Page 16 of Theirs for the Holidays

He nods and the others seem to be in agreement with that. “A couple months, then?”

“That’s a little early for us to be here to be her dates to this wedding, isn’t it?” Rhett wants to know.

I just shrug. “Not really if you think about it. Andrew’s your brother, so you would have been here anyway. And it’s not like we’re strangers. We already knew each other, so we’re justbuilding on what we already had and making it into something more.”

Sawyer raises an eyebrow. “You’ve put some thought into this.”

“Not really. It just… makes sense, right? It’s how it would be if this was a real relationship, so that’s how we should move forward so people don’t get suspicious.” The last thing I wanted to deal with was people poking too hard at the story and trying to find holes in it. This was going to be tricky enough without all that.

“Well, we can say whatever you want and we can kiss and hold hands and all that, but I’m not doing pet names. Pet names are stupid.”

As if on cue, Rhett and Lennox roll their eyes. “Why? Because a pet name means there’s some kind of permanence to the relationship?” Lennox says, keeping his voice light, but there are barbs in the words either way.

“One day you two are going to have to get some new material,” Sawyer snaps back.

“That’s fine, Sawyer,” I say, cutting in before it gets heated. “You can just call me by my name. You’re already doing enough.” I glance up at the three of them, feeling a little shy and full of emotions. “Um… thank you. For doing this. You didn’t have to. It would have been a lot easier to just stay out of it, and I really appreciate it.”

As long as we manage to stick to the story and not give anything away, hopefully this will all be worth it.

7

LENNOX

Violet looks sovulnerable as she talks, thanking us for doing this for her. It’s clear she wasn’t looking forward to going to this wedding alone, especially if having to deal with the three of us in her house is a better deal.

“It’s actually fucked up that Andrew dumped you and is marrying your sister,” I tell her, folding my arms across my chest. “It’s only right that we give Andrew a taste of his own damned medicine.”

Violet’s eyes widen, and she laughs softly. “It’s… yeah,” she says, shaking her head. “Do you know you’re the first person to even mention how weird it is? Everyone else in my life seems to think that it’s completely normal for him to dump me after so long and then get engaged to Isabelle. My mom even thinks it’s sweet.” She scrunches up her nose and then sighs. “I think she’s even more excited that Andrew’s marrying Isabelle than she would have been if he’d married me.”

Her voice is sad when she says it, and there’s an edge of bitterness to it. She could be even more bitter and it would be justified, if you ask me.

It just makes me mad to hear her sound like that, to know that her family treats her that way. That my brother treated her that way.

“Well, your mom is an idiot,” I bite out. “No offense.”

Violet smiles again, brighter this time. “None taken.” It seems like that lifts some of her sadness away, making her a bit lighter, and I’ll take that.

“My bakery is closed today,” she says, continuing on. “But I need to run some errands. I know you all have your own lives and didn’t plan for this to throw a wrench into them, so please don’t feel obligated to sit around here or hang out with me all the time. You can do whatever you want. Or whatever you were going to be doing if you weren’t pretending to date me.”

Sawyer shrugs and stretches his arms overhead. “We’ll go with you. We should be seen together, right? If we don’t go out in public the rumor mill will start spinning stories about trouble in paradise or something.” He rolls his eyes. “We all know how small towns work. If we’re all out running errands, it’ll sell the lie and people will coo about how we’re joined at the hip and all that.”

It’s logical, and he’s right, but Sawyer deciding for me what I’m going to do gets my hackles up. “I didn’t know we’d hired you as the boss of this trip,” I snap at him. “Do I need to ask you when I’m allowed to take a shit too?”

“Am I wrong?” Sawyer asks, giving me a look.

I glance away. “No. We should all go.”

“Then it’s not a problem, is it?”

“You can all come if you want,” Violet interjects. “Give me like twenty minutes to get ready?”

We all agree and split up to get ready to head out.

I slept on the floor in Violet’s office, not bothered by only having a couple pillows and blankets for padding. Being in thearmy made it so I can fall asleep anywhere if I have to, and I’ve slept in worse conditions by far.

I sit on the floor, grateful for the quiet.

The shower turns on in the bathroom, and I can hear Violet humming to herself through the wall as I pull out my phone and respond to some quick work emails.