“Mom and Dad are in the back room,” Stephanie said, pulling some toys from the backseat. “How do you want to do this?”

That was the one part of the trip Hannah hadn’t pinned down yet. Planning it had been hard enough. Neither Stephanie nor Hannah lived particularly close, and they weren’t ones to randomly plan visits, especially that close to Thanksgiving. But as it turned out, Stephanie and Charlotte weren’t going to be with the Abbotts for Thanksgiving, so Hannah had been able to angle a pre-holiday get-together in her favor. All that planning, but how to introduce Will? They would have only seconds. They’d be expecting Brian. Between Will’s wedding band and Hannah’s engagement ring and band, there were going to be a lot of questions.

“Let’s just do it.” She held up her hand. “They aren’t going to miss this.”

Stephanie pulled Hannah’s hand into her own, running a finger over the diamond. “Jesus, it gets more beautiful every time I see it.”

“Funny,” Will replied, pulling Hannah into him. “That’s what I think every time I see your sister.”

Hannah kissed him, letting his warmth and confidence seep into her. They could do this. She pulled away from Will at Stephanie’s overly loud throat clearing.  

“Ready, husband?”

His hand found hers. “We’ve got this.”

Hannah paused at the threshold and took a calming breath while Will followed Stephanie into the kitchen to drop off the bags. They were going to love him. She repeated it like a mantra, drowning out the sounds of the kids and her dad’s deep laughter, giving herself an extra moment to collect her thoughts and rehearse. Mom. Dad. This is Will. My husband. Straight to the point. Hi, everyone. Remember my friend Will from college? Well, we have some exciting news. That option at least framed Will’s connection to her life before the last month and maybe didn’t make her seem completely insane.

Too soon, Stephanie and Will returned. Will reclaimed her hand and kissed her temple. “Ready, Mrs. Thorne?”

She nodded and led him through the house to the back room, where she could hear the adults talking and the boys running around.

“Hi, everyone,” she said loudly enough to catch their attention. She waved with her right hand, her left still secured—effectively hiding her diamond—in Will’s hand.

The adults in the room turned at the sound of her voice. Charlotte stopped midsentence. Her gaze swung between Hannah and Stephanie, back again, and landed on Hannah and Will’s entwined hands. Hannah’s parents seemed only to have eyes for Will. And she couldn’t blame them—she’d brought Brian to the Labor Day barbecue.

“Who’s that?” Aiden, Charlotte’s youngest son, asked. He crawled onto his grandpa’s lap—Hannah wasn’t sure she would ever get used to her dad being a grandpa—and waved shyly at Will. Will wiggled his fingers back with a big smile.

“This is Will, you remember—” Hannah stopped short at her mother’s laser gaze on Will’s hand. He was holding Hannah’s hand with his right, so he’d waved at Aiden with his left, wedding band gleaming. Damn platinum.

Hannah disentangled herself from Will. She was either a homewrecker or crazy. She preferred that her parents think her crazy. “Will and I are married.”

“Are you...” Hannah’s father said. “This isn’t funny, if it’s some sort of joke.”

She held up her left hand, ring out. “It’s not a joke, Dad. We got married about a month ago now. It all happened so fast, and then work exploded. I’ve wanted to tell you.”

“You could’ve called.” This was from her mother, who hadn’t moved from her position on the couch.

Conversely, Hannah and Will stood awkwardly in the entrance of the family room, with Stephanie leaning against the doorjamb.

Hannah crossed her arms and curbed the urge to tap her foot. “We wanted to tell you in person.”   

“Well, task achieved,” her mother said, crossing her legs. “A month and a day too late.”

Ouch. They probably deserved that. This was why she’d wanted to tell them they were engaged first and work up to the marriage part. But Jonathan’s upcoming party had stopped that idea in its tracks.

Will shifted next to her, and she sensed that he was about to come out with some endearing response to try and win her mother over. It wouldn’t work.

She took a small step forward, but before she could say anything, Stephanie moved in, taking up a position next to Hannah. They stood shoulder to shoulder, exactly how they’d stood when Stephanie had returned home with a fiancée and stepfamily in tow.

“Mom,” Stephanie said with enough attitude that the single word conveyed a paragraph’s worth of conversation. 

“Did you know about this?”

“All right, boys,” Charlotte said, scoping Aiden up. “Let’s go check out those new Nerf guns Grandpa got you.”

A round of squeals came from the boys as they headed upstairs to Stephanie’s old bedroom. Her parents had converted it into a playroom complete with a fort.

“Will, is it?”

Hannah turned at her father’s voice. She hadn’t noticed him approach.

His eyes were locked on Will. “Do you drink? Because I could use a drink.”

Will caught Hannah’s eyes. She saw the struggle—he didn’t want to abandon her, but they both knew her father’s request wasn’t optional.

“I’ll be fine.”

He nodded and lightly brushed his lips against hers. She felt it down to her toes.

“A drink would be great, sir,” Will said, following her father out of the room.

Hannah returned her attention to her mother, who was needling Stephanie. Clearly, her mom did not believe that the youngest Abbott had no idea about her sister’s activities. Or maybe she was shocked Stephanie had kept a secret, if only her mother knew Stephanie was keeping two.

“Mom,” Hannah said, drawing her mother’s ire away from her sister. “Stephanie didn’t know. Will and I fell for each other and decided to get married. There was very little planning involved.”

“Clearly.” Her mother’s tone was harsh and a bit sarcastic. She had yet to move from the couch.

Hannah couldn’t stand being read a riot act like she was a teenager breaking curfew. She sat down on the ottoman her father had vacated. “Can we talk about this like adults, please? I didn’t mean to hurt your feelings or upset you—”

“Are you in trouble? Is that what this is about?” The subtext to that statement was more than clear.

“No, Mom. There’s no baby on the way. How could you even ask me that?”

“How could I not? You show up at our house with some strange man you married since we last saw you a few months ago? What happened to Brian? We liked Brian.”

“I was never going to marry Brian,” Hannah said dryly.

“Why not?”

She hadn’t confided in her mother for years. Kate and Riley fulfilled that need. But still, how had they gotten so far off base that her mother couldn’t tell Brian wasn’t long-term? She debated what to disclose. “Because he didn’t want to marry me.”

Her mother crossed her arms. “So you cheated on him?

“I didn’t cheat on him,” Hannah said, throwing her hands up in the air. She had spent a lifetime making smart decisions and safe choices—her mother’s voice lived in her head, guiding her down the expected road. Wasn’t she allowed a detour? Stephanie had taken several, and their mother had never questioned her integrity. Stephanie was all heart, but Hannah always led with her head. She still was, but her mother didn’t deserve to know that now.

“When I realized I had more than platonic feelings for Will, I broke up with Brian—before anything happened,” Hannah continued. “God, Mom. Who do you think I am?”

“I don’t know at this point, Hannah! Why did you get married to someone you barely know? Where did you even find him?”