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"I'll be keeping an eye on you."

I chuckled. "That's the story of my life."

She gave me one final assessing look before disappearing inside.

I headed back toward my truck. And for the first time all day, I exhaled. I'd survived Claudia Parsons. I'd even managed to make her smile. That had to count for something. I'd spent the last hour and a half convincing her that I was the kind of man who could make her daughter happy. Now all I had to do was convince Mikayla.

I had a feeling that was going to be a hell of a lot harder.

12

QUESTIONABLE ETHICS, EXCELLENT ACCESSORIES

Mikayla

There were few things in life more dangerous than a room full of women with unlimited access to champagne, nail polish fumes, and information they had absolutely no business knowing.

Unfortunately, I was currently surrounded by all three.

Aunt Reba glanced over at me. “So, when's the wedding?”

My response was inhaling my mimosa.

“Mom, stop,” my cousin Joanie warned.

“What?” My aunt looked genuinely confused. “It's a perfectly reasonable question.”

“We've been dating for five minutes,” I pointed out.

“When you know, you know,” Auntie Reba countered.

The women in my family considered minding their own business a character flaw. Gossip was their love language. They didn't exchange pleasantries, they exchanged evidence.

I was sitting in a ridiculously comfortable massage chair, my feet soaking in warm, lavender-scented water, surrounded by my aunts, cousins, and the rest of the bridesmaids.

It should've been relaxing.

Instead, I was one question away from needing a medically induced coma.

“Have you two talked about children?” Aunt Beverly asked.

Yep, that did it. A medically induced coma was sounding like a cold beer on a hot day.

I stared at her. “Children?”

“Babies, sweetheart,” Aunt Laura clarified. “Little humans.”

“I'm familiar with the concept.”

“Because you're not getting any younger,” Auntie Bev put in her two cents.

That was rich coming from the one aunt who was single and had no children. “Neither are you, but I don't bring it up at family gatherings.”

Julissa snorted into her champagne. Auntie Bev gave me a look. I gave her one right back.

“Someone’s a little testy.” Aunt Laura sipped her champagne.

I was, but it had nothing to do with the questions being posed to me. It was that I couldn't stop thinking about Damon.