Page 32 of That Reilly Boy
“Fine. We’ll get married and I’ll move to Boston with him and you can keep your promise and this house all to yourself.”
It’s an empty threat. I’m pretty sure everybody in my family—probably everybody in Sumac Falls—has figured out I won’t leave her. But this time it might land for Gin because it’s the first time I’ve said I’ll be leaving for a very handsome man with a cute dog and a lot of money. That’s a little more believable, if still a lie.
I’ll only go through with this if my mother surrenders to the fact she’s selling her house to Hayden Reilly because our marriage and my name on the paperwork fulfills the promise she made to my dad. Sure, I want to get out from under this house, but the only reason I’ll let that man put a ring on my finger is making sure my mom is taken care of and able to live on her own—or has the foundation to do so. Her choices after that will be her own, because I can’t take the pressure anymore.
“You’re not moving to Boston,” she says finally, and then she turns to leave.
“Do you want an invitation to the wedding?”
She whirls back to face me. “Of course I do. I’m not missing my own daughter’s wedding.”
Then she’s gone and I’m surprised I don’t melt right out of the chair into a puddle on the floor. Telling me I’m not moving to Boston and accepting there will be a wedding is as close as I’ll get to knowing the plan will probably work.
I’m getting married.
I ignore the lump of oatmeal turning in my stomach and send a text to Mel first.
CARA
Stop by the shop if you get a chance today.
MEL
I’m not free until six. Are you working late?
I hadn’t planned to, but I’m not facing Gin again until I’ve talked to Mel. I’ll spend the time cleaning, and hope my mother’s too angry to tell anybody before then.
CARA
I’ll be here.
And then I text Hayden and I’m not surprised my fingers are trembling.
CARA
It’s done. There’s no going back now.
Chapter Twenty-One
Hayden
“Cara and I are getting married.”
I asked Aaron to stop by after dinner—the usual Wednesday night dinner at his house was canceled due to Hope and Daisy being under the weather—so he and our mother are sitting on the couch. I’m standing across the room, facing them, and I’m glad I tucked Penny into her bed upstairs before dropping this bomb. I don’t want her upset by the fallout.
I’m braced for an angry tirade or maybe even tears, but after opening and closing her mouth a couple of times, Colleen just shakes her head. It appears she’s speechless, which is interesting. I’ve always wondered what it would take.
“No,” she finally manages to say, as if I might misinterpret her shaking her head hard enough to loosen a few strands of hair from the messy bun it’s mostly gathered into.
I wait for more, but it seems the one word is all she has. “I wasn’t so much asking you as letting you know.”
“Hayden William Reilly, I am not sharing grandchildren with that woman.”
I pinch the bridge of my nose, annoyed at not having foreseen my mother’s brain shooting right past the marriage to the babies. Babies I’d neglected to consider while concocting a plan to get my hands on the deed to the Gamble house.
I wonder if hypothetical children have crossed Cara’s mind yet, and how much of an obstacle they’ll be when Gin considers them. Colleen has Daisy and AJ, but does Gin want a grandchild more than she hates me? Not that she’ll actually get one, but she doesn’t know that.
I can only put out one fire at a time, though, so I focus on my mom.
