Page 80 of Resisting You
“If you come near Rosa, or our dog, or try to pin anything on her, I swear to God?—"
“You’re making a mistake, Noah,” she said, her voice unnervingly cold.
"No," I said, my eyes still locked on Rosa. "I’m not. Choosing Rosa will never be a mistake."
I ended the call. Something salty burned my eyes and I realized I was sweating; my heart pounding like I’d just done a five mile run in Central Park. I thought calling Morgan and pressuring her to admit the truth would help us, but now I was worried I might have made everything worse.
Rosa didn’t say anything right away. But she didn’t pull away when I reached over and took her hand.
For now, that was enough.
“What do we do?” Rosa asked, her voice small.
That was the question. I shook my head slightly. “For now, nothing.”
“But she said there’s footage of us?—”
“Footage that proves nothing.” I turned in the chair to face Rosa and cupped her jaw with my free hand. “All that footage proves is that we were drunk and having fun on our wedding night. The only people who can admit to any sort of wrongdoing here are you and me.”
She paused for a moment before adding, “And Kristen.”
“If she did that,” I started to say carefully, “She would be in such a breach of contract with me that she would have nothing left to her name when I was done with her.”
Before Rosa could respond to that, the doors to the back room swung open again. Steve walked out, wiping his hands on a towel. Both of our eyes snapped to him and we were on our feet, rushing toward my brother, all thoughts of Morgan and our dilemma momentarily forgotten.
“How is he?” Rosa asked, wringing her hands together.
"He’s stable," Steve said. "We got most of it out. He’s going to be okay."
Rosa let out a shaky breath and leaned into me, just slightly. I wrapped my arm around her shoulders, the tight knot in my chest loosening for the first time all day.
Birdie was okay. We weren’t okay—not yet—but maybe we weren’t broken beyond repair either.
Maybe this was the start of digging our way out.
Chapter 30
Rosa
I don’t know why I couldn’t simply quit Noah. It wasn’t like we were ever truly married in the first place.
Okay, yes we were married in like, thelegalsense. But never in spirit. We were a business arrangement.
Until Noah changed the game on me.
He changed the rules and I wasn’t ready for it. And now I’m standing here in Tripp’s backyard beneath an old oak tree, holding a bouquet of ribbons made out of the ribbons from my bridal shower gifts I had opened up earlier this morning.
Because my mother couldn’t stomach the thought of not throwing her only daughter a bridal shower… even if we had to wedge it into the same day as our rehearsal dinner.
And even if the damn couple was already married.
And hanging on by a thread…
Or rather, by a bridal ribbon, if you will.
The late afternoon light filtered through glass wind chimes, painting colored shadows across the grass beneath our feet. Noah stood in front of me, a smile creasing his mouth while our families and friends were all gathered for this final run-through of the wedding before tomorrow.
Which felt weird. We were already married. Drunkenly. And now we were standing here pretending in front of everyone we knew that we’d been secretly in love for years. Although according to Noah, it wasn’t so much pretending. Hehadloved me for years. He said as much.
