“Today?” Luke double checked, asking what I’d been about to.
“Yup.”
Not letting up the questions, which was just as well because I’d apparently become temporarily mute, Adam pressed, “And they were talking about him and Layla?”
“Yeeup.”
“Well, fuck me,” he murmured under his breath.
Before Mom could reach across and give him a five star in the same place she’d tried to give my other brother one, Luke slapped his hand on the back of Adam’s thigh, nodding when she thanked him as she applied the next bandage.
“What the fuck was that for?” Adam hissed, rubbing his thigh. “Jes—”
Luke pulled his hand back and swung before Adam could move, hitting him just under the first one.
“No, I’m not getting a daisy,” Adam yelled, jumping away from him.
Ah, I’d forgotten about the daisy. That was when you continued to slap the same area, moving your hand at different angles with each hit and left what resembled a red daisy on the recipient. Good times… so long as I wasn’t on the receiving end of it.
“Stop swearing, and I’ll stop hitting.” Luke shrugged and leaned back on his hands. “It’s either that or you get a slap from Mom, who’s wearing rings.”
“And I’m not against twisting your grandma’s ring so the stone gets you when I do it.”
We all looked at the ring she’d been given by our grandmother last year before she’d died. It was pretty, but the sapphire in it was large and stuck out, meaning it would hurt like a bitch if she did it.
“I’m just saying, it’s a surprise they feel that way, okay?” Adam hissed, crossing his arms over his chest. “Seriously, like he said, Layla didn’t get a big wedding, and her family wasn’t there. As her only daughter, you’d have thought Colette would be pissed about it. As one of only two granddaughters, again, I’d have thought Linda would be flipping her lid.”
“I’m not saying they’re not. But at the same time, I’ll bet they want her with someone who’s going to love Layla, worship the ground she walks on, treat her like a princess, and love her until their dying breath.” Mom nodded at me. “All of which your brother would and will do.”
I was hung on the word ‘will.’ It gave me hope that I still had a chance to do all of those things.
“How’s he meant to get her to give him the time of day?” Adam asked this time. “I don’t know if you noticed, but she didn’t seem overly happy about the marriage today. The male members of her family—of which there are a metric measurement of a fuck ton—also don’t look like they’ll be encouraging the continuation of it.”
I stared at Mom, hoping she had the answer to it, but it was Luke who smiled evilly.
“Like they’ve never fucked up.” Oh, they had, and they’d done it big time. “I think Colette and Linda will be reminding them of that fact as we speak. If the wives are behind them—which I’m sure they will be—the men won’t be able to do or say jack shit about it. That means, Mark, you only have to work on winning Layla around, and I think I know how you can do it.”
The plan he laid out was basic, but the nodding and excitement that came from my mom as he did it convinced me to go along with it.
Step 1: Prove to Layla that I can make her happy.
Step 2: Make her fall back in love with me—which hurt because I hated even the possibility of her not still loving me.
Step 3: Approach the marriage the right way this time and get approval from her dad and Hurst.
Step 4: Plan the perfect wedding for Layla Elizabeth Montgomery—there was no way I was referring to her as Townsend, regardless of our relationship currently.
Step 5: Continue making her happy for the rest of our lives.
How hard could it be?