Page 31

“Can you really blame her?” she asked. “Dakota, you come from a very conservative family. This is a pretty big ask.”

“But—”

“But nothing,” she went on. “Your momma’s loved you all your life, and she’s been preparing for a certain outcome. She’s expected you to grow up and fall in love with someone. To get married, to give her grandkids…”

“And I’m still doing all that,” I jumped in. “That stuff is still going to happen. That’s the part she doesn’t get.”

“Yes, but sharing me?” She blinked, and her blue eyes flashed silver for a moment. “With three other guys? That’s not something she ever expected.”

She was right of course, but it didn’t make the situation any better. And it didn’t assuage my anger toward my mother, who’d been pretty vehemently against coming over for the holidays… so much so that we’d actually raised our voices at each other.

In all my years, it was something I’d never done.

“We can’t get married in a church,” Sammara went on.

“So what?”

“So what?” she repeated. “Dakota, look at it from her perspective. That little fact alone might be crushing to her. And now she’ll have to share her grandchildren too. Not just with her daughter-in-law, but with other guys, who have children by me as well. Children she should see as her grandchildren but probably won’t.”

I swallowed bitterly. All she was doing was convincing me I was right. And that my mother was wrong.

“If she can’t accept you I don’t need her,” I said. “I won’t even talk to her anymore.”

“Dakota! Don’t say that!”

“No, I mean it. I’m serious.”

Sammara slid from the bed, down to the floor. She was kneeling before me now, hands on my knees. Pleading with me.

“Honey, you have a wonderful family. Parents who love you! I’m not going to let you throw that relationship away simply because your mother can’t get past what we’re doing here.”

Her expression changed, and I could see her eyes travel briefly to some far away place. Sadly, I knew where they were going.

“You’re thinking about your own parents,” I said. “Aren’t you?”

Solemnly she nodded. A lock of hair fell over one of her eyes and I swept it away.

“Look at me,” she said again. “What am I about to say?”

“That you lost them when you were young,” I replied. “You’re going to tell me to cherish mine as long as I have them. To not be so quick to throw them away.”

Her eyes were glassed over with tears, but there was a smile there too. It lit up her face. Made her even more beautiful.

“Yes, Dakota.”

“I— I get what you’re saying. But still, it’s you. I can’t let her disrespect you, even if she is my momma. Not now. Not ever.” I looked at her again, and this time I smiled back. “You’re going to be my wife, Sammara.”

Her smile grew wider. “Hell yeah I am.”

I could see the love in her eyes. The adoration and the compassion and the understanding. Sammara was the type of woman who didn’t need my mother’s validation. She’d love me the same no matter what, even if momma hated her.

But I could simply never let that happen.

“Damn, it’s so unfair!” I threw my head back and gazed at the ceiling in frustration. “Kyle’s family has already accepted you! Ryan’s dad… not to mention his sisters…” I shook my head. “And Jason has practically no one, so it’s already easy for him!”

It would’ve been nice to commiserate with at least one of the other guys on this, but luckily things had worked out for them. Kyle’s father had unfortunately passed, and his mother was a smiling ex-hippy who embraced our arrangement as ‘free love’. Ryan had only recently gotten in touch with his biological father — thanks to Sammara — so he adored her by default. Ditto for his two half-sisters. They’d actually come down for two weeks over the summer, laughing and playing and swimming in the lake. Not even once blinking an eye at the idea that we were in a five-way committed relationship.

“So what do I do?” I asked numbly. “I mean, what can I say to her to make her come around?”