Save the Date (Modern Arrangements, #1)

"You okay?" Aidan spoke in a hushed voice.

"I don’t know," I answered quickly, slightly annoyed by his interruption of my thoughts.

"Are you going to sign?" He pressed.

"Hah," I breathed out in partial amusement and partial astonishment.

"What?" His nerves were working into his voice, again.

I glanced at my watch.

"We have less than ten minutes before we arrive to JFK," he said matter-of-factly.

I nodded.

"Please talk to me," he requested.

"What do you want me to say? That I feel like a high price whore or that I’m selling my soul?" I raised my head to stop his argument, it would prevent the hurt look on his face. "I’m sorry but you asked."

"You’re not a whore and I’m not the devil," he growled.

"It doesn’t feel that way at the moment," I chuckled, humorlessly. Stressful situations had always caused me to have inappropriate reactions. I took another deep breath. "You’re ready to purchase the next four years of my life?"

"I have no other choice," he grumbled.

Nodding, I understood what he meant. I barely had any choices left myself and I knew he was right. He didn’t have a choice unless he wanted to lose everything.

"Is it only the…the conceiving part or is it the marriage as well?" he questioned without looking at me.

"It all bothers me, Aidan," I sighed out and then growled. "I could handle the marriage but putting the baby thing on top of it...well…."

"Let’s just focus on the marriage part right now and then after we’re married we can discuss the baby portion of the deal. Okay?" He looked at me hopefully.

"But I still have to agree to have a baby, right?" He nodded slowly. "I don’t know if I can do that."

"It doesn’t have to be right away," he argued. "We can wait a few months to see how things go with each other before we decide to bring a child into this." His eyes were pleading again.

"Fine. Where’s the pen?" I spit out. I watched him search around. "Hurry before I change my mind!"

"Here," he shoved the pen into my hand.

As I approached the sections about having a child, I hesitated and looked up to him.

"I will continue to take my birth control pills until we talk about this again." He nodded, knowing that it wasn’t a question.

I signed and every pen stroke felt like I was signing a deal with Satan.

Aidan took the pen and signed his parts of the contract. I felt a tear slip over my cheek as I turned to my side in my seat trying to force myself to relax.

"Now we just need to talk about the wedding," he sighed out.

"Wedding?" I croaked out trying to hide my tears.

"Yes, it will be in a month," he said factually.

I wiped my face and sat up turning back toward him.

"Aren’t we just going to go to a Justice of the Peace or something?" I scoffed.

He shook his head.

"Viola wants to plan the wedding. It will be small, just family." He shrugged.

"So, I have to wear some dress and do the whole down the aisle thing?" My voice hitched up a notch at the end of my question.

"It’s not a big deal, Lilli. Viola can handle it all. My family is close and we have certain traditions. If this were a real wedding then it would be much more elaborate and take at least a year to plan."

I scowled at his choice of real wedding.

"I don’t want a wedding," I argued.

"It would crush my aunt if I didn’t do this, if we didn’t do this. Besides you can talk to her about it when we get to the airport," I instantly turned my head back to him.

"At the airport," I exclaimed. "How about you just fill me in on all these damned plans and meetings you have arranged for me?" I spit out, angrily and sarcastically.

"Calm down. Viola wanted to meet you and talk to you before the wedding. She suggested coming to pick us up from the airport. Maggie should be with her too."

"Who the hell is Maggie?" I raised my hands palms up.

"She is Viola and Liam’s daughter, my cousin, though she is like a sister to me."

I nodded, thinking that he had mentioned her before in a conversation.

"Anything else?" I pressed.

"Well, there is this," he placed a small black leather box on the arm of the seat. My nerve endings were firing rapidly and my body started to go numb from one small box. He cleared his throat.

"Are you going to open it?"

I shook my head. He laughed.

"It won’t bite you." He rolled his eyes and opened the box, took out a ring and looked down at it. "It was my mother’s," he said almost too low for me to hear him.

"Oh, Aidan, no," I shook my head and put my hand on his arm. "Save that for the," I gulped, "for the real thing."

He shook his head and handed it to me.

"I want you to wear it," he nodded lightly.

"I can’t," I pushed his hand back. "Save it for the real thing, Aidan, honestly. Don’t waste it on me."

He looked up to my face, grabbed my hand and slipped the ring on my finger.

"Huh," he smiled a little.

"What?" I choked.

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