Page 107 of Before You Can Blink
Blue eyes glittering with murderous intent, Tripp clenched his jaw so tight that a muscle in his cheek twitched. “Don’t.”
Honestly, I found it very hard to have sympathy for him. I was in no mood to listen to him complain about losing her when he’d been too much of a coward to take action.
Folding both arms over my chest, I was determined to make sure he knew exactly how badly he’d fucked this whole thing up. “Don’t what, son? Don’t tell you that you had all the time in the world to make a move on the girl, yet you wasted it? Don’t tell you that anyone with eyes can see she’s always been in love with you too? Don’t tell you that no one can blame her for getting tired of waiting for you and moving on? Don’t tell you it’s your own damn fault that she did because you decided to sit on your hands your whole life?”
As his face contorted into an expression of pure anguish, both hands flew to his head as he tugged on the short strands of his dark hair. “Enough! I get it!”
I cocked my head. “Do you, though?” If he did, we wouldn’t even be having this conversation.
“Jett,” Daisy’s soft voice cut in, trying to defuse the situation. “Let the boy be.”
A scoff fell from my lips. “He’s not a boy anymore, Daze. He’s a grown man who has to face the repercussions of his actions—or the lack of them, in this case.”
“I know.” She smiled sadly, standing from her seat at the table to offer Tripp the comfort of her touch. Almost twenty-nine years later, about to become a grandma, she still saw him as her baby. “But he’s suffering enough without you heaping on.”
Truth be told, they both were.
It had been damn near heartbreaking watching Penny almost burst into tears when she had to tell Tripp face-to-face that he was too late, that any chance there might’ve been to build a future together was gone.
But at the end of the day, she was just as much to blame for their shared misery, having elected to keep her mouth shut all this time, the same as Tripp.
The two of them had spent decades making this bed, and now came the time to lie in it.
May
“Don’t do it!”
A collective gasp sounded from those gathered at the outburst.
“Oh my God.” Daisy’s nails dug into my thigh as her head whipped around, but I didn’t need to look to know it was Tripp.
To say he’d cut it close was the ultimate understatement. Penny was currently standing at the altar, halfway through the ceremony that would legally tie her to another man.
But I had to say, I was proud the kid had finally grown a set of balls. And they had to be huge to interrupt a wedding in progress.
The preacher looked horrified, and the groom, Jake, was so pissed it was a wonder steam didn’t billow out from his ears as my son laid it all on the line, confessing his lifelong feelings to his best friend in one breath, while begging her to choose him in the next.
It shouldn’t have come as a shock to anyone that Penny pulled out of her fiancé’s hold and rushed up the aisle, only stopping long enough to link hands with my son before they both took off running.
Daisy clasped both hands over her chest like it was the most romantic scene she’d ever witnessed while mayhem ensued. The jilted groom ran after the pair of lovebirds as Wade and Caroline shouted their daughter’s name.
But the roar of the heavy-duty pickup engine out front, combined with the sharp crunch of gravel under speeding tires, made it clear they were all too willing to stir up the drama with zero interest in dealing with the fallout their actions would cause.
Caroline put an arm around Jake’s shoulders, guiding him into the house while Wade trudged back to where all the guests stood as they looked around uncomfortably, unsure of what to do next.
My best friend’s gaze landed on me, and I inwardly groaned. With Tripp gone, I was on the hook for that little charade.
Tugging on the back of my neck, I shifted on my feet when he stopped before me. “Listen, Wade—”
He shook his head. “Took him damn long enough.”
My eyebrows rose. “Excuse me?”
“If I’d have known all he needed to light a fire under his ass was to think he was gonna lose her to another man, I’d have taken a page out of one of those books the ladies like to read and brought in a guy to pretend he was gonna marry her ages ago.”
“Sounds like a good idea in theory, but those fake dating situations have a tendency to turn real.” My neck twisted to find that Mac had joined our conversation.
Wade blinked at my son-in-law. “What would you know about that?”
