“I’m going to marry her.”
The pronouncement is met with silence, and a few sly, knowing smiles. Gray, for her part, simply meets my eyes with her own stony gaze.
“You don’t know anything about her.” My sister’s voice is flat, giving nothing of her feelings away. It’s a skill she cultivated at a young age, and even now my heart aches for the need she had to learn it.
“I know she’s mine.” That’s all I need, but I understand if my siblings don’t see it that way.
It’s Elias who speaks now, his voice gruff with the anger that always seems to be simmering just beneath the surface. “She could have family, friends who will come looking for her.She stole a fucking church van, Ax. Means she’s part of a community.”
“And they’ll mourn her loss,” I say with a shrug. “As soon as anyone comes across that van and puts the pieces together, they’ll assume she wandered out into the woods and succumbed to the elements during the storm. There’s no reason for them to look for her, and certainly no reason for them to come looking here.”
My family exchanges meaningful glances before Ford speaks up. “And what about her?”
“I told you. She’smine.”
“I understand.” Ford’s voice is patient in that way he has. While he may be as cutthroat as the rest of us when push comes to shove, his heart is far more tender. If things had been different for us, I have no doubt he would have gone to medical school and become the best goddamn doctor the world had ever seen. “But if she’s part of a community, she’s going to miss her people. Is it really fair of you to keep her trapped here?”
“No.” It’s the honest answer, even if it’s not the one that appeases my family. “But we can’t send her back, either. We’ve taken enough risks, calculated as they’ve been, by growing our business and helping out our friends on the island. The last thing we need is someone we have no control over out there in the world talking about us.”
“He has a point,” Grayson says, her dark eyes never leaving mine. “Moving the lumber to and from the island was only worth the risk because Maxwell could guarantee our family’s safety. And because he writes checks with big fat fucking zeros on them. Melanie is a wildcard. And there’s no telling what she might pick up while she’s stuck here with us. Sending her home afterward is far too risky.”
“We put it to a vote.” Bram runs his gaze over the rest of our siblings before returning to me. As the second oldest,technically, he’s always been my rock, my conscience when I can’t see the forest for the trees. “It’s how we’ve always made decisions, even before mom and dad died. I don’t see why this should be any different.”
Unease settles in my gut. The thought of leaving my fate up to the whims of my family doesn’t sit right, but Bram has a point. It is how we’ve always done things, and being the eldest doesn’t give me the right to shuck our family traditions out the window.
“A vote, then. All those in favor of Melanie staying, raise your hands.”
All but one hand slowly raises in the air. Ford is the only holdout, which actually helps to ease the churning in my gut. If Elias was against this, I know I’d have a fight on my hands, but Ford is only sticking to his guns out of worry for my Little girl. As soon as he sees how happy she is here with us, I have no doubt he’ll change his mind.
“It’s settled then.” A slow smile curves Gray’s lips. “I guess we’re planning a wedding.”
Melanie
“Rise and shine, little one.”
The soft, feminine voice pulls me from my slumber, but I don’t recognize it at first. Whoever that voice belongs to, it certainly isn’t my mother, or any of the women in the church.
It isn’t until I open my eyes, blinking blearily at my surroundings that I remember. Fleeing my own wedding, thevan running out of gas, ending up in a house full of terrifying giants.
And Auntie Gray, the owner of the voice. Crouched beside the couch, she runs a hand over my hair. “There you are. Time to get up, now. We have lots of work to do before the ceremony.”
Sitting up, I rub at my eyes. I’ve always hated the way I feel after a nap, groggy and disconnected from the world around me. The feeling is even more pronounced now, waking up in this strange place. So it takes me a moment for her words to really land. “Ceremony?”
“Mmhmm.” With an ease to rival Axel’s strength, she picks me up off the couch and settles me on her hip as she heads for the stairs. “Your Daddy is very anxious to get you tied down, so to speak. Though he might decide to take that literally if you fight him too much.”
“Tied down?” My brain is still too muddled from the nap and I can’t seem to focus. “What do you mean?”
At the top of the stairs, we turn right and head down a long hall to the very last room. Unlike the rest of the house which has a much more masculine influence, this room is more feminine, but in a quiet, earthy kind of way rather than with frills and bows. The large canopy bed is lighter than the other furniture, though it’s still gigantic, and it’s covered with a comforter in a deep blue that pairs beautifully with the green and purple silk of the throw pillows on top.
“Is this your room?” I ask, though I already know the answer.
“It is.” Setting me down in front of a large vanity, she winks at me in the mirror. “No boys allowed.”
For the first time since I woke up in this house, happiness flits through my veins. There’s something about being in this space where the men aren’t allowed that makes me feel that sisterhood with Auntie Gray that was missing before. “Really? So if Axel?—”
In the reflection, Auntie Gray’s eyebrow kicks up toward her hairline. “Daddy. You call him Daddy, Melanie.”
Okay, apparently not enough of a sisterhood for her to drop that whole nonsense. “IfDaddywanted to spank me, I could just hide out in here?”
