Page 73 of Autumn on My Mind

She actually seems happy. Can I really be selfish and take that away from her?

“Selfish?” Dom says when I ask this question. His eyes have widened, his brows furrowed, like he can’t believe what he’s hearing. “In what universe is it selfish to try to stop a train wreck?”

He’s most likely correct. History and experience suggest their relationship won’t go well. And yet…

“But what if it’s not a train wreck?” I find myself saying, a note of pathetic pleading in my voice.

“People don’t change, Reese!” The words burst out of him, and I startle as they sink in, daggers to my heart.

“People can change,” I bite back. My nails dig into my palms as I clench my hands, a prick of pain to quell the rising tide in my chest, the dam that will burst if I let it. “Of course people can change. People change all the time.”

I have to believe people can change.

I blink my lids rapidly as I turn my head, looking away and trying to banish the burning in my eyes.

“Fine,” Dominic says from the other end of the couch. “Let’s assume people can change.” A hollow laugh escapes him. “Our parents get married and live happily ever after. Picture their wedding, Reese. The dress your mom wears, and they’ll probably get married in the chapel here. You and I attend the wedding. We’re brother and sister now.”

The silence after he says this is thick and heavy and horrible. It presses on my chest until I can’t breathe, until tears trickle down my cheeks because I’m useless at trying to stop them.

When Dom speaks again, his voice is blank, no emotion detectable. “And you’re okay with all of this?”

My heart is ripping.

“Reese,” he says when I don’t answer. “I’m going to say it, all right?” A beat of silence, and then—“You know as well as I do that we can never be—be siblings.” He spits the word out, bitter and poisonous. “That’s not going to work. It will never work, and you know it.”

Despite my desire to hide, to run, to retreat to safety, I can’t—because Dom no longer sounds emotionless. My gaze is dragged helplessly to him, over a neutral expression to a pair of eyes that betray what his face conceals.

Pain. Hurt. Disbelief that I could sign off on something that could be so painful for both of us, and with no guaranteed end.

“Dom,” I begin, sighing, but he shakes his head.

“You’re scared of your mom,” he says, and he sounds so tired now. “She drives you nuts. You don’t want to be like her, and yet that’s where we’re ending up again, Reese. Trying to have the best of both worlds with no accountability. Just like throwing out marriage proposals you didn’t mean back then, like it was nothing⁠—”

“Hey,” I say sharply as my ripping heart tears further. What hurts isn’t that he’s saying these things—it’s that most of them are true. “It wasn’t nothing. Maybe it was ill-timed, but I wanted to marry you. I meant it.”

“How could you have meant it?” Dom says. He pushes himself off the couch, his shoulders tense as he puts his hands on his hips.

I watch him rise, watch him turn away from me and take some deep breaths. Then he faces me again.

“We’d only known each other a few months, Reese. That’s not enough time to—to know someone well enough,” he says, shaking his head. “Or to love them well enough. You didn’t think it through at all—you couldn’t have. It was a whim.”

“I thought it through,” I snap. “I loved you.”

“I thought you did,” he says quietly. “I genuinely thought you did—until you said we should get married. And then it felt like you cared so little you were willing to throw out marriage as a Band-Aid, knowing it wouldn’t work and diving in anyway.”

“I loved you,” I say as the accusation pierces. “And you loved me; don’t pretend you didn’t.”

His eyes jump to mine, and something electric passes between us—not painful but tauntingly bright with possibility, especially given the wounds we’re digging into tonight.

I didn’t expect this conversation to happen here, or now. I knew it would probably come up at some point. But I wasn’t prepared, and I don’t think Dom was either.

We stare at each other for a moment, and then he blinks and looks away, taking a step back. He runs one hand over his face.

“I shouldn’t have lost my temper. Or brought the proposal up,” he adds, the words stiff. “Sorry.”

I deflate. “It’s fine. You’re not—” I break off, trying to figure out the words I want. “You’re not wrong. About a lot of it.”

“I know things aren’t black and white with Alvina,” he says grudgingly.