“Sawyer said the same thing.”Chloe bit her lip.“It matters to me what my family thinks.I know it shouldn’t, but it does.”
“Of course, it does,” Knox said as Jesse leaned over to take her hand.
“We get that, Chloe,” Jesse said.“We’ve both had that fear, that our parents, our families wouldn’t accept us for who we are, who we love.”
Chloe curled her fingers around Jesse’s.“They did though, right?”
“Yeah, they did.”
“It was a little bumpy in the beginning for me,” Knox confessed.“I come from a Southern military family, and my dad was as old school as they come.But he loved me, and that always came through.He was my best man at our wedding.”
“I don’t think my family will be like that,” she said, voicing her biggest fear.“My mom…she has really specific ideas about how my life is supposed to go.She was so mad when I quit my job to make jewelry.”
“You don’t talk?”Jesse asked.
“We talk all the time,” Chloe said, then shrugged.“She came around.”
“So maybe she’ll come around again.”
“Maybe,” Chloe allowed, then sighed.“But there’s gonna be drama first.”
“We can handle drama,” Knox promised.“And if it makes you feel any better, I think Mo’s already come around.”
Hope bloomed in Chloe’s heart.“Really?”
Jesse squeezed her fingers.“After you left, Carrie kind of went off.Reminded her that the crap she was feeding you was the same crap other people laid on them when they fell in love thirty years ago.”
Chloe’s eyes widened.“Oh, shit.”
“It got heated,” Knox admitted.“But Mo was looking pretty shame faced by the time Carrie wound down.”
“Did you let them know you’re safe?”
Chloe winced.“I didn’t even think of it.I left my phone in my apron.”
“Well, at least you weren’t ignoring our calls on purpose,” Knox said dryly and picked up his phone from the nightstand.“Here.Call the pub, let them know where you are.”
“Okay.”She took the phone.“We’re doing this, right?”
“You, me, and the old man?”Jesse asked.“Oh, hell yes, we’re doing this.”
“We’re going to fuck up.”
“Probably,” Knox allowed.
“Definitely,” Jesse declared.
“It’s going to be complicated.”
Jesse plucked another slice from the pizza box.“Yep.”
“And sometimes hard,” Knox warned.
“Hard as balls,” Jesse agreed.
Chloe looked at them, Jesse devouring pizza like it was about to be banned and Knox watching her so patiently, that soft smile on his lips.“I think it’ll be worth it.”
Knox’s smiled deepened, his eyes twinkling.“I know it will.”
