He catches me in his arms and settles me on his bent knee. “Such a brat,” he says softly. “But you’re my brat. And if we fly back through Vegas, you can be my wife before New Year’s Eve, too.”
“It’s a twelve-hour drive, we could road trip it,” Nathan says, making up for a lot, but I still ignore him.
I kiss Jake firmly on the mouth. “Don’t worry. They’re not invited to our wedding.”
“Bite your tongue, young lady.” To everyone’s surprise, that’s Nana. She shrugs when we all look at her. “What? Call me a romantic, but I like a big party. They can get hitched in Vegas, but we’re celebrating it in Conception Ridge this summer.” She winks at me. “Sundresses cover baby bumps well, don’t you think?”
“Nana!”
“Mom!”
Carina and my mother look vaguely horrified, but Jake just shrugs, which makes Nana cackle.
He looks at me. “Sounds like a plan?”
I wrap my arms around his neck and hug him tight. “Most definitely.”
ChapterTwelve
Jake
One week later
I’mon the balcony of our Vegas hotel room, watching the sun set behind the mountains, when my phone—which is inside the room—rings.
“Baby, do you hear that?”
“Yep.” Sienna’s getting dressed for dinner. I watch through the open balcony door as she leans over the bed to grab it. “Hi Justin. It’s Sienna. No, he can’t answer his own phone, not even when he’s on vacation. I’m good, thanks. Great, actually. Really, really great. Yeah, hang on, I’ll grab Jake for you.” She pushes the door open and wiggles the phone at me. “It’s your brother.”
“So I gathered.” I hold out my hand and take the phone, holding on to her fingers at the same time. I tug her into my lap, nuzzling her hair for a moment before I focus on the call. “Hey, brother.”
My older brother Justin is chuckling at the other end of the line. “Jake? Since when does she call you that?”
Since a lot longer than I realized.“It’s a long story.”
“You sound…relaxed.”
I laugh. “I am.”
“Because of Sienna?”
“Yes.”
“Good.”
Here’s hoping he’s not offended when I tell him our news. “Listen, about us. We did something.”
“Oh yeah?”
“We eloped.”
My announcement is met with silence.
I clear my throat. “You there?”
“Uh huh.”
“We’re going to have a proper wedding celebration in the summer, and her family will come to that, you guys and Jenna… but we wanted this just to be us. And fast. Her family knew about it and tried to come along, but we fought them off.”