Chapter 12
AMARA
I’m not sure where I’m headed, but I know that I need a second to breathe.
I’m aware of the confused glances. Of the gasps. Of Leo and Owen watching me leave, the cameramen following us, and my girls behind me, wondering what happened.
Cooper. Cooper happened.
“Hey!” Lindsey calls, her footsteps falling fast and hot behind me. “Are you okay?”
I turn the corner of the house, and only when everything is out of sight do I relax, stopping to catch my breath.
This dress is heavy.
Looking up, I find my producer in front of me, and right behind her, the cameras.
“I don’t want to be filmed,” I tell her with a cry.
“Amara—”
“I don’t think I can do this,” I admit, falling to the ground. My dress billows out around me, and I hide my face in my hands.
She’s quiet for a few beats. And then she’s in front of me.
“You guys have history?” she asks.
I let out a dark chuckle. “You could say that.”
“What kind of history?”
I know I’m still being filmed. I know that this is going to make their show. I know that I’ve caused a scene, and this is exactly what they want. I know that she probably knows much more than she’s letting on.
“I think that’s for us to discuss,” a low voice says behind her.
My eyes flicker up.
I’ve always hated how much his eyes make me melt.
Since the second I laid eyes on him as a kid. No matter what, his eyes could make me do anything they wanted.
They’d crack me open when I was feeling down. I’d spill my guts and my feelings in an instant.
Those eyes used to look at me like they cared. Like he wanted me, once upon a time.
And I hate how they look at me the same way now. They were lying then. They’re lying now.
“I don’t—”
“Can you give us a second?” he asks Lindsey. She looks behind her at the crew before nodding curtly and walking away.
The cameramen stay.
Cooper looks around before carefully sitting next to me, like I’m some wounded thing.
“Are you okay?” he asks softly.
“I don’t want to be here,” I say again. I mean it. I mean it with everything in me.
“What can I do to make this better?” It’s a plea. I remind myself that he’s a liar.
“You can leave.”
He shakes his head. “You had to have signed a similar contract as I did. I think you know I can’t do that.”
“Why are we here, Cooper?”
He looks around us. The cameramen have moved closer, and I scowl at them.
“We’re here because it seems as though our friends take NDAs a little too seriously. I was absolutely positive that NDAs do not include significant others.” He groans. “It appears they do, and none of them opened their normally big mouths.”
And it’s true. I’m honestly shocked that they all kept it a secret.
I’m shocked that the girls kept it from the men, too.
“Is this a joke?” I ask suddenly, anger pumping through my veins again.
His brows furrow as his face pinches. “Why would this ever be a joke?”
“To make me look stupid again.”
Again.
He rears back like he’s been punched.
“Amara—”
“You left me,” I cry. The tears came within a split second. One moment I’m angry, and the next I’m sobbing, desperate to cling to someone who isn’t him.
“I didn’t mean to—”
“Bullshit,” I spit. “All the promises. All the years of friendship. I trusted you.”
His face crumples.
I stand, making a move to unhook the mic pack from behind me. Lindsey seems to appear out of thin air. “What are you doing?”
“I’m quitting,” I tell her simply, turning my back toward her so she can take it off.
“You can’t do that,” she panics. “If you quit now, it’s in your contract that you owe fifty thousand dollars.”
I freeze.
Fifty. Thousand?
And then I remember Zara mentioning it. Specifically, she told me that if I were to go through with this, I had to commit, because otherwise I’d be absolutely fucked.
“I have good news and bad news,” she had told me, sitting a pile of papers in front of me.
“Bad news is that if you do this, you have to go through with it, or you owe them fifty grand. You’re fucked if you don’t get up there and follow through with the show until the end.
The good news? You don’t have to sign a marriage license until the end.
It’s a fake one until your commitment ceremony. ”
“Fifty thousand dollars?” I struggle to get the words out, instead placing my hand on the cool siding of the building.
“Amara, listen to me,” Cooper begs, still on the ground. He stands, leaning against the surface beside me, ducking his head to look into my eyes.
Do NOT melt, I have to remind myself.
“If you don’t want to do this, I will pay our way out of the contract. Both of us.”
I open my mouth to say okay. He absolutely can do that. But he interrupts.
“But I think we should do it.” His voice is a whisper as his eyes flicker to the camera crew.
“I think that we should do it for ourselves. They’re going to cut this up and blow it up no matter what. This wedding is fake. We’re not really signing anything. Why don’t we just get through this, and at the end, go our separate ways?”
I can’t meet his gaze, instead opting to run my thumb along the back of my other hand roughly, my skin bunching up at the movement. “I don’t think I can do that.”
He’s quiet, and when I look up, his eyes are welling with tears. “Please. Just give me one single chance. If at any point you want out, you’re out.”
I look back down, knowing that if I keep looking at him, all my willpower is going to go right out the window. He’s always had that superpower.
Cooper’s frame overwhelms mine, and the smell of bourbon sweeps over me. It’s sweet and masculine, and mixed with something that smells an awful lot like Old Bay. And it only brings me back to the ocean that time we got our hands on a bottle of his grandfather’s old bourbon. I know it’s a cologne.
But it hits me that Cooper is the exact same boy I fell in love with. Everything about him. The way his eyes look at me with worry. The way his words caress my heart.
But nostalgia is a bitch and a liar. It’s a trap that I so easily fall into every single time. Weak-kneed, with no backbone.
And yet, I hear myself saying “I’ll do it.”
Cooper walks me back to the arch. My beautiful arch.
I was so excited when they asked me what flowers I wanted.
Of course, I wanted hydrangeas. They were everywhere back at home. My parents had them in their garden too. They’re my mom’s favorite to this day.
I wonder what Cooper thought when he saw them.
What he thought when he saw me.
I don’t even remember what his face looked like when he turned around. I think I blacked it all out. All I saw was him.
The only reason I agreed to keep going was for exposure for my business. At least, that’s what I’m telling myself. That’s it. I can pretend to like him even just a little for a while. It won’t kill me. I’ve been doing it to some extent for the last few years.
I just have to remind myself not to fall in love with him.
Under no circumstances will I let Cooper Henry into my heart, or my pants.
Especially not my pants.
Heavens, why am I even thinking about that right now? I’m so fucked.
The man behind us clears his throat. “Amara and Cooper will exchange promises. Amara,” he gestures to me.
I take a deep breath. I don’t have to think about who I’m reading to. I wrote these before I knew it was Cooper waiting here for me.
I take my vow book from the officiant.
“Cooper,” I start, my voice shaking. “I promise to wake up every single day with a pure heart, with every intention of letting your love in. I promise to make you my home, and to remind you of how much love you deserve every single day. I vow to never stop holding your hand as we start this journey together, and I vow to never forget this moment, standing here in front of you.” I take a deep breath. “And how excited I am to marry you.”
Cooper’s bright eyes bore into mine. I lick my lips, looking around, only to find Natalia’s face in the crowd.
She holds my eyes, wiping away a tear.
And she smiles, offering me a simple nod.
I haven’t seen her in so long. Not since I reached out about their grandpa.
My heart grows heavy.
“Amara Flores,” he starts, holding his vow book at his waist.
It’s closed.
His eyes are only on me.
“I vow to make sure that you wake up feeling loved, whole, and happy every single day. I could stand here and tell you how much I love you already, but those words mean nothing without action.” He looks out into the crowd.
“I promise to show you. Through small acts of utter devotion, I promise to show you that I love you every single day. Through the good and the bad.”
I close my eyes, squeezing them shut.
“I vow to always keep fighting for you, because I know that we can overcome anything. To choose you each and every single day. To honor, respect, and cherish you, in sickness and in health. Through sorrows and success. I vow to be your biggest fan. And most of all, I vow to keep loving you for the rest of your life.”
A tear falls down my cheek, and his rough finger reaches up, brushing it away.
He lingers there, his hand expanding to hold the side of my face. His eyes working their magic on me.
All I want to do is run.
There was once a time I dreamed of him saying those words to me. Once, when I truly thought it would come true. I was stupid. Na?ve.
But to hear them now…
It hurts.
A buzzing fills my ears, and I’m not sure what is said next. At some point, I say I do.
And I only snap out of it all when Cooper grasps my face.
“Can I kiss you?” he whispers, his breath fanning my lips.
I nod shallowly, and he kisses me.
I’m glad he’s holding me, because I nearly pass out.