Love Takes Home (Boulder Canyon #4)

1. Chapter 1

Chapter 1

Virginia “Ginny” Mills

“You look beautiful,” Mom tells me, kissing my cheek. Looking around the room at my friends, she adds, “You all look beautiful.”

She’s smiling, but it’s the saddest smile I’ve ever seen. The tears are right there. Like one more breath and they’ll fall.

“Thanks, Mom.” I return her sad smile with one of my own.

There’s a knock at the dressing room door and my dad quietly asks through the wood, “Is everyone decent?”

A chorus of ‘yes’ rings out from all of us as he opens the door and steps inside. He looks dashing in his charcoal gray suit and tie. His eyes also have a sadness in them I haven’t seen since I told him about the weekend Trish and I came back from visiting Davis.

“I guess that’s our cue,” Trish says from a chair in the corner. “Someone’s going to have to help me up or we’ll have to do this thing here.”

This thing. Not ceremony. Not wedding. Thing.

“I got you,” Elle volunteers.

I watch as the two women get Trish out of the chair until she’s standing with her belly on full display in her deep blue gown.

“If your water breaks today, we’re all in trouble,” I tell her.

“You’re the one who scheduled this thing for today,” she sasses back. “Besides, I still have another week to go. But if you want, I can try to get things moving sooner.”

“Trish,” I call her name, both of us trying to hide our smiles. “You can’t fuck my brother in the clergy closet.”

That finally gets the room laughing, my parents rolling their eyes at our antics.

“Killjoy.” She pouts. “How about the bathroom?”

“No,” I mouth, shaking my head.

“Come on, ladies,” my mom says, breaking up the little bit of happiness that’s seeped into the day. “It’s time to get ready, and I think Dad here wants to say a few words to his baby girl.”

She gives me another kiss on the cheek, squeezing me tight in a hug that only a mom can give. Something I’ll never be able to do for another human, reinforcing why we’re here today.

“I’ll see you out there,” I reply, returning her squeeze.

I swear I hear her say, “I hope not.”

Trish is next. My first friend. My sister from another mister. And now my sister-in-law. We’ve come full circle and are now legally family, but we never needed that to know we were sisters.

“If this is what you want, I’m happy for you. Just know we’re here for you. For anything,” she whispers in my ear, pulling me into her version of a hug. Her protruding belly gets in the way of everything these days, but my little niece or nephew needs the room, and the room they shall get. And I will be the coolest, most favorite aunt who ever aunt-ed.

“Love you. Thank you.” I return her hug, trying not to cry.

Lottie is up next. “You are stunning.” She smiles. “Only you could look like a centerfold wet dream in that gown.”

“Bitch,” I laugh, pulling her into a hug.

“I second what I know Trish just told you. If you’re happy, we’re happy for you. And if you can’t get ahold of them, you call us.”

“Thanks. Love you,” I tell her.

She moves to the door with Trish and Mom, and Elle takes her turn faking niceties.

“There’s still time.” She pointedly looks at me. “There’s still time all the way up until you officially sign the thing.”

“I’ll keep that in mind.”

“I also have a lead foot and access to a plane, helicopter, and boat.”

“Shut up.” I smile at her. “I’m fine. Everything’s fine.”

“What a glowing recommendation for marriage there, Gin.”

“Just go. And pretend to be happy for me today? Please?”

“You got it,” she says as she finger-shoots at me. “Pretend to be happy. I know a thing or two about doing that. I’ll pull it right out of my bag of tricks for you.”

“Appreciate it,” I deadpan.

“Love you.”

When the most important women in my life file out of the room, each one looking like they are being dragged to the gallows, I turn to my dad. “Daddy?”

“Sit with me for a minute, Princess.”

He hasn’t called me Princess in years. I silently nod and make my way to the couch along the back wall and sit as comfortably as I can in this monstrosity of a gown. Don’t ask. Please. Just know I would have never picked this dress to wear today.

“First,” he begins, sounding every bit the accomplished attorney he is, “I love you. And your answer today will never change that. Understand?”

I feel like I’m being scolded for something I’ve done wrong, but I dutifully nod my head.

“I don’t want you to go through with this.”

I open my mouth to object, but he holds up his hand, halting the words I’ve rehearsed to defend my actions from spilling out.

“You don’t love him, baby girl. And I think we both know he doesn’t love you. And I’m going to say something that I will probably regret the rest of my life, but if it’s just a sex thing, there are other options out there to get what you need.”

“Daddy!” I laugh, and it sounds a little deranged even in my head. “What?”

“I’m saying if you’re only with him for the physical aspect of it, you can surely do better, Virginia. But I know you aren’t in it for the love side. Do you even like him?”

I stare at my father, Mr. Stoic, who never has a cross word to say out loud about anything or anyone, never talks unless he has to, telling me not to go through with this. And I break. The tears I’ve been holding back all morning finally fall, and I’m not sure they are ever going to stop.

“I don’t know what to do, Daddy.”

Saying the words out loud, in front of another person, feels like the weight of the world has been lifted off my shoulders—my soul.

“You say no, sweetheart. You get up and you walk out of this place with your head held high, knowing you’re doing the best thing for yourself.”

“What about Kei—”

“I’ll handle him.”

“I don’t think you understand.”

“I understand more than you think I do, Virginia. And I don’t need you to tell me. I know. That’s why you aren’t going home, and you’re getting out of town for a few days.”

I snap my head up, the confusion loud and clear on my face. “What did you do?”

“Contingency plans. You have a friend who’s going to get you out of town.”

“But Trish—” I try to reason with him.

“Will call you as soon as she’s in labor and you’ll be there in plenty of time.”

“But—”

He cuts me off again. “Do you want to marry this asshole? Say yes and I’ll walk you down the aisle to your doom.”

“You make it sound fatal,” I whisper.

“Is it not?” he challenges me.

“Daddy, I don’t want to be here anymore. This isn’t the life I want.”

He pulls me into his arms and holds me like he did when I was little and scraped my knee, rocking us both back and forth.

“I know, baby girl, I know. We were all just waiting for you to catch up.”

“Who’s the friend?”

“Harrison Bennett.”

“Who?”

“Oh, I’m sorry, you know him as Joker.”

“Joker’s real name is Harrison?”

Dad nods.

“Harry?”

“I don’t think I’d call him that to his face.” Dad smirks for the first time since he walked into the room. “He’s got a place. It’s safe and out of the way, but not too far from home. He’s going to take you there.”

I should think about this more. I’m going to let Joker take me away? To some place I’ve never been? I bet it’s in the middle of nowhere, some remote spot no one knows about. He’s going to drop me there and some ax-murderer is going to come chop me up in the middle of the night, and no one will ever find my remaining body pieces.

“It’s not quite that remote, honey.” Dad chuckles, reading me like a book. Like he always has.

“How do you know? How do you even know Joker this well?”

“I, um, think that’s his story to tell. But I trust him with my life. I trust him with yours.”

He pulls me back into his arms again before trying to move us to the door.

“I can really do this?” I ask, more to myself than to my dad, but he answers anyway.

“You can do anything you decide you’re going to do, Ginny. You are the maker of your own story, and your story is just starting. Take a breath, take a moment. And look around you. Look for the people who will help you, not hurt you. Look at what you could be passing up without even having the conversation.” It seems he’s trying to tell me more than what he just said, but I don’t know what it is. I’ve never been a good dad mind reader.

“Can I take this dress off?”

“No time. You can change when you get there. Let’s get you out of here.”

He grips my hand, tugging me through the door and down the hallway. He pushes open a side door that dumps us into the back lot used for overflow parking on Sunday mornings, and there’s a big, oversized truck waiting, its engine running.

“Um, Dad? How am I going to get in that thing with this thing on?”

“I got it.”

The voice. The immediate flutters in my stomach. The throb I always feel between my legs. Joker. He rounds the back of the truck and comes to me, nodding to Dad and taking my hand, drawing me to the passenger side.

“What? No. You can’t lift me up that high. You’ll hurt yourself!”

“Watch me,” he growls. “And you will never say shit like that again.”

“Like what?”

“Like anything about your weight. Not around me. You’re fucking perfect, and I won’t stand for it.”

“You won’t stand for it?” I ask, placing my hand on my hips. “I’ll have you know—”

“Don’t care.”

He cuts off my sentence and places his hand on my waist, lifting me right up into the cab of the truck. What. The. Fuck.