I walked through the crowd, all eyes on me. People I hadn’t seen in years and whose names I couldn’t remember for the life of me grinned, and a few patted me on the back, offering me congratulations. Climbing the stairs, I turned my full focus on my father.
“What the hell is going on?” I demanded in a voice low enough that only the three other people on the stairs could hear me.
Darcy linked her arm through mine and laid her head on my shoulder, her blue eyes gazing up at me adoringly. I knew it was an act she was putting on for the crowd, and it irritated the hell out of me. All I could think was that my beautiful little kitten was thousands of miles away, hurting because she was scared she was going to lose her father, and these people had kept me from being with her because they wanted to announce my marriage to this spoiled little bitch?
Fuck that.
“Darling, we know you’ve been dragging your feet about setting a date for the wedding,” my mother said with a beaming smile for the crowd below. “So, we thought we would just take all the stress away and do it for you.”
“Darcy and I aren’t even together,” I gritted out. “I forgot all about her until just now.”
Darcy made a pained noise and pouted up at me. “Brax, don’t be mean.”
I shrugged her off and took two steps away from her. “I’m not in the mood to play any of your games. Tell these people the truth, and leave me the hell alone.”
My father clenched his jaw. “You will marry Darcy. It’s part of the merger her father and I agreed to. Your marriage will only solidify our new joint corporation.”
“Fuck your new corporation,” I told him. “I won’t be a pawn you can use to make more money with Hamilton. Tell everyone you were joking. Now.”
“Darling—” my mother started to scold me, but I turned to face the crowd to do it myself.
“Everyone, I’m sorry, but my parents have it wrong. Darcy and I are not getting married—”
“Until after Christmas,” Darcy interrupted, and for the first time in my life, I actually wanted to cause a woman bodily harm. “Because we want to move in to our new house and get the nursery decorated before the big wedding.”
Collective gasps and cheers went up at her basically announcing her pregnancy. What the actual fuck?
But as I opened my mouth to tell everyone it was all a misunderstanding, I saw cameras flashing in our direction and knew the story of Braxton Collins and Darcy Hamilton’s upcoming wedding and parenthood was going to be on all the trashy gossip sites by morning.
Barrick was right.
My parents were going to ruin my life.
Chapter 7
Nevaeh
M y head was foggy when I woke up the next morning.
After talking to Braxton the night before, I felt like I could breathe a little easier again and was able to talk to my sisters and brother rationally. As rationally as I could while being pissed at each and every one of them for keeping Daddy’s illness from me.
Arella hadn’t wanted to put more stress on our parents, I got that, but they still should have told me. Having the entire country between us shouldn’t mean that our loyalty to each other disappeared. We were close, and yeah, we fought like crazy at times—especially Arella and me—but we’d always promised we would have each other’s backs.
Once I stopped bitching at them and they apologized contritely and promised it wouldn’t happen again, I’d gone back to my room and done some research. I found out that it wouldn’t matter if it were a child or a sibling that matched as long as the genetic match was a good one. According to Mom, Daddy and Uncle Shane were as good as it got from what the doctors told them. That was a relief at least.
Once I learned all I could on what to expect, and what Daddy should and shouldn’t be doing to prepare for surgery, I finally passed out in bed. That had been close to three in the morning.
Blurry-eyed, I glanced at my clock and saw it was almost noon. Groaning, I got out of bed and walked half blind into the bathroom to shower.
By the time I got downstairs in search of something to eat, the rest of the house had been up for hours, and it seemed we had guests.
Aunt Lucy and Aunt Layla were sitting in the kitchen with Mom, both of them drinking tea. Both of them were Mom’s biological sisters, but Aunt Layla and Uncle Jesse had adopted Aunt Lucy when she was a little girl and raised her as their own. We had a weird family, but I loved it that way. Normal just seemed boring to me, and boring was unacceptable.
“Happy birthday!” Aunt Lucy greeted as she stood and practically bounced over to wrap her arms around me. Both she and Aunt Layla were shorter than Mom and even more so than me. With her smaller size, Lucy didn’t look like she was a mother of two. She always laughed when people told her she looked like a teenager, and she said it was because her doting husband’s love kept her looking young.
I hugged her back, then accepted one from Aunt Layla.
“We’re going shopping,” Mom informed me with a smile. “I think you need a new outfit for your party tonight, don’t you?”
“I’m not really up to shopping, Mom,” I told her. What I really wanted to do was crawl into my dad’s lap and soak up his love for a few hours while we watched crappy old movies.
“Your dad went golfing with your uncles,” Mom informed me as if she could read my mind. “The younger kids are all over at Shane and Harper’s, and Arella is getting ready to go with us. So, hurry your ass up. We’re leaving in five minutes.”
Sighing, I looked down at my outfit. Skinny jeans with a hole in the left knee and the hoodie I’d stolen from Braxton the first week I’d moved in with him. It was my favorite hoodie, and sometimes I slept in it when it got really cold back in Northern Virginia.
“I’m ready,” I told Mom.
“Really?” Her brown eyes skimmed over my attire, and her lips pressed into a firm line. “Don’t you want to change that hoodie?”
“This is Braxton’s hoodie. I’m not changing it.”
Her eyes softened, and a sly grin teased at her lips. “Of course it is. Okay, then. Get your beautiful butt in the van while I go make your sister hurry up.”
“We’re meeting Emmie and Mia at the mall,” Aunt Layla informed me as we entered the garage and got into Mom’s minivan. It was spacious and always clean, no matter how hard Damien tried to destroy the interior every day.
I climbed into the back with Aunt Lucy, and by the time I had my seat belt on, Mom appeared with Arella. My younger sister was dressed in a skirt I knew our dad would have freaked over and a red sweater with thigh-high black boots. Her hair was pulled into a ponytail, but she’d curled the ends. With the makeup she had on, she looked like she was ready for a date, not a simple day of shopping with her family.
Knowing Arella, though, I imagined she was probably expecting to see friends from school at the mall, and she didn’t like to look anything but perfect around them.
We met Mia and Aunt Emmie in the mall’s garage. Marcus and Rodger, their bodyguards, were with them but thankfully dressed in casual clothes rather than their normal suits.
As soon as she saw me, Aunt Emmie threw her arms around me. “Happy birthday, sweetheart,” she said as she kissed my cheek.
“Thanks, Aunt Em,” I murmured.
As she stepped back, she put her arm around Mia’s waist. “Where to first?”
“Coffee,” Mom spoke. “I need caffeine stat.”
Mia’s face turned green, and she muttered a small oath but put on a bright smile and nodded her head along with the others who agreed that we needed to arm ourselves with drinks before we started shopping.
As we walked into the mall, I dropped back to talk to Mia. “How are you feeling?” I asked quietly.
She only gave me a look that was full of misery. “Kill me now.”
“Is it that bad?”
As soon as we walked through the mall entrance, she groaned and put her hand to her nose. “Worse,” she muttered. “These food smells are killing me.”
“But the food court is on the third floor,” I reminded her.
“Yeah, but it seems like my sense of smell is amplified. Mom told me she had the worst morning sickness when she was pregnant.”
I glanced at the others as they walked ahead of us. “You told her?”
“Just her,” Mia said with a nod. “Not Daddy yet.”
I stopped and turned to face her. “Mia, don’t you think it’s time to finally forgive your dad? It’s been two years, and he’s tried time and again to earn back your trust.”
Her chin trembled for a moment before she shook her head. “I’ve tried. Believe me, I really have. It’s just hard to get over what he did, Nev.”
“I understand, but you forgave Barrick. Why can’t you do the same for Uncle Nik?”
“Because…” She clenched her jaw and swallowed hard. “Because he broke my heart more than Barrick ever could.”
That made a lot of sense to me. Having your heart broken by your father—the man who was your first hero, the first man to ever love you wholeheartedly—that was a million times worse than any other heartbreak. Mia lost a part of herself when Uncle Nik betrayed her, and I didn’t know if she was ever going to get it back.