Connie hesitantly walks into the embrace and turns her head with a questioning look as my mom doesn’t let go.
“You going to hug me like that too, mom?” I ask. “Can you please let my wife go, I don’t want to get jealous.”
“One more moment, there are a few cameras at the perimeter, and I want to make sure they have the best picture.” My mom says with a forced smile.
“You called the paps? Mom, seriously, can we just have a normal dinner?” I frown.
“We have an image that we must keep to. If we let the public know that this marriage was not on our radar, then that ruins the whole family image that helped elect your father and could help with the re-election.”
After another awkward moment, we enter the massive house and go into the sitting room.
“Now, what the hell were you thinking?” My dad bellows, his voice echoing through the room with anger evident on his face.
“Ken! Tone it down!” My mother tries to hush him by patting his arm.
“I will not.” He shoots her a look. “Seriously, Devin Michael, what were you thinking?”
“Well Father,” I hit him with a stern look, then pull Connie’s hand into mine. She scoots closer automatically and places her hand on my thigh in return. “I figured that I was an adult and could make my own decisions.”
“Be that as it may, you are always to run this stuff by me. I did not appreciate being taken by surprise the other morning. In fact, it was one of the most disrespectful things you’ve ever done. As your parents, we should have been told this news as soon, no before it happened,” he sneers.
I fight the urge to roll my eyes to not piss him off further and instead I concentrate on Connie’s hand on my thigh.
“Next week we will have a garden party here at the house, since you won’t allow a real wedding, we will just need to carve out a respectable story as to why. We have Dennis working on the details and will get those over to you both soon.” My mother, always about business and appearances says.
“That sounds great, we’d be honored to have the party here, thank you.” Connie says with a genuine smile.
“Great. Now, Constance, what do you do?”
The evening calms down as my mother and Connie talk and by the end of the night, my parents are both in love with her and a weight is lifted.
“Well, that was a good night, better than I was expecting.” I turn to her in the car on the way home.
“Parents don’t scare me,” she replies simply.
“Not even the Mayor?” I quirk my eyebrow.
“Even though your dad is the mayor, he’s still a person. He’s still a parent, just a little higher profiled than others. Once they got over the initial shock, I think they’re buying into it.”
“We’ll see at this party, just to warn you, the stunt with my mom hugging you earlier for the paps, well that will be times a hundred at the party. I guarantee that they’re going to invite the paps and whatever news outlet that they possibly can to garner positive attention to mask the fact that we surprised them with a marriage. I will warn you; your lips will get chapped.”
She looks at me confused, then nods her head. “Oh, because there’s going to have to be some PDA, I get it.”
“Well, that, yes. But there will be a lot of ass kissing.” I grin.
Chapter Fifteen
Connie
The backyard is massive, there are several round tables with string lights reaching from one end of the space to another. There are people milling about, and even I recognize a few local athletes and celebrities. This is now my life. There was even a red carpet leading up to the house.
Devin is getting us a drink and I’m left gazing at the small crowd that is here to celebrate our fake marriage.
I spot my parents and move to go and talk to them, when a hand lands on my arm.
“I thought that was you, you look gorg!” a tall, beautiful woman says.
She looks familiar. I’ve seen her before, but I’m not placing her name with her face.
“Hi,” I say mimicking the same excitement. “How are you?”
She places her hand on her chest and laughs. “You don’t remember me, that’s okay. You and Dev had quite the night. It’s me, Marisa.”
“Oh, God, I’m so sorry. I knew you looked familiar, there’s just so many people here, that I wasn’t sure.”
Marisa waves me off and smiles. “Totally okay, I just need someone to talk to. I wasn’t so sure about coming here, but I know that Devin would have appreciated it.”
“Why wouldn’t you have come? I mean I get it, one end of the country to another.”
“No, Devin is good friends with my ex, and I know that he is likely here,” she says quietly while she looks around. “That’s how I know Devin, from my ex.”
“Was it a bad break up or a good one?” I ask, enjoying the companionship since I haven’t seen Becca yet.
“It wasn’t the greatest, but we were young and dumb, and it was quite a number of years ago. But you know how it goes, seeing an ex, bringing up old feelings or anxiety.” She stops scanning the yard and then I see her face pale. I follow her line of sight and I see a very attractive man standing in a group of guys, his arm is around a beautiful brunette and they’re all laughing about something.
“That him?” I lean in and whisper.
“Yes.” She says in a sigh. “He’s gotten a lot more hotter.”
“They do that. At least some men, take Steve Carrel, when he first started out, he was this floppy dorky dude, then all of a sudden bam, silver fucking fox and someone that I would like to take home.” I joke.
“I like you.” Marisa smiles whipping her head in my direction.
“Well, you can’t say that I’m wrong, right? It’s like as you get older, the hot dads look a lot better than those guys with no chest hair and are in their twenties.”
Marisa laughs loudly and clutches onto my arm. “I agree, and time has definitely been kind to him.”
“So, why did you guys break up?” I ask.
“I messed up. I took a job across the country thinking that he would come with me, when he didn’t, I kind of cheated on him.”
“Oh,” I try to mask my dislike for the topic.
I despise cheaters. My ex cheated on me and that kind of left me paralyzed in the romance department. I’m trying to not hold judgement, she says it was a long time ago.
“It was a huge mistake. I had a job opportunity that I couldn’t pass up, I made the decision without talking to him. So I ruined our relationship in more than one way.”
“Forgive me for asking, but why cheat on him? Why not just end it?” I ask.
“Well, yeah, in hindsight that would have been what I should have done. But try telling that to a fresh out of college big girl with her first promising job opportunity.”
“Riss, I’m so glad you could come.” Devin walks up to us and hands me a drink, places his arm around my waist and pulls me to his hip.
I look up at him with a smile and he takes the opportunity to lean down and place a chaste kiss on my lips and it feels natural, like we’ve kissed a million times.