Forty-Four
Sienna
The kids are gone.
Finally.
I take a deep, cleansing breath, sinking into my chair at the reception table, free from sticky fingers and tiny, insatiable attention-seekers.
If I never hear the words Do you know how to do a cartwheel? again, it’ll be too soon.
I glance over at the kids' table.
Nathan?
Not so lucky.
He’s surrounded, blowing bubbles while a pack of miniature humans shriek and dive-bomb into them.
To his credit, he doesn’t look like he minds all that much.
Tall, broad, and entirely out of place, but somehow not. The suit doesn’t matter. The power, the reputation, the wealth—it’s all meaningless here. He’s just a man, laughing as a four-year-old launches herself onto his leg like she’s claiming him for her kingdom.
God help me, my heart clenches.
“You know,”
comes a familiar voice beside me, “it suits him.”
I close my eyes with a sigh before turning to my mother, who has gracefully slid into the chair next to mine, wine glass in hand, watching Nathan with far too much interest.
“Mom,”
I groan, “please, not this again. If you’re about to start on about how I need to have children, I swear to—”
But she surprises me when she doesn’t argue. She doesn’t push.
Instead, she reaches across the table and takes my hand, her grip warm and familiar.
“I know,”
she says softly.
I blink.
That’s it?
No, But when you meet the right man! No, You’ll change your mind when you're older! No, Grandchildren would look great on me!
Just… I know.
Her thumb brushes over my knuckles, and when I glance up, I see it.
The understanding.
The regret.
The love.
“I thought the right way,”
she says, “was always to do things the way your father and I did. Find the person, settle down, start a family.”
She pauses, staring into her wine glass like it holds answers. “But looking back, I gave up so many opportunities to be a mother so young.”
I squeeze her hand. “Mom—”
Her lips curve into a soft, bittersweet smile. “Would I change it? Never. But I understand now, and I’m proud of you.”
Her voice wavers, her eyes shining with unshed tears, and that’s what does me in.
I turn fully toward her, squeezing her hand tighter. “I’m happy, Mom,”
I tell her, meaning every word. “I really, really am. New York is my place.”
She nods, patting my hand, then sniffs, blinking her tears away. “Then I’m happy too.”
My chest aches.
“I just miss you,”
she admits, her voice softer now. “But you and your brother’s happiness is what matters most to your father and me.”
I follow her gaze to where Jeremy is on the dance floor, completely wrapped up in Grace.
And yeah, it’s beautiful.
“Looks like he got his happily ever after,”
I say, smiling.
My mother looks from my brother to Nathan, and with absolute certainty, she says, “I think you did too.”
I freeze.
My breath catches, my stomach dipping as guilt claws its way up my throat.
Oh, Mom. What am I doing?
She doesn’t know this is fake. That Nathan isn’t mine. That this entire week has been one massive lie, built on a napkin contract and a misunderstanding at an airport bar.
For a split second, it’s on the tip of my tongue. To tell her the truth. To spill everything.
She cuts in first, shaking her head with a small chuckle.
“You know,”
she muses, tilting her glass, “I found it strange how you never spoke about him before this wedding.”
She looks at me then, lips twitching, eyes sharp. “You didn’t even give us a name, Sienna. Not once.”
My heart pounds.
“I thought for a while that you’d just made him up. That there was no man. That you just didn’t want to show up alone.”
I force myself to keep my expression calm, to nod along like I haven’t just been completely exposed.
She simply smiles, winks, and takes another sip of her wine.
“Whatever way you got a hold of him,”
she says, “my advice? Keep holding.”
My throat closes.
“That man looks at you…I don’t know, Sienna. It’s intense.”
Just like that, I realize the truth.
I might have fooled everyone else, but not her.
Not my mother.
She’s known from the start. She just never called me on it because she sees the same thing I feel.
Something real.
Something terrifying.
Something I don’t know how to hold onto, even if I wanted to.
I swallow hard, blinking down at my wine, pretending I don’t feel like I’m coming apart at the seams.
“Mom,”
I whisper.
She just pats my hand, knowing.
Understanding.
Loving me anyway.