“Seriously?” she hisses.
“Get used to it.”
Her face is pink and her smile is small and bitten off.
My chest swells. “Youwillget used to it, Bailey.”
The flush spreads to her neck. Is this what marriage would be like? Making my future wife blush in public? If so, sign me up. She is deliciously bitable when she blushes. She is also, to my great surprise, really fucking nervous.
She keeps smoothing her hands down her dress. She wore adress, like she has someone to impress, and it makes my chest pinch every time I look at her.
I think, and she would never admit it, that she so badly wants to belong. She already does with my siblings, but she has no idea.
Sienna’s smile is evil. “So, Tristan, how’s the spouse search?”
I throw a piece of bread at her, and she laughs, and the tension cracks.
“Congratulations, you two.” Emory squeezes Katie’s knee and she seems to settle into herself. Under her nerves and her sweaty palms, I see a flicker of the woman she will be inthe decades to come. Confident, calm under pressure, loyal to a fault, full of heart and feelings that are too big for her to contain. A leader to rival Emory as she comes into her own, and god, I can’t wait to see it. I drop a kiss on her shoulder, and my siblings groan.
“Tristan, gross,” Sienna exclaims. “Prepare a girl first.”
Katie is laughing and blushing until my sister slides her the phone. “Here. Say hi to Whit. And then pick dinner.”
“I need to pick?” Katie looks briefly uncertain.
“It’s tradition.” Emory curls next to Aiden and he tucks an arm around her, almost unconsciously. They are impossibly connected, and I can’t wait to have that with Katie. “New family members have to pick dinner.”
“Hello, sister,” Whit says from the screen.
“Stop pressuring her.” Everyone turns to me, brows raised. “Katie doesn’t have to marry me unless she wants to.”
“I want to.”
All heads swing her way. My heart is in my throat. “What was that?”
She’s biting her lip, trying not to smile. “I’ll marry you. Um, if it helps with the inheritance stuff. I’ll totally marry you.”
“That’s the only reason?” I growl.
Everyone is laughing, but I have eyes only for Katie. “I’m doing this over later. Better.”
She grins at me. “Make it good.”
“We need a plan.” I turn to the room. “Grandfather was…let’s sayhesitantat the thought of my marrying her.” I wrap my hand around Katie’s and squeeze so she knows we stand together. “I am willing to accept a fight from him, but what I’d like is to fight fire with fire. I want him out of the business and out of our personal lives.”
Whit and Sienna are sitting up straighter, nodding. Aiden looks thoughtful.
“Ideas?”
Aiden leans forward, elbows on his knees. “The twins marry. Mom modified their trusts years ago so they get shares before thirty. We can all inherit enough shares to oust him before your next birthday.”
Whit and Sienna nod, and my heart swells. “You’d do that?”
“Of course we would.”
“Mostly for Katie,” Sienna says, and I roll my eyes.
“What if you just—took over?” Katie asks quietly. “I mean, I don’t want to overstep.”
