Crouching to be eye-level with my sister, she runs a hand through her hair in a loving gesture. “The only princess here is you, but thank you!”
I watch my sister gaze at Amelia, amazed as she shakes her head.
“I wanna look like you when I’m older.”
A look crosses Amelia’s face at my sister’s sudden confession. “You know what’s so cool?”
“What?”
“The fact that everyone looks different. I think this world would be super boring if everyone looked the same.”
Stella nods, a thoughtful expression on her face.
“I think you’re beautiful just the way you are. We would all be boring if we looked the same.”
“Does that mean I’m cool?” Stella’s hopeful voice makes me feel things for Amelia that should be forbidden—they are, but my heart doesn’t care.
One thing I haven’t been able to give my sister for years is a woman role model she could look up to. But watching these two have a heart-to-heart conversation that I could’ve never had with my sister sends a zap of pain that feels good in my chest.
She’s not mine yet, but I’m determined to make herours.
“The coolest.” She smiles, kissing my little sister on the cheek before standing up.
“We have to go. Meet you guys at the gala?” I say to my bandmates.
Nodding their heads, they both bid Stella good-bye before I hear Rowan’s Aston Martin zoom down my quiet street.
“I guess I’m your driver for today,” I say over my shoulder while grabbing my keys.
“Sadly,” she teases.
I watch her as she walks into my kitchen and pauses, looking straight at the window ledge, where a thin little vase sits with one dainty flower.
“That looks like a flower in the bouquet you gave me,” she states, confused.
This girl has me so wrapped around her finger. I didn’t think of hiding the evidence before she came over, but instead of acting like a coward, like I normally would, I own up to my intentions.
“I kept one, so I’d know when I needed to buy you more.”
She plucks the flower from the vase and gazes down at it like it’s the best thing she’s ever seen. “You purposely kept one flower so you’d know when to get me more?”
I clear my throat. “A pretty girl like you always needs something beautiful in her presence to remind her of her own beauty when she doesn’t feel it.”
From the way her eyes light up, it’s like I told her I’d buy the entire galaxy for her. I would if she asked me. I’d rather be a poor man with the girl that brings so much sunlight into life rather than be rich and alone, living a life without her.
“You know what’s beautiful?” Her voice is as smooth as honey as she breaks the silence.
I raise a brow in question as she walks toward me, stops a few feet away, and places a hand over my racing heart.
“This.”
“There’s nothing beautiful about me, honey,” I whisper, hypnotized by her glistening eyes.
“If only you knew,” she whispers back.
She ruins our intense moment when she hits my nose with the flower and winks.
* * *
