Fool for You (Southern Bride 7)

Emmerson ran her fingers across her forehead. “Goodness, this is a mess.”

Dad cleared his throat. “The only way you’re going to get any answers is to go straight to the source: Hannah.”

“I agree,” Malcolm said. “Only way to find out what’s really going on is to get the truth from Hannah.”

“Mom, Paislie, do y’all still have her address?” I asked.

My mom nodded. “Yes. I can look it up first thing in the morning.”

Turning to Emmerson, I reached for her hand. “Do you have appointments in the morning?”

She shook her head. “No. The only thing I had planned was to stop in at a floral shop. I’m open until two, and then I have to meet with Abby Hawn and Kurt Richard.”

Hailey gasped. “The senator’s daughter? She really called you?”

With a wide smile, Emmerson nodded. “Yes! Fingers crossed things go well. I thought it was sweet that she wanted to meet with me in Waco, so I didn’t have to drive to Austin.”

“That was very nice of her,” Paislie said with a proud smile on her face.

It was time to get back to the subject at hand. “Emme, I’d like for you to go with me when I talk to Hannah.”

“Smart, son,” Dad said. “Best you don’t see her alone.”

Emmerson took my hand and gave me the sweetest smile. “Of course I’ll go with you.”

With a loud sigh, I looked around the room. “Looks like we’re paying Hannah a little visit tomorrow.”

Emmerson

“YOU DON’T REALLY think Jason got Hannah pregnant, do you?” I asked Landon as we drove down the street that Hannah Patterson lived on.

“You dated him, you’d know him better than me.”

I turned and faced the front window.

“I’m sorry, Emme. I didn’t mean to be short with you. I don’t really know what in the hell is going on. We just need to get it figured out.”

My GPS alerted us that we were at the right house, and we pulled into the driveway of Hannah’s address.

“Well, let’s just hope she’s home,” I said. But before we could get out of the car, my cell phone rang. “Hailey’s calling.”

“Just send it to voicemail.”

At that moment, Landon’s phone rang too. He glanced down at it. “It’s my dad.”

We both swiped our screens and answered our phones. Landon stepped out of the truck to speak to his father.

“Hey, Hail, what’s up?”

“What’s up? What’s up!? It got out, Emme!”

“What got out?” I asked in confusion. “What are you talking about?”

“That you and Landon are already married. Someone leaked it to the media.”

I quickly turned to look at Landon. He was slowly shaking his head. “Is your dad telling Landon right now?”

“I’m not sure. Amy called and said someone at her job asked her if it was true that you and Landon had already secretly gotten married.”

I sighed. “It must have been someone at the courthouse who recognized us.”

“Maybe,” she replied. “The only people who knew were our folks, me, Noah, and Amy.”

A thought occurred to me. “You don’t think Amy would…” I let the rest of my sentence die off.

“No way. She is so madly in love with your brother, she’d never betray you or him. Never.”

Landon was now on my side of the truck, opening the door. “Listen, we’re at Hannah’s house,” I said to Hailey. “We’ll have to deal with this later. At least there aren’t any more secrets floating around. Now it’s all out there.”

Hailey laughed. “Yeah, unless you’re pregnant and not telling anyone.”

“Ha!” I said with a fake laugh.

“Oh. My. God. Are you fucking pregnant?”

“What? No! Hailey, I need to go.”

I quickly hung up and turned my phone on silent. It was already blowing up with texts from friends asking how I could keep yet another secret from them. It hadn’t even been twenty-four hours since we’d gotten married.

“It’s out,” Landon and I said at the same time.

Laughing, I rolled my eyes. “I don’t even care anymore, Landon. We might as well just embrace it and let it run its course. Hopefully people will get tired of our boring story soon and move on.”

Landon placed his hand on the small of my back and led us up the steps to the quaint, two-story brick house. It was cute, nothing over the top, but it was well maintained by someone who clearly loved plants.

“Right,” he said. “Our elopement takes backseat to this mess with Hannah Patterson.”

I nodded.

Before we could even walk up the three steps of the little front porch, the door opened.

A woman with dark hair and dark eyes about my age came to an abrupt halt. She looked at Landon and then me. She was holding a baby who looked to be about one or so.

“Hannah, do you have a few minutes to talk?” Landon asked, reaching for my hand and threading his fingers in mine.

Hannah closed her eyes and mumbled something under her breath before sighing and focusing back on me. “I guess I shouldn’t be surprised to see you here.”