by Amy Vastine
“You have a serious problem,” Sawyer said.
Gretchen tossed the last petal on the floor. “He loves me not.”
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
“Y’ALL HAVE THIS place locked down like it’s Fort Knox. I thought you boarded horses, not gold.”
Gretchen was out of control. Sawyer could not handle any more of her nonsense.
“Take her back, Harriet. She’s not welcome here,” Sawyer growled.
“I didn’t know she was in there,” Harriet insisted, following a stomping Sawyer to the front porch. “I swear to you I would not have let her come.”
He’d never been so angry in his life.
“Just get her out of here, Harriet.”
“Gretchen, let’s go,” Harriet said, but Gretchen had other plans. She was already walking toward the horse stables.
“I need to talk to my daughter!”
“I will call the police and report you for trespassing!” Sawyer shouted from the porch steps.
Heath came outside to see what the commotion was about. “Your mother again?”
Faith was leading one of the horses out of the stable to work in the outdoor arena. Her head fell back in frustration when she caught sight of Gretchen.
Sawyer ran over there. “Can you help me out? She snuck in in the back of Harriet’s truck.”
“Really, Mother?”
“Hey, ask him what he did before you get mad at me for simply coming here to talk to you. I wanted to see my daughter, and he has guards at the gate. What was I supposed to do?”
“I know what I’m going to do,” Sawyer said, pulling out his phone.
“Don’t go calling the police with all those paparazzi out there,” Faith said. “She can come with me to the arena until Harriet’s finished with you.”
Sawyer didn’t like that plan. Give Gretchen an inch and apparently she would take a mile. “She can’t stay here.”
“She’s not going to stay here. She’s going to watch me work while Harriet makes you beautiful wedding flowers for your wedding that’s happening tomorrow no matter what anyone has to say about it.” Faith looked pointedly at Gretchen.
“Sawyer wins. I’m not here to stop him. I’m here to talk to you. I’ve done all I can to knock some sense into him. I finally understand how my father felt. He’s probably having a good ol’ laugh up there in heaven. I got exactly what I deserved—a child as hardheaded as I was.”
“You and I are nothing alike. Stop saying that!” He hated that she kept comparing him to herself. She was the exact opposite of the kind of person he wanted to be.
“I got this,” Faith reiterated. “Go, plan your wedding.”
“And don’t think you’re going to bend Faith’s ear and convince her to talk to me on your behalf. She is on my side. She’s the one who’s always been on my side.”
That was all he had to say about it. He was not going to engage with Gretchen again. She could mend fences with Faith and Harriet, but their fences had been obliterated. There was no fixing anything between her and Sawyer.
Piper and her parents were on the bus with Harriet. Sawyer took a deep breath to regain his composure. There was something about that woman that rubbed him all the wrong ways. She was nothing like the mother he remembered. The one who took him hunting for toads down by the lake or told him stories about adventurous space travelers and rambunctious cowboys.
The mother from his memories was someone different. Someone who mattered to him. This Gretchen Stratton had nothing to offer him except her misguided opinions.
“So we can use these around the horses’ necks.” Harriet had taken down the flower garlands and was carefully placing them in a box.
“Everything coming along?” Sawyer asked.
Piper fixed her gaze on him. She seemed reluctant to speak. He hated that Gretchen intimidated her so much.
“I think we can reuse almost all of this,” Harriet said. “Everything okay out there?”
“It’s fine.”
“How about between you and me?” Harriet asked, obviously afraid he would take Gretchen’s surprise visit out on her.
“Did you know she was in the truck?”
“Absolutely not. I told her I was going and she said she would watch the store for me so I didn’t have to close early. I forgot your mother is relentless to a fault.”
“Then we’re fine, as well.”
“I’m going to go check on Matthew,” Heath said. Flowers and feelings were most likely not on his list of favorite things.
Sawyer made his way over to Piper. He pressed a soft kiss to the side of her head. “Are we okay?” he whispered as Claudia and Harriet discussed the flowers she would pull out for the bridal bouquet.
Piper leaned against him. “I’ll be happy when this is all over. Is that bad?”
He smiled and wrapped an arm around her waist. “There’d be no such thing as elopement if everyone loved weddings.”
“Tell me everything is going to be fine and I’ll believe you,” she said.
Her lips were so close and he could feel her breath on his neck. Every time he was around her, he felt the urge to hold her, to kiss her. It was beyond lust or want. It was a connection he couldn’t describe with words.
“Everything will be more than fine. I promise.”
“You two are so cute. Ah, to be young and in love,” Piper’s mom said as she and Harriet stopped what they were doing.
“Remember this feeling, sweet peas. Love is what will get you through all the tough times. And trust me, there are tougher times ahead that will make your mother’s reappearance seem like nothing.”
Sawyer’s brow dipped. “That’s not very reassuring, Harriet.”
“It is if you focus on the part about love getting you through.”
* * *
LOVE, LOVE, LOVE. Piper felt love for Sawyer that she’d never experienced with anyone else. He was good and kind. He made her laugh and challenged her in ways that made her better. He was the spontaneity she needed in her scheduled existence.
Did he feel it for her? That was the million-dollar question. One she was too afraid to ask straight up. He acted like he was in love. He treated her the way she would expect someone to if they were in love. He didn’t say it, though. Wasn’t it more important that he showed it? She told herself it was until that annoying doubt crept back in. He was so focused on his mom and proving her wrong. Were they rushing only because Gretchen had reappeared? She hated to think it, but there it was.
“Why don’t we show your mom and Harriet where we’re going to set everything up for the ceremony?” Sawyer suggested, pulling her out of her dark thoughts.
They all went out back, behind the house and recording studio. The space was surrounded by paddocks and rolling hills that were much greener in the summer. The temperatures were still chillier than Piper would have liked for an outdoor ceremony, but she would have to work with what she’d been given. On Friday it was supposed to be almost seventy degrees. They would survive.
“This is where we’ll say our vows. The guests will be over here, and after the ceremony, we’ll head inside for dinner,” Sawyer said, pointing out the important details.
“It will be lovely,” Piper’s mom said. “And the paparazzi can’t see anything back here, so that’s good. You’ll have some privacy.”
“What in the world are they doing now?” Harriet asked, looking over Piper’s shoulder and back toward the barn.
Heath and Gretchen came marching across the property together. Sawyer pulled Piper behind him, placing himself between her and whatever it was those two were about to say.
“We need to talk,” Heath said, slightly winded from his walk. “Your mother, although a bit unusual, has a few valid points about this wedding.”
“It doesn’t matter,” Sawyer said. “Nothing she sa
ys matters to me. I don’t know how many times I can say it.”
“Piper, sweetheart, you know you’re rushing into something that doesn’t need to be rushed,” Heath argued.
“Dad, I don’t feel rushed. This is what I want.” Sawyer had asked her to stand up for herself and this was her chance to prove to him that she could.
“You can’t decide to get married one day and have a wedding the next.”
“I don’t understand this argument,” Piper’s mother said. “They’ve been engaged since November and together since August. Marriage was the goal. They aren’t taking a lot of time to plan a wedding, but they made the decision to get married months ago.”
Piper saw it on her father’s face. He was about to say something he couldn’t take back.
“Dad, please,” she begged.
“It was all pretend. I made them pretend to be engaged to protect Piper’s reputation,” Heath confessed. “The entire relationship was a fraud up until a little while ago when they decided they should date.”
Piper felt like a flower wilting in the sun. She couldn’t look at her mother.
“In fact, we discussed telling the media they had set a wedding date when we were in LA, and Sawyer refused because he had no intentions of getting married. He wasn’t ready. That was four days ago. Four days ago, he said he wouldn’t lie and claim the wedding was this summer because that was too soon.”
“Is that true?” Piper’s mom turned on Sawyer.
“I don’t like it when Heath tells me what to do. It was more about not wanting him orchestrating the whole thing than it was about marrying Piper.”
“You were angry with her after she called in to the radio station three days ago and said she wanted a summer wedding. You felt she was pressuring you,” her father said, more emboldened by the second. “The only thing that changed was her.” He pointed at Gretchen, who actually wasn’t gloating. She appeared more saddened by this than anything. “She showed up and all of a sudden he wants to get married.”
“That’s not true,” Sawyer said, sounding less convincing than he had a moment ago.
“Piper Ann, why is your father saying this if it isn’t true?” Claudia asked.
“I fell in love with Sawyer at the end of the summer. We made this baby because I was in love with him. I want to marry him because I’m in love with him.”
“That’s not what I asked.”
She knew that wasn’t the answer to the question, but she felt it needed to be said. Piper had been in love with Sawyer from the beginning. Yet her heart was breaking because everything her father said was right. She’d tried to ignore it, but the ugly truth couldn’t be denied any longer. Sawyer was rushing their wedding to spite his mother.
“What about you, Sawyer? Have you been in love this whole time like Piper?” Gretchen asked. “Or did you decide that you were going to marry her because I showed up saying it was a mistake? If you love her, I’ll back off. If you love her, it doesn’t matter when you get married.”
Piper had a hand on his arm, and his muscles were so tight. He was straining to keep control. “I am not answering you. You aren’t my mother. Harriet has been more of a mother to me than you ever were.”
“Then answer me,” Harriet said. “If I had asked you a week ago if you wanted to get married, what would you have said?”
Sawyer swallowed hard. “I would have said I wasn’t sure. But just because I wasn’t sure a week ago doesn’t mean I’m not sure now. Maybe Gretchen made me realize that I do want to be married. That making that commitment is important. Not like she would know anything about commitment.”
Every answer led back to his mother. Piper wanted to cry.
“What have you two gotten yourselves into?” Piper’s mom shook her head and covered her mouth with her hand.
“It was a business deal. Their relationship was supposed to soften the blow that Piper was pregnant. We didn’t want to tarnish her brand,” her father said.
Claudia would have none of that. “You are the one I’m most upset with right now. Your daughter is a person, not a brand. She has feelings. Obviously she has very strong feelings for this man, and you put her brand ahead of those feelings. She’s been forced to pretend to be in a relationship with someone who wasn’t sure he felt the same way until three days ago. That’s horrible. Have you thought for a second what that was like for her?”
It was kind of horrible. But Heath hadn’t come up with this plan on his own. “I’m the one who suggested we handle things this way, Mom. I didn’t want anything to jeopardize my ability to take care of you and Dad and Matthew.”
“It’s your father’s job to take care of you and your job to take care of yourself and the baby you’re carrying. Period,” her mom said, pulling her in for a hug. “I am sorry you thought you had to put all of us above yourself.”
Faith came sprinting from the arena. “I swear I was watching her. She and Heath were talking and no one was arguing, so I took Freddy to return Winston to the paddock. When I got back, they were both gone.” She laced her fingers behind her head and tried to catch her breath. “I’m sorry.”
“We were just discussing how your brother and Piper have been lying about everything,” Harriet said. “They have been having a fake engagement since the beginning of this mess.”
Faith bit down on her bottom lip.
“You knew,” Harriet said, reading her like a book.
Faith nodded. “But to be fair, I have expressed my dislike for the fake engagement plan from the very beginning. Heath wanted them to get married right away and I fought to stop that.”
“So, on Thanksgiving, you invited everyone here, knowing it was all a ruse? And let us all believe they were a happy couple?” Harriet asked.
Faith threw her hands up. “They weren’t an unhappy couple. I do believe that Sawyer cares for Piper. I think he genuinely wants to coparent.”
“He cares about her,” Piper’s mom repeated. “But does he love her?” She swung her attention to Sawyer. “Do you love her? Do you want to spend the rest of your life with her?”
Piper didn’t want him to answer that. Not right now. Not in front of all these people. She couldn’t take it if he said no.
“Okay, hold on a second. Everyone needs to relax. Whether we decided three months ago, three days ago or three seconds ago, it doesn’t change the fact that we decided to get married,” Piper said. “Everyone is so worried about what’s real and what’s not. We decided without Dad’s influence to get married, and we picked tomorrow as the day to do it. If y’all don’t want to come and celebrate with us, that’s your choice. We are done defending ourselves.”
Piper took Sawyer’s hand and started walking toward the house. “If Dad has been talking to Gretchen this entire time, someone needs to check on Matty.”
“Your silence says it all, Sawyer,” Heath called after them.
Piper refused to turn around. She kept walking and pulled Sawyer right along with her.
“I’m sorry,” he said as they made their way up the porch stairs.
“There’s nothing to be sorry for. I should be apologizing for what my father did.”
“My sister wasn’t wrong.” He stopped her from opening the front door and took her into his arms. “I care about you more than I’ve cared about anyone.”
Care but not love. “Do you still want to get married tomorrow?”
“Do you?” he asked.
She wanted to marry him more than anything. “Of course. My mother may be less supportive, but I feel the same way I did when you asked me.”
“Then I say we don’t change a single thing.”
“You want this? You really want this?”
He smiled and placed a hand on her stomach. “We’re having a baby. We both want to give him the family he deserves. If I didn’t think it could work, I wouldn’t be doing i
t. You asked me to trust you and I’m doing that. I guess now I need to ask you to trust me.”
Piper wanted to trust him. She wanted to believe he would never regret what they were about to do.
“Trust me, Piper. I say we get married tomorrow no matter who says they object.”
“I trust you. But maybe we should ask the pastor to take that question out of the script,” she suggested.
Hopefully they’d all gotten their objections out of the way. They would find out tomorrow, because this wedding was still on.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
“IS THERE A reason that Jason Green told me he’s sorry to hear about our mother’s Alzheimer’s?” Faith asked as she poured herself a cup of coffee the next morning.
“I have no idea,” Sawyer replied.
“He said that Bud Maddox told him that you said Mom lost her mind.”
Sawyer smacked his forehead. He hadn’t realized how what he’d said could have been so misconstrued. Sometimes the town’s gossip train went off the rails.
“I did not tell Bud that she had Alzheimer’s. She told people the whole town was invited to the wedding and I told Bud to let people know that wasn’t true. Maybe when I heard what she did, I offhandedly said something about her being crazy. I didn’t mean it literally.”
“It’s not funny to joke about stuff like that, Sawyer.”
“Well, you know what else isn’t funny? When your mother walks back into your life after abandoning you twenty years ago and thinks she can mess it up because she knows best.”
“She’s worried about you repeating mistakes she made. She doesn’t know you.”
“If the worst mistake I can make is being a father to my son and being present while he’s growing up, I think I can live with that.”
He was so done explaining why it was important for him to do this. He had overcome his distrust of Piper, and that had been the only thing holding him back. If she could stand by him, he should be able to commit to her.
Faith sat down at the kitchen table with him. “It did hurt my feelings to know that she regretted getting married because they were pregnant with me. She made me feel like I ruined her life or something.”
