Chapter 6 #2
The venue for the rehearsal dinner is a converted barn on the outskirts of town, all exposed beams and twinkling lights and rustic elegance. The parking lot is already half full when we arrive, and I spot several familiar vehicles.
"Ready?"
Nadia takes a deep breath. "No. Let's go anyway."
We walk in together, my hand at the small of her back. The contact is possessive and deliberate, a clear statement to everyone in the room about who she belongs to tonight.
The reaction is immediate.
Heads turn. Conversations pause. I see Silas across the room, grinning like he's won some kind of bet. Helena Chen's mother actually drops her wine glass.
And then a woman who looks like an older version of Nadia descends on us with the force of a natural disaster.
"Nadia Michelle Smith." She pulls Nadia into a hug that's half embrace, half interrogation. "You didn't tell me your date was Callum Ridge."
"You know him?"
"Everyone knows him. He's the most eligible bachelor in the Kootenay Rockies." She releases Nadia and turns that assessing gaze on me. "I'm Gloria. Nadia's mother. And you must be the man who's been keeping my daughter trapped on a mountain for two days."
"The storm was keeping her trapped. I was just providing shelter."
"Mmhmm." Gloria looks between us with obvious suspicion. "Shelter. Is that what we're calling it?"
"Mom." Nadia's voice carries a warning. "Please don't."
"Don't what? I'm just making conversation.
Getting to know the man who's apparently swept my daughter off her feet in less than forty-eight hours.
" She loops her arm through mine and starts walking.
"Come on, Callum. You can sit next to me and tell me all about yourself while Nadia goes to find her sister. "
I glance back at Nadia, who mouths sorry with an expression of genuine horror.
But I meant what I said this morning. Her family doesn't scare me.
Gloria spends the next twenty minutes grilling me about my business, my brothers, my romantic history, and my five-year plan. I answer honestly and watch her suspicion slowly transform into something like grudging approval.
"You're not what I expected," she admits halfway through her second glass of wine.
"What did you expect?"
"I don't know. Someone slicker. Nadia usually goes for men in suits who can quote stock prices and don't know how to change a tire." She studies me. "You're different."
"I'll take that as a compliment."
"It is one." She glances across the room to where Nadia is talking with her sister, both of them gesturing animatedly. "She looks happy. Relaxed. I haven't seen her like that in years."
"She's been under a lot of pressure."
"She's been under pressure her whole life. Most of it self-imposed." Gloria's expression softens. "Her father and I, we made a lot of mistakes when she was young. Divorce is hard on kids, and we didn't handle it well. She learned early that the only person she could count on was herself."
"That's a heavy lesson for a child."
"It is. And it made her strong, but it also made her closed off.
Afraid to depend on anyone." Gloria meets my eyes.
"If you're going to be in her life, you need to understand that.
She pushes because she's scared. She tests because she's been disappointed.
But underneath all that armor, she's just a girl who wants someone to fight for her. "
"I'm not afraid of a fight."
"Good." Gloria pats my arm. "Because that daughter of mine is worth fighting for."
The rest of the evening passes in a blur of introductions and small talk and carefully navigated family dynamics.
I meet Nadia's father, who's awkward and clearly uncomfortable with the whole situation.
I meet her sister Yasmine, who's stressed but grateful that the seating chart crisis has been resolved.
I meet Tyler, the groom, who seems genuinely decent and obviously adores his bride.
Through it all, I keep finding Nadia across the room. Our eyes meet over wine glasses and around conversations with relatives and through the chaos of a family gathering that's equal parts love and dysfunction.
And every time I look at her, she's already looking at me.
After dinner, there's dancing. Nothing formal, just music playing and couples swaying and the kind of loose celebratory energy that comes with good wine and happy occasions.
I find Nadia at the edge of the dance floor, watching the other couples.
"I don't dance," I remind her.
"I remember." She doesn't look away from the dancers. "It's okay. We don't have to."
"I said I don't dance. Not that I won't." I extend my hand. "Come here."
Her smile is worth every awkward shuffle step that follows. I'm not graceful. I'm not smooth. But I hold her close and move with the music and watch her face soften into something that looks a lot like wonder.
"You're full of surprises, Callum Ridge."
"Just this once. Don't expect it to become a habit."
"I wouldn't dare." She rests her head against my chest. "Thank you. For tonight. For being here. For handling my family."
"Your family is fine."
"My family is a lot."
"So are you." I press a kiss to her hair. "I happen to like a lot."
She tilts her face up, and the look in her eyes makes my chest ache.
"I don't want this weekend to end."
"Neither do I."
"So what do we do about that?"
The question hangs there, full of possibilities I'm not sure either of us is ready to explore. Tomorrow is the wedding. The day after, she goes back to Chicago. Back to her life. Back to being someone I used to know for four days in February.
Unless.
"We figure it out," I tell her. "Together. After the wedding. We sit down and we talk about what this is and what we want and whether there's a way to make it work."
"You make it sound simple."
"It's not simple. But the best things rarely are."
She laughs, soft and warm against my chest. "When did you become such a romantic?"
"Approximately forty-eight hours ago. When a mouthy woman with expensive shoes walked into my bar and turned my whole life upside down."
"Your bar? It's Silas's bar."
"Details." I spin her in a clumsy turn that makes her laugh harder. "The point is, you showed up. And now everything's different. And I'm not ready to go back to the way things were before."
Nadia stops laughing. Stops moving. Just looks up at me with an expression I can't quite read.
"Me neither," she says quietly. "I'm not ready either."
We don't solve anything standing on that dance floor. We don't make plans or promises or any of the concrete commitments that would make this feel more real.
But when she kisses me in front of her entire family, soft and slow and full of something that feels like hope, I start to believe that maybe, just maybe, this thing between us has a chance.
The wedding is tomorrow. The ending we agreed to is coming fast.
But standing here with Nadia in my arms and the future stretching out uncertain and terrifying and full of possibility, I realize I'm not ready to let her go.
And I'm starting to think she's not ready to let me go either.