“Adelaide wanted to come back to make sure her daughter has found somewhere else to stay.”
“Sorry to disappoint you,” Tobias says, shoveling food into his mouth. He chews for a few seconds, making Dad wait for whatever he’s going to finish his sentence with. “But Cora doesn’t need anywhere else to stay.”
“Well, she can’t stay here,” Dad says.
“She’s coming with us,” Mark says.
“I am,” a soft voice sounds from the doorway. Randolph’s head swivels so fast that it almost looks disjointed, and he finds Cora standing behind him. I don’t think I’ve ever felt so much relief to see someone as I do at that moment.
“You’re coming with us when we move out,” I say quickly, not letting Dad take the opportunity to jump in with anything about selling the house.
“You’re moving out?” she asks, taking a step forward and gazing at the apartment listings. “Why?”
“That doesn’t matter,” Mark says, shooting Dad a warning look.
“Because I told them that I’m not prepared to have you all fornicating under my roof.” The sneer in Dad’s voice would be bad if it was aimed at us, but he’s looking directly at Cora as though he blames her for everything. As though the five men he raised could never be responsible for instigating any of this. Shit. Why am I even mentally agreeing with the term fornicating? It’s a word that should have been relegated to history years ago.
“Fornicating?” Cora snorts as though she’s been reading my mind.
“Yes. Fornicating,” Dad says.
Adelaide chooses that moment to walk in and gasps. “This conversation isn’t happening,” she says, putting her hand to her chest as though the very idea of us continuing is risking her having a heart attack.
“This conversation has to happen,” Cora says. “Now, I know you guys don’t want this for us. You’ve flown a very long way to make that clear. But just as you have both chosen to live your lives without much care for how it’s going to impact us, you can’t be surprised that we might choose to do the same.”
“You don’t sound very sure,” Randolph says, taking a step closer to Cora’s mom.
“I am sure,” Cora says, and I blink, not certain if I’m following what she’s saying.
“You’re sure of what exactly?” I ask.
“Sure that I want to be with you all, if you’ll have me,” Cora says. I blink because her voice is bright and unconcerned about the fact she’s speaking in front of our very disgruntled parents.
“I told you the pots would work,” Mark says smugly, standing and making his way over to Cora. He takes her hand and brings it to his lips like a hero in a period drama. “We’ll have you, baby.”
Cora blinks, her eyes filling with tears, and I stride toward her, pulling her into a fierce hug. “Are you serious?” I ask. “Really serious?”
“How could I resist?” She smiles against the skin of my neck, but I don’t get much of a chance to enjoy the embrace because Tobias pulls her out of my arms and into a hug of his own.
“You have to stop them,” Cora’s mom says. “This…it’s crazy.”
Dad looks between us all as though he can’t quite comprehend what the hell is going on. “There’s no stopping us,” River says. “We love each other, and that’s it. Whether we have your approval or not, this is happening. Obviously, we’d rather you were okay with it. None of us want our relationship to interfere with family, but we will do what we need to do to make this work, with or without your support.”
“You’re serious?” Dad says. “Serious about Cora?”
“We are,” Alden says, taking his turn to embrace our girl. “None of us meant for this to happen, but it has, and we’re not going to walk away because you can’t deal with it.”
“But there are five of you…” Adelaide’s cheeks are bright red, and her hands flutter in front of her.
“And Maggie has eleven husbands, and she’s ecstatically happy,” Cora says softly. “I know this isn’t a traditional setup. And I’m sure that it isn’t what you dreamed for me, but you told me the Carltons were good men. You love Randolph, and he raised them. I love them,” she says, making my heart skitter.
She loves us.
She really loves us.
“What do you know about love?” Adelaide says, shaking her head. “Life is hard. Even the strongest normal relationship has more chance of failing than succeeding. Look at your dad and me. What makes you think this is going to stand the test of time?”
“Because we know each other,” Cora says. “The good, the bad, and the ugly, and we’re okay with all the perfect and the broken parts of us. I can’t keep living my life scared that what happened with Dad is going to happen again. I can’t tell these men that this can’t work because of something that happened in my life over a decade ago. They’re not my father, or their father. It’s not fair to them to believe they’ll repeat those mistakes, and it’s not fair to me to walk away from something so amazing for no reason other than fear.”