Page 29 of Knot Your Bridezilla (High Fructose Corn Syrup Verse #2)
DAVID
This was not at all how I expected meeting Avril’s family would go.
I thought that maybe we would meet at a restaurant, or at her house.
Instead, the address that her father sent me was an office building.
Suddenly I felt underdressed in my button-up and gray slacks.
This felt more like I was there for a job interview than meeting my fiancée’s dads.
When I got to the interview room, there were over a dozen men all glaring at me like they were the judge, jury and executioner—all there to come to uncover my horrible, horrific crimes.
One thing that struck me when I met them was that all the men in the room were noticeably handsome. More than one of the younger men and some of the older ones as well belonged on the covers of magazines, or walking down runways.
Which didn’t make any sense.
If these men were Avril’s family, and she was used to seeing such handsome men all the time… why the hell did Avril always choose such ugly guys for her dates?
I guess it didn’t matter anymore. It was me that Avril was marrying.
Anyway, I sat down in the empty chair—the only one facing them all down, as each of these men stared daggers at me.
They glared at me like they would happily rip me to pieces if I even thought about hurting Avril—and honestly, that put me at ease.
Avril had the survival instincts of a panda—which didn’t sound that bad, except that pandas are clumsy as hell, eat nothing but shitty bamboo and don’t even want to reproduce. Why are they so bad at existing, anyway? They should at least want to live, right?
So, it was good to see that Avril had so many men in her corner, ready to fight for her if one of her poor romantic decisions tried to waltz back into her life and make problems for her.
The man who was clearly pack lead—even seated it was obvious he was built like a whole mountain, with flowing auburn hair and biceps made for ripping apart the skulls of his enemies—he leaned forward, glaring down at me like I was some naughty pet his kids had dragged into his house and had just made a puddle on his shoe.
“What are your intentions with our daughter?”
Uhh. They knew that I was her fiancé, right? Did they just need me to say it out loud?
“I want to marry her.”
“How long have you known Avril?” A tattooed man with burn marks asked me next.
“About five months now.”
“Don’t you think that marrying her now is a little too soon?” The burned and tatted man asked next.
I scratched my head. Well, obviously, marrying someone after knowing them for a few months was too soon. But admitting it to her brothers and fathers seemed like it was backstabbing Avril somehow.
“I knew almost from the first moment that I met her I wanted to marry her. Ideally, we would have had more time to date, but Avril had already put her heart into all of the wedding planning. She really put together a dream wedding,” I shrugged.
Avril had shown me some of the plans, and I had to admit that it was pretty intense.
She had spreadsheets . She was consulting Pinterest boards that she had made over a decade ago to color coordinate her wisteria archway to the seating sign.
“I’m not going to be the man who takes that away from her.
I want her to be happy, even if that pushes our relationship timeline forward a bit. ”
“How do you feel about the fact that she originally started planning this wedding for another man?” asked her dad with long white hair and piercing blue eyes that were currently narrowed at me, as if he was laying a careful trap to catch me being emotionally toxic.
“I think that her ex was an idiot.” That was putting it mildly. I can’t even imagine how someone could have a girl like Avril in their grasp, and then decide to fuck it all up. “Anyone who would let a girl like Avril go is making a huge mistake. I will not be repeating his stupidity.”
I could already sense some of the tension in the room fading, as the glares on Avril’s fathers’ faces shifted to begrudging respect.
Some of her brothers’ attention was fading as well.
One of them had actually started texting somebody underneath the desk.
Were the siblings bored because they didn’t get to beat me up?
I guess that was a good thing? Did that mean that I was now allowed to marry Avril?
“And what do you do?”
“I’m a business owner. I own The Thirsty Pearl.”
One of her brothers muttered, “That bar has the best Pilsner. You can’t get it anywhere else in New Oxford.”
“Well then, you should come to the bar sometime.” I nodded respectfully to the men.
This was weird, but I could vibe with their protectiveness.
“Clearly, all of us are here because our love for Avril brought us together, and that deserves a celebration. Food and drinks are on me. We’re going to be family soon. ”
The pack lead raised an eyebrow. “I like you. It seems like you make my daughter happy.” He smiled in a way that was casually menacing. “Make sure that things stay that way. I’d hate to kill you.”