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We let Susannah pull us through her enormous house and out onto an outdoor patio that should have been on some TV show.
There was a fireplace and several mounted televisions with elaborate patio seating. All of it looked over an oasis in the middle of the otherwise dry land. Her gardening skills were on display, surrounding a massive pool with an actual lazy river and diving board. It looked like something out of a resort. And sounded like it with a few dozen people floating in the water, sitting under covered cabanas, and laughing over drinks.
The patio had an outdoor kitchen bigger than most indoor kitchens with two built-in grills and a grilling egg. A man was manning one of the grills, and the smell of hamburgers wafted toward me. I tried to keep my face neutral, but, fuck, it was hard.
He stepped away and drew Gavin into a hug. “You’re home.”
“Whitley, this is my uncle Richard.”
“The lady of honor,” Richard said genially. “A pleasure.”
“My baby,” a woman said, jumping out of her seat and sloshing her margarita as she rushed toward Gavin.
“Hi, Mom,” he said with a laugh.
They hugged, and then his father was there, giving him a hug as well. Without waiting, his mom scooped me up into a hug too.
“You must be Whitley. Oh, we’ve heard such good things about you.”
“So nice to meet you, ma’am.”
What exactly had Gavin said about me? I glanced at him, but he was just beaming at his family.
“Oh, please call me Julianne,” his mom said. “And this is my husband, Edmond.”
“We’re so happy to have you here.”
I laughed and drew back with surprise. They were all sonice. So fucking nice. Wow. My parents’ friends were all that fake nice. That sugary-sweet, backstabbing nice that put you on edge. These people weren’t like that at all.
“Sit. Sit,” Susannah said. “Whitley, can I get you a margarita?”
“Actually,” Gavin said, clearing his throat, “before we get to drinks, we have news.”
He wore a wide smile as he turned to face me, taking my hand in his. A shiver of anticipation ran down my spine.
He held my hand up so that everyone could see the ring on my finger.
“We’re engaged.”
9
GAVIN
The next several hours went by in a sort of blur of delight. My family was ecstatic. To put it mildly. My mom cried at the sight of my grandma’s ring.
Suddenly, Whitley and I were whisked around the backyard, and I was introducing Whitley to all my King cousins, plus dates and friends and children. It was an overwhelming number of people on a first visit. Whitley handled it like a champ, laughing and greeting everyone like this was a common occurrence.
“Okay, remind me of names again,” she said with another secret grin.
“There’s a lot of them. I don’t expect you to remember everyone.”
“I’m going to get it right,” she said determinedly.
“All right. Malcolm, Margaret, Trent, Nathaniel, Cora, and Lawrence. We call them Mal, Maggie, Trey, Nate, Cor, and Law.” Which I realized was probably even more confusing.
“Do they call you Gav?” she asked.
“Actually, yes.”
