Page 53 of Spin the Damn Bottle

"Don't fuss, they love you."

I sincerely doubt that. There's nothing in me that the likes of Lauren and Charles Alden might love. I'm not well-bred, worldly, I don't have tons of money, and if anything, my family's problematic. "They don't know me."

"They know I love you, and that's enough." He snickers. "I mean, my father would have preferred if I kept the Moores happy, no doubt, but he's fine with you, truly."

Jace climbs out of his car and extends his hand, like he hasn't just dropped several bombs on me.

I'm meeting his parents. His parents approve of me, maybe, sort of? Most importantly…he loves me.

He loves me?

He has the audacity to say those words to me like that, casually, as though they don't matter.

Yet, I'm hardly surprised to hear them. Of course he loves me. I've known that for weeks, if not months.

I take the hand he'sholding out to me and follow him to the front door.

A group of forty- or fifty-somethings sitin gilded high-backed chairs set near a firepit right in the patio. Jace brings us over to stand in front of a vacant outdoor couch, but neither of us sits.

I recognize Mr. Alden from all the political campaign ads I've seen, and I don't want to assume who might be his wife, as there are three gorgeous white ladies—and one ebody-skinned one—in their party.

“Mother, Father." Jason gestures to me. “This is Nadia Reyes.”

The senator is all smiles. “Call me Charles."

One of the two blondes in the gathering, who looks too young to be his mother, stands and rushes to hug us both. “And I'm Lauren, dear,” she gushes. "I was so eager to meet you, darling!"

In my head, she was supposed to secretly hate me and force a smile for Jason's sake, but if she's faking anything, I can't feel it.

Jason and I take our place on the loveseat, andLauren introduces us to the rest of the party—the Eatons—and after she mentions their name, I do see the resemblance to Maverick—and five other legacy names. I do stare at Viola Billington for longer than I ought to, wondering at her relation to the creep.

"We're on whiskey and cigars, darlings," Lauren tells us. I wonder if she's British, at her use of the endearment, although her accent doesn't betray anything other than upper-class New York. "I know that's not your favorite, what can I serve you?"

Like my parents, they seem rather liberal about alcohol usage, which is hardly surprising, given everything else I know about the couple.

"Do we have any bubbly? Nadia seems quite partial to it, and we have cause to celebrate."

My fingers reach for Jason's thigh and grip it tight in warning.

"Oh? Do tell." Lauren waves her hand and I'm surprised to see Charles get to his feet with an eye roll. He retreats to the kitchen obediently, though.

"Oh, just the start of the winter break. It's Nadia's first time in the mountains, too."

I let go of my hold on his thigh just as his father returns, armed with a bottle in an ice bucket in one hand and a platter of flutes in the other, seemingly comfortable with balancing it all—despite the fact that I can guaranteeCharles Alden has never waited tables a day in his life.

“Why are you so stiff?” Jace whispers teasingly. I scowl at him, and he winks, before raising his voice again. "That, and Nadia agreed to marry me."

I'm going to kill him. "I said no such thing!"

"I distinctly remember you saying you'd like to marry me."

"Someday. We'reeighteen."

"Nineteen, dear," Lauren sees fit to remind me. "My Jace is nineteen."

That literally doesn't make any difference. "Wait, how are you okay with this? Don't you want him to wait, or, I don't know, end up with the girl you chose for him?"

Charles and Lauren exchange a long look. "I may have been hasty and unwise in making a verbal agreement with the Moores when the boys…" Charles catches himself. "When Jason was so young. And obviously, no such agreement is binding."