seeing her with you all now?”

He let out a deep breath. “It just hit me that I need to lock this down. This needs to be official between us. Because Simone belongs here. With you. With me.”

Grace smiled over at me. “I think you’re right about that, son.”

“I’m your best man, right?” Sean joined the conversation. “I’m guessing it’s either me or Paul, but Paul’s not family.”

“He’s basically family,” Harry shot back before he took his seat.

“Dad! Tell Harry that he has to make me his best man!” Sean said in a mock whiny voice.

Harry rolled his eyes and gave me a look as if to say, See what I mean?

As I took another bite of my dessert, I strangely felt more at home than I had in a very long time.

* * *

“What was his house like? Did they have a bunch of rich people stuff?”

Taylor was on the other end of the line as I pulled a pair of jeans out of my closet. After dinner with Harry’s family last night, we’d decided that he should meet my family, too.

Even if my mom was all the family that I had left.

“Oh, it was full of rich people stuff. Taylor, I could hardly process what I was seeing. Even their light fixtures looked like they cost thousands of dollars.”

“What about his family? Were they nice to you?”

“The nicest.” I held the jeans up to my frame as I looked in a mirror. “So nice that it was weird. He always seems so tortured when he talks about his family.”

“Rich boy problems.” Taylor laughed. “I still can’t believe you’re going through with this, though.”

“Trust me. I can barely believe it myself.” I threw the jeans back in the closet. “But if this helps my mom get that surgery she needs, I’ll keep it up as long as it takes.”

“Shit. Does your mom even know about all this?”

“Well, by the end of the night, she’ll at least know that I’m getting married.”

“Right. Good luck with that, babe.” Taylor sounded like she was grimacing.

“Thanks for all your support.” I chuckled as I walked back to my closet. “I’ll keep you posted about how it goes.”

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