Page 24 of Gin and Bear It

Dad blinks. When we were kids, he always took his time putting together his thoughts, so I’ve learned to let him compute in silence.

But he’s silent for a long-ass time.

“Dad?”

“Yes. I’m just…” He takes off his glasses and runs his hand over his face. “You knew about this, Jeremiah?”

“Yes. She asked me to keep it quiet,” he says. And he leaves it at that, thank god.

“The will said your marriage has to be based on true love,” Dad says to me.

“We’re in love.” Thank god Dad has his hand over his face so he can’t see my expression.

Does he believe me? Maybe he does. I don’t lie to him, ever. But even if I did lie regularly, this one’s a doozy.

“Jada, love is…” Dad sits back in his seat and glances above my head. One of the wedding photos of him and my mom is on the wall. They were high-school sweethearts and look so damn young in that picture. And so happy. “Love isn’t a surface-level thing.”

“I know.”

He slides his glasses back on. “I’m not trying to talk down to you, but I’m not sure you understand fully. It’s the most serious decision you can make. I just don’t understand why your grandparents put this contingency in the will when you’ve been single for a while.”

“About that.” I close my eyes for a moment. This is absolutely not going to help me seem credible, but he has to know. “Mimi thought Troy was going to propose. She wanted to give him a nudge.”

“What? What made her think that?” Dad tolerated Troy.

“She didn’t know we broke up”—or rather, I didn’t tell her the whole truth—“and Troy told her that he was going to propose because he felt bad that she wasn’t doing well. This was around when Pop got sick, before he passed.”

“That fool.” Dad huffs. “I can’t believe he’d lie like that.”

“I didn’t tell her everything, either. She would have been heartbroken and she was going through a lot with Pop being sick. I messed up.”

“Oh, sweetheart.” Dad rubs the back of his neck. “So you’ve been forced into this position.”

I bite my lip. “Not forced. Ash and I really are in love and the hotel is at stake. He isn’t what he appears to be. He’s grown. You’ll see. We’re really just moving up our timeline a little bit.”

Dad takes his time soaking that in, not breaking eye contact. I’m sweating bullets into my bra and down my back. Has Ash grown? He has very solid motivations to do this, but all the motivation in the world can’t hide who he truly is.

“Fine, you’re in love,” he says slowly. He absolutely does not believe me deep down, but at least he’s saying he believes it. “But marriage. Marriage.”

“We have the love, we just need the marriage. So I can keep the hotel. Otherwise it’ll go to Danika.”

“Wait, she’s graduating?” He literally snorts, then looks embarrassed that he did.

“Yeah, she got together the credits. And she proposed to her boyfriend, so she could qualify.”

I try to not fidget and mostly succeed. News of Danika’s hat being thrown into the ring sobers him up, like the gravity of the situation finally settles in. He loves his niece, but he knows she’s a mess. He chose not to work at the hotel because he enjoyed accounting, but he loves it as much as I do.

“I saw her engagement on Facebook. Marriage isn’t something light, JJ,” Dad says.

“I know.” Do I need to be reminded again? I know and that’s why this sucks.

Dad never remarried after Mom passed because he never found a woman who compared. He took it seriously and I’m basically throwing it back in his face.

“I hate that Momma changed the will like this,” he murmurs. “I don’t want you to get hurt, Jada.”

“I won’t. We’re solid.”

Dad blows out a breath and slumps in his seat. I hate seeing him this defeated. But like Jeremiah, he knows that even though I can be impulsive, I tend to be locked in on my ideas like a train on a track.