Page 172 of Headstrong Like Us

4 days until the wedding

Sun is out.Birds are chirping. Just another beautiful afternoon in paradise.

Really though, it’s gorgeous in Capri, and I’d probably wish we could stay longer if we weren’t counting down tothe day.A day that I’m too stupidly eager for, and I’m trying so damn hard not to smile each time I swig my water.

Right now, the small outdoor café is packed for lunch. Plaid light-blue cloths line square tables, shaded by a bright yellow awning, and theclick, click, clickof paparazzi cameras are almost drowned out with café chatter.

Banks Moretti and a couple temps do a good job barricading the media.

Cameras are usually in my peripheral. Out of sight, just background, but after what happened at the coves, I think about them more.

How SFO obtained the phones that belonged to those guys. How they ensured no one captured any pictures or videos of the girls.

How you’ll never know that the skinny-dipping dare happened or the fistfight. Those assholes won’t file assault charges, not when they coerced underage girls to take off their clothes.

You’ll never see just how livid SFO were at thecollege-agedguys. Seething on the way back to the villas, and I’ve never heard that many men curse on comms. (Farrow let me listen in.)

It always feels good knowing they care. Especially when it’d be so easy to place all the blame on the girls—or on me, for being hot-tempered and charging after the guys. I probably, definitely, should’ve waited to run, but that’ll always be hard.

My parents, aunts, and uncles praised Omega the whole night, and I was in Akara’s villa when SFO cracked a few beers, winding down after the intensity. They raised their bottles a hundred-and-one times. Toasting to every damn thing.

“To the girl squad being safe.”

“To the captain, my captain.”

“To the zip ties in the car.”

“To Farrow’s med bag.”

“To busted earpieces.”

“To Maximoff’s paracord bracelet that didn’t come in handy.”

At the end, seriousness returned, and Oscar lifted his beer bottle and said, “Kitsuwon Securities 1 – Triple Shield 0.”

So yeah, that’s where my mind descends, but it’s easy to be in the here and now at the café. Farrow is bouncing Ripley on his knees, and with alluring casual ease, he lifts his aviators to his head, the sunglasses pushing back hisblackhair.

I’m super-glued to his new hair color, probably as much as the tabloids.

I had no clue he planned to dye his hair for our wedding. But he surprised me this morning and said,“I know you have a giant, overwhelming thing for my hair this color.”

Yeah.

But he has no idea why—no idea that the first time we met, he had black hair and that my brain has tied a neat ribbon around the memory and planted lipstick kisses all over the damn thing.

It’s embarrassing.

I take a bite of pizza, watching Farrow adjust Ripley’s dark-tinted sunglasses and hat that protects his fair skin. Surprisingly, Ripley has grown used to the constant camera flashesfast.I thought it’d take a decade for him not to fuss whenever a stranger screams his name.

A decade.

God, my stomach clenches thinking he might not be with us that long. My dad and uncles think there’s a likelihood Scottie will be released from prison earlier than expected. They keep warning me that litigation will be hard, and if we fight for Ripley publicly, it’ll be harder.

I think they’re afraid of an outcome where we go to court for parental rights…and we lose. It’s possible, and it’d crush me.

Pizza goes down like a lump in my throat. I gulp more water. We just got done sightseeing and swimming, and my hair is still damp from the sea.

My whole family is around here, strolling up and down the cobblestone pathways and popping into the shops.