Chapter 35
HARRISON
I hadn’t realized how badly I needed something like a Christmas market until we were actually there.
After weeks of dealing with CC’s disapproval and Regina still circling like a hawk, it felt good to go to a place that smelled like roasted chestnuts and cinnamon sugar.
The only drama here was whether to go with mulled wine or hot cocoa.
“What did I tell you?” Aurelia asked playfully as she dragged me along from stall to stall. “This is good, right? Getting away from it all for a bit was exactly what you needed.”
I couldn’t deny it. That conversation with my mother had helped to ease the tension that had been tugging my chest tighter than a drawstring. With CC no longer being a threat, Aurelia and I had decided to put the situation with her family on the backburner for the rest of the night.
Frankly, it had already been an eventful one. On our way back into the city from my parents’ estate, when she’d first suggested that we come to this market, I’d thought the stress of it all had finally made her lose it, but now that we were here, I had to admit, she’d been absolutely right.
I squeezed her hand and sighed. “Fine. You might not have been as completely nuts as I thought you were when you suggested this. It’s nice. Normal.”
She pressed a gingerbread cookie into my hand and stole a bite of it for herself, laughing when I pretended to be offended. God, she’s radiant when she laughs.
“Normal? Well, yeah, that’s kind of the point, but you and I are normal, Harrison. We’ve just been going through it a little bit.”
As we crossed the street into the park, she slid her hand into mine, not even hesitating for a beat.
She just twined her fingers around my own like they’d belonged there all along.
There was no second-guessing from my side either.
I tugged her closer to my side, twirling her into me to slide my arm around her, our joined hands now draped over her shoulder.
It hit me then, the sharp and sudden realization that she wasn’t just some girl I was seeing. This wasn’t temporary. It didn’t have an expiration date.
She was real. We were real.
I blinked hard, wondering if it’d hit her yet, but since she hadn’t mentioned it, I decided not to either. Instead, I just let the knowledge burrow itself under my skin, wrapping me in a weird sense of peace. We found a bench and sat down together.
The whole park glowed like a snow globe come to life under the canopy of Christmas lights they’d strung up for the market. She leaned into my side, happily munching on another cookie she’d pulled out of the bag she’d bought.
“Should we—” I cleared my throat. “We should probably discuss money moves at some point, huh? We’ve had the we’re really doing this conversation. We’ve talked to my mom. If I can get my way, I still want to get married on Christmas Eve, but we’ve never really talked about what comes after.”
She glanced up at me, blue eyes twinkling under the lights. “Money moves, like what? Are you talking property, investments, life insurance policies?”
“All of the above,” I said after thinking it over for a beat. “Let’s start with the obvious, though. Property. Where will we live?”
She didn’t respond immediately, and I liked that she was actually giving this some thought. “That depends on whether we’re staying in San Francisco.”
My eyebrows moved up but not fast. It was an interesting point, and not one I had ever really given much thought to myself. “Okay, let’s imagine for a minute that we don’t. Where would you like to go?”
“New York, maybe,” she said, then got quiet for a moment as she chewed another bite of her cookie. “We could start fresh there. Open up our own firm, or a branch of W&S if you think your family would allow it.”
I shrugged. “Somehow, I doubt Sterling will have a problem and he’ll be the CEO soon, so we should be okay if that’s what we decide to do.”
Bells jingled from the stalls across the street. Kids darted around in the park while their parents sat on benches like ours, consuming the treats they’d bought. A guy came past selling hot cider and I bought us each one, chuckling when Aurelia grabbed a bag of candied almonds, too.
When she looked at me, her eyes were wide, like she was daring me to complain, but I didn’t. I loved her this way, smiling, playful, so vibrantly alive that it made my chest hurt. These last few weeks, it was like I’d slowly seen her coming into full bloom.
From the uptight, furious woman I’d first met, to the brutally honest, vulnerable girl who’d first called me about that deal, to where we were now, candidly talking about our future together like it had always been meant to be that way.
“Let’s say we actually do this,” I said after I’d swallowed a sip of my cider. “Where do you want us? San Francisco or are we packing up and starting an empire in New York?”
“An empire,” she echoed, chuckling. “Maybe we shouldn’t refer to it as that yet, shall we? Unless you’re planning on getting us crowns and matching thrones as soon as we arrive.”
“Obviously.” I frowned at her, pretending not to believe that she’d thought otherwise. “I’ve already put in an order for our crowns and we need to decide between red and green upholstery for the thrones.”
She nearly choked on her cider as laughter bubbled out of her. “Red or green? It’s not going to be Christmas forever, you know.”
“Festive is the vibe I’m going for anyway,” I deadpanned, and she snorted into her cup.
After the moment of levity, I turned to face her fully, needing her to know I was serious about this.
“Well, look, crowns and thrones aside, I’m game for giving New York a try.
We can talk to Sterling about a new branch of W&S or we can do our own thing.
Put our own names on the door. Westwood and Westwood. It could be fun.”
It got quieter between us then. The silence wasn’t heavy or uncomfortable. It was just different, but I supposed that was to be expected with all these big dreams on the table.
She leaned back against the bench, studying the lights overhead. “Honestly, I think that decision goes hand in hand with what else we might want.”
I frowned. “Like?”
“Like, this is primarily a marriage of convenience, right? I mean, that’s why we actually agreed to do it. So what exactly do we consider convenient? What do we actually want from it?”
I shifted, caught off guard. “Convenience? That’s what we want, isn’t it?”
She rolled her eyes, a smile tugging at her lips before she got a little more serious again. “Sure, but what does that convenience look like to you? For me, arranged or not, marriage is for life. That means we don’t only have to think about business. We also have to think about life stuff.”
“Life stuff.” That pulled me up short, but not because I hadn’t thought about it. I had. What surprised me was that she’d said it the way she had, like it was a foregone conclusion. A fact. “Like, kids? That’s what you’re talking about?”
She shrugged, but her gaze was steady on mine. “Eventually, yeah. I’d like to have them. Would you?”
“In a few years,” I said honestly, figuring this was one of those big, important topics that one had to be totally truthful about or risk dooming it all right from the start.
“Definitely not within the next couple years at least. The way my brothers are going, I’m going to be drowning in nieces and nephews soon.
I figure it’s best to use them for practice before we add to the chaos. ”
Her lips curved into a slow, mischievous smile. “So you’re saying you’ll sign us up to babysit?”
“Only if they come with an instruction manual.” I stole one of the last almond nuts and she gasped like I’d committed a felony, but she didn’t try to steal it back.
“An instruction manual would be useful, but I don’t think babies come with those.” She glanced at me again, but instead of turning her gaze back to the lights like she had before, she held my eyes for a long beat. “We’re agreed, then? To wait a few years, but to definitely start trying after that?”
Just like that, the conversation had shifted into something bigger.
We weren’t just talking hypotheticals anymore.
We were sketching the outline of the life we wanted to build together and the weirdest part of it was that it didn’t freak me out.
It didn’t make me feel like we were rushing into something we couldn’t possibly understand.
Aurelia and I had been on the same page about everything so far, and the thought of actually doing it all with her was, unexpectedly, pretty fucking exciting.
We lingered at the park for a little bit longer, but eventually the cold pushed us to get moving. It was getting late and as the hours ticked by, the wind was picking up and a definite added chill was sinking in.
Christmas lights blinked from lampposts as we strode down the block, toward our street. Halfway between our two places, I slowed on the sidewalk and turned to look at her. “My place or yours?”
She stopped walking too, arching a steep eyebrow as she looked back at me. “How much do you like that townhouse?”
I rubbed my chin, pretending to think about it much harder than I actually needed to. “It was recently renovated. The building is old enough to have a real fireplace and it’s got great water pressure. How much do you like your apartment?”
“I don’t have a fireplace and it’s winter.” She smiled. “I do like my espresso machine, though.”
That was all I needed to know. Ten minutes later, I was in her kitchen, wrestling the damn thing off the counter. It weighed about as much as a small child, and she was doubled over laughing while I muttered threats at it.
“Are you seriously doing this?” she asked between giggles. “Why?”
“I’m seriously doing it,” I grunted, nearly tripping over her rug as I strode to her front door. “If this cursed thing is what’s keeping you at this place, then taking it to mine solves the problem. Pack a couple bags. Let’s go home, baby.”
She blinked hard, but she was still smiling.
There was also something softer in her eyes now.
I wondered if she was seeing through the joke to the truth underneath.
The truth that I wanted her at my place, with me, and not just for tonight, but tomorrow, and the day after that, and the one after that.
I wanted her with me for every tomorrow, and tonight? Well, tonight was just the beginning of all that.