Chapter 35 Grace Nash

What Time on Tuesday

Six Days After the Wedding

He looks so sweet when he's sleeping. I haven't really taken the time to observe that, but as I wake up a little before seven, I allow myself the time to study him for a few beats.

We're both naked, tangled together after the night where we finally had the time to express how we're both feeling, and I don't ever want to move.

I know I have to. I need to get to my office. I've been gone nearly a week now, and I'm sure there's a mountain of things to do.

But right now, I just want to stare at the way his forehead smooths in his sleep, at the little freckles I never noticed before peppering across the top of his straight nose, at the short hairs of his eyebrows, and at the scruff covering his strong jawline. At the hair that's always so neat now mussed from sleep, and the full lips that worshiped my body last night.

And speaking of his lips, that dirty mouth of his…my God. It's going to be the end of me.

His eyes slowly start to open, and I close mine before he catches me staring. I shift in his arms to let him know I'm awake, and when I open my eyes, I see him peering at me with those blue ones of his. My privacy shades keep it fairly dark in here, but his eyes are still bright from the little bit of light peeking its way in around the sides.

And it's as our eyes meet that I know for sure.

I'm in love with him.

It's not just from the sex, though holy hell, that's been top-notch. It's from the strong foundation we built first as friends.

I can picture this love carrying us into a future where he's the one pressing that glass of wine into my palm after a long day.

He leans forward and presses his lips to my forehead. "Morning," he murmurs.

"Morning." I duck my face so my morning dragon breath doesn't scare him away. "As much as I don't want to move out of your arms, I need to get to work."

Instead of words, he responds by turning into me and tightening his arms around me. "I don't want to face reality. I just want to keep living in this dream with you."

An overwhelming sensation tightens my chest as I snuggle a little more closely into him. "Same."

We don't move for a few sweet moments, just holding onto one another in this perfection, but then my alarm starts to ring, letting me know I need to get into the shower or I'm going to be late.

We both sigh, and I turn out of his arms to click my alarm off before I get up and pad over to the bathroom to shower.

When I get out, he's not in bed anymore. I get dressed, pull my wet hair into a bun since I'm already running short on time, put on some makeup, and meet him in the kitchen.

To my surprise, he made me breakfast.

"You didn't have much, but I found the coffee and your stash of breakfast burritos in the freezer. I hope you don't mind that I made you one."

"You…you—" I cut myself off as I try to figure out whether this man is actually real or just a dream. "You hope I don't mind? This is amazing, Spencer." I sit down, pour salsa on the side of my plate, and dig into the burrito. "Make yourself one, too. These are the best. "

He chuckles. "I already ate mine, and you're right. I'm going to take a quick shower while you eat, and then we can go over and tell Maggie our news together."

He knows she'll be in the tasting room making sure we're ready for the day. It's always where she starts the day, usually an hour before anyone else is even awake. It's her favorite place to be…and I need to go tell her that Spencer and I are married now.

I am beyond grateful that Spencer is the kind of guy who wasn't about to let me do this on my own. I don't think Nana will have a negative reaction. After all, I did confess my feelings to her regarding Spencer once upon a time, so I don't think it'll come as a complete shock to her that I went through with this. However, it might come as a shock to her that Spencer did, and all of this will shock Amelia, who we will more than likely have to tell next.

Now that is a conversation I'm not ready for. I'm going to need some backup with that one.

Once I'm done eating and he's out of the shower, we regroup in the kitchen.

"Did you want to practice how you're going to tell Maggie on me first?" he asks.

I chuckle. "It's probably a good idea, but I think we should just head in and get it done."

"Whatever you want," he says with a nod.

When I walk out the front door, I glance over toward Amelia's bungalow out of habit. I think I probably always glance over at her bungalow when I leave mine, thinking maybe I'll get the chance to see Spencer.

I think back over the many times I did get to—when his car was parked behind her place, and I was looking for him, hoping I'd get to run into him, pining away for my sister's fiancé when I shouldn't have been.

But look at us now. I guess things work out how they are supposed to.

She's not out of her bungalow yet, unsurprising since it's only eight o'clock and she usually doesn't roll into her office until closer to nine .

I glance up at Spencer as he shuts the door behind him, and I type the code into the keypad next to it to lock it.

"Oh-five-two-oh? Isn't that your birthday?" he asks.

"Shit, now you know my secret. Don't break into my house."

"I'm your husband. Shouldn't I have the code?"

He makes a good point.

We make our way over toward the tasting room, and as predicted, Nana is sitting at the counter with today's newspaper. She flips it down onto the countertop when we walk in together.

She's alone, which means Delilah is either not in yet or in the inventory room, and Nana's eyes move slowly between us as she studies the couple in front of her. She's quiet as she squints and tilts her head, trying to piece together what's going on.

And then, finally, she speaks. "You two? Together? Happy glows all about you…is there something you need to tell me?"

I giggle a little nervously. I nod, and I glance over at Spencer as if to tell him to go ahead.

He shakes his head a little. "It needs to come from you."

He's right, and so I look back at Nana as I allow the truth to tumble out of my mouth. "I flew to Vegas to meet Spencer, and while I was there, we eloped."

I leave out the part about being raging drunk and hopped up on allergy drugs that caused us to blackout and completely forget the night when we tied the knot.

All that matters is that we have a certificate proving my words to be true.

"Well, I'll be…" she says, surprise evident in her tone. "Of all the things I thought you might come in here saying this morning when I saw your car behind your bungalow, I don't think it would've been that, but congratulations."

She stands and walks over toward us. She pulls me into a tight hug.

"I'm happy for you, sweetheart," she says to me. She hugs Spencer next. "And you, my boy. You have become like another grandchild to me, and I was devastated when you and Amelia ended things. But now…I'm thrilled. I'm thrilled to welcome you into the family, even if it's under circumstances I wasn't expecting. "

He opens his mouth to respond, but we all hear the voice of complete and utter disbelief before he gets a chance to utter his words.

"Welcome to the family? What the fuck is going on here?"

I whip around at the sound of Amelia's voice, and so does Spencer as Nana's eyes focus on her other granddaughter.

"Oh, hey, Amelia," I say, going for casual even though my voice is shaking as I face my sister. "We were going to find a better time to tell you…" I suck in a breath as I say the words she already heard Nana say anyway. "Spencer and I got married."

Her face reddens with anger. "You?" she asks, pointing at me. "And…and… you ?" she asks, pointing at Spencer. "You two? When?" She doesn't give us time to answer. "Wait. You told me you wanted to wait until your contract was up." She turns her accusatory gaze onto Spencer.

"I did," he says simply. "And my contract with the Vikings ended." He says it so easily even though we all know that's not what he meant when he told her he wanted to wait.

"So, you just…marry the first girl you see?" she asks snidely, jabbing a thumb toward me.

"It's not like that, Amelia," he says quietly.

"Then what the fuck is it like?" she demands.

"Amelia!" Nana scolds. "I know you're emotional over this shocking announcement, but I will not allow you to use that kind of language in my tasting room."

Amelia doesn't bat an eyelash at the scolding as she continues, staring the two of us down as Spencer leans in toward me, draping a defensive arm around my shoulders.

"And you," she says, turning to me with a hiss. "How could you do this to me? You know how much I loved him."

"Did you?" I ask. "Because the last time I checked, you were sleeping with Drew behind Spencer's back on my desk ."

She glares at me. "When?"

"Months ago," I admit, assuming she means not when we got married but when I caught her and Drew doing it on my desk.

Her face blanches. "You've been married for months? "

"No," Spencer clarifies. "I was in Vegas. Gracie came to see me, and while we were there, we knew we couldn't wait another minute."

Now he's just lying to her, which I'm fine with if it helps this look as believable as it's starting to become.

"So, you swoop in on my man five minutes after we broke up?" she asks, turning toward me.

I shake my head. "It wasn't like that. He was hurt over getting cheated on by the woman he was planning to marry, and he confided in a friend. We grew close."

"Oh, come off it," she spits at me. She glances at Spencer. "You were always close, and I was always competing with her for your attention."

"I won't deny that we shared a special friendship," Spencer says. "But we didn't cross any lines."

"No?" she demands. "You don't think getting married to your sister's ex is crossing some sort of line?"

"Not when it was something we both agreed to," I say with a shrug. It doesn't matter at this point that neither of us remembers it. We had to have agreed to it. The state of Nevada wouldn't have granted us a marriage license if we didn't both agree to it, never mind the question about being of sound mind. Maybe we were, maybe we weren't, but we're nearly a week into this already, and things are going pretty damn good—barring Amelia's reaction, anyway.

"How long have you been married?" she asks again, and it's kind of an odd piece of the puzzle for her to be suddenly obsessed with. "How many days?"

"Tuesday," Spencer says.

"Shit," she mutters under her breath, and she glances at Nana. "Sorry." She looks back at us. "What time on Tuesday?"

"What the hell difference does that make?" I ask.

"I just need to know," she says.

To be honest, I have no idea what time we got married. But I'm not sure why she would care. Just then, the door to the tasting room opens, and Drew struts in.

I feel Spencer stiffen beside me at the entrance of the guy his ex-girlfriend was cheating on him with .

"Oh, there you are, sweetheart," Amelia says, really laying it on thick.

"Here I am," Drew confirms as she rushes into his arms. "Why did you text me to come over here?"

Amelia clearly didn't want him to say that, but he did anyway. She huffs out a sigh as she points an accusatory finger at the two of us. "I saw them walking over here from Grace's bungalow, and guess what?"

He looks at her a little dumbly. "What?"

"These two got married in Vegas on Tuesday."

His brows shoot up. "On Tuesday? Er…what time?"

"What do you two care about Tuesday for?" I demand.

"Well, as it turns out," Amelia begins. "We have some news of our own."

"You do?" Nana asks.

"We do," Amelia confirms. "Drew and I also got married on Tuesday."

"On Tuesday," I echo.

There's only one reason she would have gotten married on Tuesday.

Somehow, she figured out my plan.

Somehow she knew I was going to Vegas, and she had to get ahead of me and get married before I did. There's no other explanation for why she would've married Drew so quickly. Especially not given her reaction to that footage I found when he told her they had love.

They don't have love.

They have sex.

"I didn't realize you were there ," I say as I try to keep the accusations out of my tone.

"Well, that's a hell of a statement coming out of you," she retorts, looking between Spencer and me.

"Oh, so it's okay for you to marry someone when you were trying to make us all believe that you were in love with Spencer, but it's not okay for Spencer to marry someone he actually does have real feelings for?" I ask.

"You're saying that he was in love with you the whole time he was with me," she says flatly .

"You're the one who said that. But you can make whatever assumptions you want out of the fact that he wanted to wait three years to marry you, but he married me a few months after he got out of the trap you set him in."

"You bitch," Amelia screams at me, and she raises a hand into the air like she's going to come over and slap me across the face.

Maybe under other circumstances, I'd have it coming after the things I just said, but this is Amelia. She was cheating on this wonderful man and using him for his money. There's no part of me that thinks she doesn't have all of the worst things coming to her.

"What's going on in here?" another voice demands, and this time it's Uncle Jimmy with my dad sauntering in behind him.

"Oh, Daddy, thank God you're here!" Amelia cries dramatically.

She only pulls out the daddy card when she's being dramatic, though I'm sure Drew would say differently.

"What's going on?" Dad asks, repeating Uncle Jimmy's question as he glances around at the scene in front of him. What a complicated web.

"You want to know what's going on?" I ask, my hackles fully risen at this point. "Amelia found out about Nana's plan for the future of this winery, and she tried to get married before I did to steal it out from under me. Turns out we got married on the same day." I turn toward Nana, but before I can continue, Dad jumps in.

"Wait…what? You're married?" he asks Amelia.

"I'm so sorry, Daddy. Drew and I went to City Hall last week to make it official."

Uncle Jimmy sighs. "And you?" he asks, turning toward me. "Wait, let me guess. You and Spencer?"

I press my lips together, and Spencer fields this awkward one.

"I fell for Grace over the last couple months. We eloped in Vegas." The way he says it makes me believe it's the truth.

I want it to be the truth.

With everything in me, I want it to be true .

"On the same day as Amelia and Drew," he says flatly.

Spencer nods. "Apparently so."

"Well, Mom, I guess…ball's in your court," Dad says to Nana.

"I'm older. I deserve it," Amelia snarls.

"Age doesn't matter! What about the person who practically runs this place now as it is?" I ask, and I do my best to keep the whining out of my argument.

"Seems like everyone got by just fine for the last week in your absence," Amelia says thickly.

God, I could slug her. "Well, I'm back now, and I'll be stepping back into whatever I need to do to fix whatever you messed up while I was away," I snarl right back at her.

"Girls, girls, that's enough," Nana says. "It sounds like you all discovered my plan for the future of the vineyard, something I was trying to keep secret so things would happen naturally. I don't know if either of these marriages are real, but I suspect foul play. Regardless, I want to see out the next year. I will figure something out in the event both of these couples are still married one year from last Tuesday. I'll also take into consideration how involved you both are in the vineyard as well as your spouses. Drew has been around a long, long time here, but we've come to love Spencer, too." She shrugs. "I'm sorry, but I don't have an answer for any of you beyond that. Now, if you'll excuse me," she says, and she bolts from the tasting room.

A heavy silence falls over the six of us still in here.

It's Amelia who breaks the silence—I know, big shocker there.

"We'll see if you're still married a year from now." She smirks at me, and I get the sinking feeling she's got some tricks up her sleeve to make sure that doesn't happen.