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“What happened?”
“I don’t want to talk about it,” she says, her voice muffled as she burrows her face into the crook of my neck.
I try to pull back and get a better look at her, but she’s holding on too tightly.
So I stroke her hair instead while studying the house over her shoulder. There’s no one at the windows or the doors, but I have a hard time believing the Marches would let Melody storm out of the house without someone coming after her. I suspect we don’t have much time alone, and it’s probably wise to figure out what’s going down here before I find myself in the middle of it.
“Come on, Mel. Tell me what happened,” I urge “I can’t help if I don’t know what’s going on.”
“They treat me like I’m an infant, incapable of making reasonable decisions, and it’s just…ridiculous.” Her arms slide from around my neck as she rocks back on her heels, pressing her hands to her flushed cheeks. “Aria ran off and got married to a guy she hadn’t dated since she was fifteen and acted like she hated for years, and everyone welcomed Nash like he was the prodigal son. I want to introduce them to a great guy I’ve been responsibly dating for weeks and suddenly it’s time for an intervention?”
Her breath rushes out, and her forehead furrows as her pained gaze meets mine. “They told me they only agreed to dinner tonight because they wanted to talk to both of us at the same time about what a ‘serious choice’ we’re making.”
I grunt. “What does that mean?” A possibility flickers at the back of my head, and I grimace. “They aren’t going to give us ‘the talk’ or something, are they? They know we’re not fifteen, right? And that we’ve known about the birds and the bees for a while now?”
Melody’s lips quirk, but she doesn’t smile. “God, no. At least I hope not, that would make it even worse.” She rolls her eyes as she crosses her arms at her chest. “I think they just want to tell us to break up because our relationship might mess up the family. Nash and Aria are together, and that’s okay, but apparently Mom and Dad and everyone else, except Aria, thinks another Geary-March matchup is a bad idea.”
“Why?” I ask, my heart lurching in my chest at the mere mention of the words “break up.”
She pulls in a breath, and her words emerge in a rush. “They think it will make things miserable for everyone else when we break up. And that it’s not fair to Nash and Aria, who are probably going to have another baby soon, to make things more complicated for them. And it’s uncomfortable for Mom and Dad. And I’m young, and what I have with you isn’t serious, so I should do what they want for the good of the family and blah blah blah. What I want or feel or think doesn’t matter, as usual.”
I start to respond, but Melody pushes on before I can speak.
“But I’m not young!” she protests, tears rising in her eyes. “I’m going to be twenty-three in a few weeks. Most of my friends are already married. Some of them even have babies already, but my family refuses to see that I’m not a little girl anymore. It makes me crazy. It makes me want to just… just…” She shakes her head with a soft growl that I can’t help but find sexy.
She’s hot when she’s angry, especially when she’s not angry with me.
“I don’t know what I want to do,” she continues, “but I can’t stay here. Let’s go somewhere. Anywhere.”
“Wait.” I catch her arm as she starts past me. “I know you’re upset, and you have every right to be, but…”
“But what?” Her eyes narrow on mine.
“I think we should go inside,” I say, hurrying on when the wrinkle between her brows becomes a furrow of betrayal. “No, they’re not being fair, but sometimes families are like that. People get focused on what’s easiest for the group, and they forget that what’s easiest isn’t always what’s best. Or even right. So…let’s go in there and show them that us, together, is what’s best and right. We’ll show them we can have a calm, mature conversation about why we intend to stay together. Hopefully, that will be enough to convince them to back off.” I shrug. “And if not, at least we can say we tried.”
Her forehead smooths and tenderness softens her eyes, those killer brown eyes I sometimes mentally compare to things like melted caramel and dark honey when I’m thinking private, cheesy thoughts about how beautiful she is.
She is so beautiful and already so important to me. I don’t want to give up on winning her family’s—and my brother’s—stamp of approval without a fight. Not when I hope to be in Melody’s life for a long, long time.
