Worth the Risk(84)

To more of everything I swore I’d never allow myself to feel again.

“Shit, Gray,” Grant whispers as he leans in to my ear, “beg, borrow, and steal, but don’t let that walk away, especially when she looks at you like that.”

“Fuck off,” I mutter under my breath as Sidney is pushed into my family with introductions. I wait to see if she shrieks when Moose comes up and puts a wet nose against her hand.

She doesn’t.

I study the looks on my sisters-in-law’s faces as they meet her because women are judgmental and an approval from them goes a long way.

They approve.

“She was walking in when I was walking out, and I thought she might like to have some company.”

“How noble of you,” I mutter to myself, knowing damn well my mom and her matchmaking skills are starting to rub off on my old man.

I get a glare of a rebuke from my mother and then just shake my head, telling her I’m confused as fuck about what to do.

“She said she had been looking for Gray so she could give him some good news. That he must be so busy he isn’t returning her calls,” my dad says, and I see Grady shake his head in my periphery.

Yeah. Yeah. I’m a disgrace. I get it.

“What’s the good news?” This comes from my mom, who has graciously taken a break from mapping out my and Sidney’s wedding, honeymoon, and first three children together.

“You’re a finalist. You made the top five.” I know she’s addressing me, and I let the cheer go up around the table. I grit my teeth at the pats on my back and let them distract me from meeting her eyes because . . . fuck, Grant’s right. She looks goddamn gorgeous as she stands with my family. Fitting in when I don’t think I want her to. Think being the operative word.

“Calm down, guys. It’s just a popularity contest,” I say and roll my eyes.

“No, it isn’t,” Dylan interjects. “It’s a beefcake contest, and you’re grade-A prime.”

Grady turns his head to spit out his beer because he’s laughing too hard to swallow it. “See why I married her?” he says of his wife. “She gives as good as you fuckers.”

“Grady.” A warning by our mom that gets completely ignored. “You’ll have to excuse the manners of my boys. They seem to have reverted back to second grade for some reason.”

“It’s fine. I promise you I’ve heard the F-word before,” Sidney whispers and winks, a smile warming on her lips.

“Sit. Drink,” my mom says as she wraps her arms around her in a motherly welcome and then ushers her to the table. “Food will be cooked shortly.”

“Thank you. I feel bad, though. This was so unexpected, I should have brought something to contribute to the meal.”

“Nonsense. The more the merrier, I say.” Mom is clearly in her entertaining element. “I’ll grab you a chair.”

And she does. She grabs a chair while Sidney stands there awkwardly and waits to see where she puts it. Of course, she positions it right next to me.

“Hey,” I murmur but don’t look her way. Every single one of the people sitting at this table can read how I feel about her clear as day, but that doesn’t mean I want her to as well.

“Hi,” Sidney says as she takes a seat and accepts the beer my dad offers her.

A beer.

Sidney drinks beer?

“I tried to get out of this,” she murmurs under her breath. “The last thing I wanted to do was make you uncomfortable.”

Now I feel like more of a dick.

“It’s fine.”

“Do you think my boy here really has a shot at winning?” my father asks.

“Jesus, Dad,” I mutter as Grady and Grant begin the catcalls.

“You’re the ones who signed him up,” Sidney says with a shake of her head. “You don’t get to talk shi—crap now.” She blanches as the kids giggle down on the lawn.

“No worries,” Grant says. “Sadly, they’ve probably heard it more times than they should have.”

Small talk ensues. The weather. The kids. The influx of tourists to Sunnyville for the harvesting season.

My attention is on Sidney, even though I still refuse to look at her.

How she interacts with my family. How she slips right into the conversation as if she’s always belonged. How Luke comes and sits on her lap and she wraps her hands around his waist and rests her chin on his shoulder. How, every so often, she’ll say something that makes him giggle.

All the while, I sit and brood and watch and listen, trying to figure out how this all fits into my life.

If it could.

If I want it to.

It always comes back to how I’ve already been left once, and I refuse to put Luke or myself in the position to be left again.

And then the focus turns back to Sidney.

“So why journalism?” Emerson asks as she leans forward, hands propped under her chin, eyes kind and genuinely interested.

“Probably for the same reason you all do what you do. It’s a passion. I love helping to tell stories or be part of the narrative.”

“But a parenting magazine?”

She looks down to the label of her bottle and then back up with a smile. “Fashion is where I’d like to end up in the future. Being an editor of a fashion magazine is my dream job.” She shrugs. “What can I say? The opportunity came up to help save the magazine, and I took it.”