Lex smirks. “I look forward to it.”
“Lex, cut it out.” Lorenzo points in our direction. “Don’t fucking move,” he says as he walks around the table and follows his wife out of the dining room with her sister and Ares.
It’s not until we’re alone that Lex actually looks at me. And the moment he does, his face drops. “Fuck.” It’s as if he forgot I was sitting here. “Are you okay?”
“Me?” I point to myself. “What the hell was that, Lex? Areyouokay?”
“He pissed me off,” Lex grunts. “We’re at family lunch. He shouldn’t be bringing up shit like that at the fucking dinner table.”
“Is it true? Did you really do that?” I ask him.
“Yes.” He nods. “And I’d do it again too.”
“Should have put nails in the bat first,” I blurt out before slamming my lips closed.
Lex smiles wide. “I’ll do that next time.”
“You know you don’t have to hide things from me.”
“I do actually,” he says, and I frown. “Not because I don’t trust you, Addi, but because I don’t want you to look at medifferently. I also will never put you in a situation where my crimes could be held against you.”
“Do you think the law will catch up with you?” I ask him. “We could run, right? Become different people?”
“You’d run away with me?”
“Well, I sure as shit am not letting you run away without me,” I tell him. “We just got engaged, remember?”
“You what now?” This comes from Lorenzo. “You’re getting married?”
“You shouldn’t eavesdrop,” Lex tells his cousin.
“You’re in my house,” Lorenzo counters.
“We’re leaving.” Lex stands, takes hold of my hand, and pulls me to my feet.
“It was nice to meet you, Addison,” Lorenzo says. “Sorry lunch went… Well, you’re going to marry him so you should get used to shit going south.”
“It was nice to meet you too,” I tell Lorenzo, ignoring his dig at Lex.
As soon as we’re back in the car, my phone pings with a message.
I look to Lex. “It’s your mom.”
“Tell her you’re busy,” he says.
“I’m not saying that.” I laugh. “She’s coming to the hotel to meet me.”
“Of course she is.” Lex rolls his eyes. “It’s weird how much my parents love you. I mean, I get it. I fucking love you. But I know you. They met you once and decided they were keeping you.”
“You kind of did that too.” I smile, recalling the first day of school. Everyone ignored me, treated me as if I weren’t even in the classroom. Lex stood up, dragged his desk over to where mine was, and sat next to me, declaring us best friends.
“Yeah, I did,” he says. “We need to find a jeweler. You should have a ring.”
“I don’t need a ring,” I tell him. “I have you.”
“You need a ring. Something big, unmissable. Something that says you’re well and truly off the market.”
“I’m not a cow, Lex,” I tell him. “I also don’t need a ring to know I’m yours. I’ve always been yours.”
