AllFreeNovel
Share Us
I narrow my gaze. “The movie was that awful?”
She rears back. “It was thatbeautiful. Oh, come on. You know what I’m talking about, right? Tell me at least one of your girlfriends has forced you to sit through one of those.”
“What girlfriends?” I deliver a sound kiss to her disbelieving pout. “Let’s just say you can be my first. I’ve read many of the books they’re based on, so that has to count.”
I hope for an equally breezy comeback, but the melancholy memory only persists in her eyes. “They all teased me when I couldn’t stop crying during the scene,” she murmurs. “But I couldn’t help myself. I didn’t even want to stop. It was…a revelation. An incredible but confusing one. I didn’t understand how something I’d perceived as so ugly was actually so wrenching. So wonderful. So jaw-droppingly beautiful.”
I hear every word she’s saying, but my expression clings to solemnity after her first statement. “They made fun of you? Forcrying?”
She drops a hand to my chest and lightly bats at me. “Adolescent girls giggle about everything from phallic-shaped clouds to soda commercials. You should know this, Professor. Some of them are determined to stay frozen at that age, even in college.”
I give up a reluctant grunt. “That’s barely an excuse, even on their behalf. But Kell was there too, right? Didn’t she defend your honor?”
“Who do you think kept me in a decent tissue supply?” I return. “Though to this day, I suspect selfish motivations. She may be the queen of sneaking feelings past others, but not her own sister. My big, weepy ball was plenty lubricated by whatshewas holding back from those twits.”
She smiles through that last part, but it’s not without a few fresh tears. I look at them carefully as they absorb tiny prisms, gravity pulling them down until I catch them with broad strokes of my thumbs. Not to erase them away. To treat them like the precious stars they are. The badges of the struggles she’s endured, the hardships she’s survived.
To much of the world, she and Kell are princesses in a castle on a Hollywood hill. But they’re not close enough to see the castle has cracks and enemies are lurking at the ramparts. Even in the form of jealous twelve-year-old girls.
“Well, none of the twits get invitations to the wedding,” I whisper, kissing the tip of her nose. “And if you want a day just like the one in the movie, then—”
She pushes fingertips against my mouth with a rough-edged laugh. “What I want…whatwewant…doesn’t matter. Your mom will find that out quickly enough too. Nothing will be more important about this wedding than every optic, designed for every camera angle from every sponsor, all conveying exactly the messaging my mother desires. Our biggest responsibilities of the day will be showing up, hitting our marks, and speaking our vows. And likely very little else.”
During her rundown, I say little. React even less. There’s no need to feed her fuel or put up an argument. Kara knows Veronica much better than I do. For that matter, more than most of the world. She doesn’twantto be making these assertions about her own mother, as I can see from the contortions across her face, but fighting her own assertions is an even scarier prospect for her right now.
“Oh, my God,” she finally adds, backhanding her forehead. “I’m sorry. I’m rambling. And believe me, nobody wants to be wrong about this more thanme. If Mother really told us that nothing matters more about our wedding day than our own happiness…”
When she extends a long sigh into more silence, I drop my hands around hers.
“What?” I utter. “If thatwerethe case, you’d do what, Kara?”
Her head jolts all the way up. She searches my gaze with her own, again with those furtive little sprints of her big browns, until her whole body jerks in the same unpredictable way.
“You’re…serious,” she states.
“As Charon on the Styx.”
“Not funny.”
“Wasn’t the intention. I’ve met Charon, remember?”
Her fingers twist mine tighter. “I’ll never forget.Ever.”
When she looks ready to lose it again, enforced by the dark hell memories that are my own stupid fault, I squeeze her hands in a new way. The rhythmic compressions are a prelude to my roguish grin.
“And now you’re skirting the subject. Come on, out with it. What would you do if our wedding day was all ours to control?”
She rocks back on her feet. Not very far, perhaps a few inches, until she starts a back-and-forth kind of swish. It’s adorable, but even more so when she arches up to capture my lips on a couple of those girlish pass-throughs.
“Hmmm.” One playful smack. “You mean something that doesn’t involve a beach and a yurt?” Another kiss, longer and mushier. “And a dog named Bubba, of course.”
“Well.” On her third sweep up, I pull her in close. “Can’t forget Bubba.”
She presses up and in, sealing our lips tighter. But I’m glad when she keeps the tongue contact to the barest of touches. Longer waltzes with her tonsils would have my cock screaming commands about getting her prone in the space we seem to have to ourselves tonight.
A conclusion I’ve grasped with scarily lucky timing.
Kara and I aren’t nearly finished with our lip lock before a loud tone sounds from the elevator landing. As we break contact and look up together, one of the leaf-shaped lights in the floor comes to life. Embedded beneath its clear cover are the wordsCar Approaching.
