He didn’tgetit, that was the thing. How could he?
Four Corners had always been a family. Even if, much like her own, it was dysfunctional in some ways. The school had been small, and they’d all known each other—even if she and Justice had been closer to each other than to anyone else.
Justice was popular, he always had been. He played kickball, baseball and backyard football with the rowdier kids. She had taught some of the other kids who preferred to sit to crochet, then eventually knit and the ones who were interested would sit with her in relative silence while sports occurred.
They’d had different kinds of home lives. She’d never really talked about her situation with anyone but Justice.
The dirt, the trees, the view of the mountains, that would always be a profound part of her. Asher seemed to find it inconvenient that she liked to spend time there.
But it was fine. Asher would get it eventually, she was sure. Because no, she wasn’t going to keep eating dinner six nights a week at King’s when they were married, but they would definitely go over sometimes. That was just how it was.
Justice and his family were part of her life.
“Yes,” she said. “I’d love to come to dinner. I might bring some bouquet pictures too. Maybe Penny and Bix can give some input.”
“You think Bix is going to tell you what flowers to get?”
Bix was Justice’s brother Daughtry’s fiancée. She was unorthodox to say the least. Rue had an interesting time with her. Not that Penny was much better. A headstrong, feral woman who had been taken in by the Kings when she was a teenager, after her dad had died.
“Maybe I’ll hold back unless Fia’s there.” His sister-in-law. There was no point showing flowers to his sister, Arizona, either.
It was sometimes a little sad not to have a passel of close female friends, though she did like the women of King’s Crest. But Justice was the one whose opinion would always matter most. He would always be the one who mattered most.
“Probably a good plan.”
“I only have a month, Justice. Thirty days. And then Asher and I are finally going to be married and...”
“And what flowers you carried won’t really matter.”
She looked up at him, shocked by his uncharacteristic show of... sentimentality. It was deeply unlike him. “That’s really sweet, Justice.”
“Is it? You didn’t ask me why the flowers won’t matter.”
“Oh. Dear. Why won’t they matter?”
“Because men don’t give a shit about flowers. All he’ll care about is what you’re wearing, or not, under the wedding dress.”
She scoffed and tried to hold back the color she could feel bleeding into her cheeks. He was outrageous sometimes and it was embarrassing, even though she should be used to it. “That isn’t true.”
“It is,” he said. “Trust me, I’m a man.”
“But you aren’t a man in love,” she said.
“What difference would that make? I’m still never going to care more about a bouquet than a bra.”
“But the whole thing matters when you’re in love. All of it. It’s not about sex. It’s about caring, and saying vows and...”
“The sex should matter,” he said.
“But it isn’t the point.”
He squinted. “It’s not?”
“No. Your thoughts on that are why you’re stuck in bar-hookup Groundhog Day, where you wake up at the same time every morning with a different woman in your bed, doomed to repeat it again the next day.”
“First of all, is that supposed to sound bad?”
“Yes!”
