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“You’re—” I swear. “—scary.
She frees a preciously small sound, then caution touches her words. “Wynn-Wynn?”
“Yeah, sweetheart?”
“I’d like to begin planning our wedding.”
I shudder.
“I’d like it to be on Christmas. I’d like to send an invitation to my parents. And I’d like to meld the planning for it with our other seasonal plans. I’d like to invite my parents to everything we do, to see how much time for me they’ll make. I want to see if they’ll come to their only daughter’s wedding, even if it means passing up on the work events they normally pack into the day. I want to know if they’ll pick their clients over me every time or if they’ll show me they can change. I want to know if I’m a priority, and I want to know if they can learn to see me and my world in a new light. All throughout everything, I’d like you to be whatever the—” She swears. “—you are, because right now? I don’t know how much of their schedule they’ll bother to clear in an effort to lecture me back toward their idea of sanity, but I do know you’ll be here. With me. Every single day. Forever. And if they surprise me, if supporting or at least respecting my decisions is possible for them, I want them armed with the truth of who I’ve chosen. No pretenses. No pretending. I want them to see you as you are, because you are the man I love. Can you do that for me?”
Burying my face against her neck, I kiss. “Yeah, baby.” I lick, and nip, and bite until she turns into putty and makes a noise that sets my heart off. “I can do anything for you.”
Breaths ragged, she says, “Even wait until Christmas…? Even if—” She shivers. “—even if I can’t ever go back to sleeping alone?”
I chuckle. “Oh, babygirl. You really must like it rough…because now you’re begging me for torture.” Nevertheless, I scoop her up and plop onto my side, settling in as I free a low growl. “You’ll behave until we’re married?”
“If you tell me to, I’ll be good.”
I sigh. “And if I tell you to spin more depraved suggestions instead?”
She smiles against my skin. “I’ll do as I’m told.”
What a dangerous game we’re playing.
“Christmas, huh?” I murmur. That’s mere weeks away.
She yawns, delicate lashes fluttering against my skin. “Mm. Surely by Christmas…my parents will have had enough opportunities to prove they are capable of letting me make my own decisions.”
“After a lifetime, you’re giving them weeks to change their beliefs?”
“After a lifetime…no. It’s only been about half a decade since they should have started treating me differently. But after half a decade, I’m finally ready to show them that things have changed. If I break something between us in the process, so be it.”
“You won’t regret this?” I ask.
“I have no intention of acting in a manner I might regret. My hope is that my parents will see what I want for the first time in their lives and accept it. If they don’t…is finally letting myself live without shame or cowardice anything to regret?”
Clutching her, I say, “No, it isn’t.”
Chapter 16
◼
Ahh, parents… Can’t exist without them. Obviously.
December
Properly, I sit in Mr. and Mrs. Winslow’s cozy kitchen, across the table from Mr. and Mrs. Winslow themselves. Tense, I keep my breath held and wait for a parental smack of common sense to hit me in the face.
Instead, Mrs. Winslow turns the wedding invitation I made on Canva and printed at Staples this morning over. She hums. “I’m…not certain we’re the best judges here, honey.”
I look between them. “What do you mean?”
“We met Alister two weeks before he legally married August.” Mr. Winslow smiles fondly. “He showed up and laid out a plan that involved coercing our daughter into marrying him via tying her extended family up and ‘hypnotizing’ you and me as his vampire thralls, remember?”
Mrs. Winslow beams. “We said ooh, fun and jumped on board.”
“More than that, though,” Mr. Winslow continues. “We trusted that August would make whatever decision was right for her, regardless of the fantasy plot surrounding it all, and we were grateful, given the odd situation they’d built, that the guy she might marry valued our role in her life as much as he did.” Mr. Winslow cups his jaw. “I fear our parenting style is completely opposite your parents’. I also hate to say it, but after having met your mother the other day, I think your parents are probably going to take an announcement like this as an attack even if you weren’t planning to get married for an entire year. Ultimately, you’re telling them that you’re going to do something they don’t want you to do. No amount of respect on your end is likely to get through to them no matter how you frame it.”
