Chapter Twenty-Seven
1254 Words
Five Years, Four Months Earlier
The trouble starts, in earnest, at a hockey banquet in February — the kind of formal, boosters-and-donors event Ashford University throws once a year to celebrate the program and, more practically, to court the wealthy families whose contributions keep it funded, and which Adrian's parents, as significant long-standing donors, never miss.
Mara attends as Adrian's date, wearing the nicest dress she owns, the ring from the stairwell tucked carefully into a small jewelry box at home rather than on her finger — still their secret, still unshared with anyone beyond the two of them, though Mara has started, in the weeks since, to wonder when that's going to change.
The evening starts pleasantly enough. Adrian is in his element, easy and confident among teammates and coaches, introducing Mara to people with obvious pride, his hand steady at the small of her back all night. It's the kind of evening Mara could get used to, could imagine as a preview of an entire future built around exactly this — him, thriving, her at his side, both of them genuinely happy in a room full of people who seem, for the most part, happy to have them there.
Richard and Eleanor find them near the dessert table, an hour into the reception, and the pleasant evening shifts almost immediately.
"Mara," Eleanor says, her smile arriving a half-second too late to feel fully genuine. "How lovely. Adrian didn't mention you'd be joining us tonight."
"I invited her," Adrian says, an edge already creeping into his voice. "She's my girlfriend, Mom. Of course she's here."
"Of course." Eleanor's eyes do the familiar assessing sweep, quick and clinical, before returning to something like pleasant neutrality. "You look lovely, dear. That dress is very... practical. Sensible for an event like this."
It's not quite an insult, not one Mara could point to directly and call rude, but the undertone is unmistakable, and she feels Adrian tense beside her, his hand pressing more firmly against her back, protective.
"She looks beautiful," he says, flat, final, the kind of statement that leaves no room for further commentary.
Eleanor's smile tightens slightly, and Richard, who has said almost nothing all evening beyond a stiff greeting, clears his throat.
"Adrian, there's someone here I'd like you to meet," he says. "The Marshes are here tonight. Selene's grown into quite the young businesswoman, joining her father's firm early. You remember the Marshes."
"I remember them," Adrian says, tight. "Dad, now's really not the time."
"There's no better time. Networking is networking, son, regardless of the occasion." Richard's tone is pleasant, reasonable-sounding, the specific reasonableness of a man who has never once had to consider that his priorities might not align with everyone else's. "It would be good for you to reconnect. The families have history."
"I'm here with Mara."
"And Mara's welcome to come along," Eleanor says smoothly, though her expression suggests the invitation is anything but sincere. "It's simply a conversation, Adrian. No need to make it complicated."
Adrian's jaw tightens, and Mara feels, standing beside him in a room suddenly gone tense and difficult, the first real, concrete evidence of exactly what he'd tried to warn her about months ago — the plan, the expectations, the specific someone his parents have apparently never stopped hoping he'd eventually choose instead of her.
"It's fine," Mara says quietly, squeezing his hand once. "Go say hello. I don't mind."
"You shouldn't have to not mind," Adrian says, low, frustrated, but he lets his mother steer him toward a cluster of people across the room anyway, glancing back at Mara with an apologetic expression that does little to ease the tightness in her chest.
Mara finds herself alone for the better part of twenty minutes, nursing a glass of champagne she doesn't really want, watching from a polite distance as Adrian is introduced to a young woman she assumes, correctly, is Selene Marsh — elegant, composed, engaged in what looks, from this distance, like a perfectly cordial, entirely unremarkable conversation that neither participant seems especially invested in.
It should be reassuring. It mostly is, watching the conversation's obvious, mutual disinterest. But underneath the reassurance sits something colder — the understanding that this is a plan Richard and Eleanor have clearly been nurturing for a long time, one entirely independent of what Adrian actually wants, and the fact that it currently seems harmless doesn't mean it's going to stay that way.
Adrian returns to her side eventually, visibly relieved to be free of the conversation, and steers her gently toward a quieter corner of the room.
"I'm sorry," he says again, low, genuine. "That shouldn't have happened. Any of it."
"Is that her? The one they've been hinting about?"
"Selene Marsh. Yeah." He shakes his head, frustrated. "She seems nice, actually, for what it's worth. We talked for two minutes about literally nothing. I don't think she wants this any more than I do."
"That's something, at least."
"It shouldn't have to be something. It shouldn't be happening at all." His voice carries real anger now, more than Mara's heard from him before, directed, she understands, entirely at his parents rather than at her or even at Selene. "I told them, months ago, that this isn't happening. That I'm with you. That the whole business-connection plan is not something I'm ever going to agree to. They just keep — pushing anyway. Like if they push hard enough, eventually I'll give in."
"Do you think you might?"
The question comes out smaller than Mara means it to, more vulnerable, and she watches Adrian's face soften immediately, taking her hand in both of his.
"Never," he says, firm, certain. "Mara, I promise you, there is no version of my future that includes marrying someone my parents picked out for business reasons. I don't care how long they keep pushing. I chose you. I'm not un-choosing you because my mother thinks a different dress code would have been more appropriate tonight."
Mara laughs, despite herself, some of the tension in her chest easing at the small joke. "That dress comment was pretty savage, for what it's worth."
"She's very good at savage. Years of practice." He pulls her closer, resting his forehead against hers, the gesture familiar and grounding. "I'm sorry tonight got complicated. I should have prepared you better for how bad they'd actually be."
"You did warn me."
"I don't think I warned you enough." Something serious crosses his face again. "I need you to know — whatever they do, whatever pressure they apply, it doesn't change anything on my end. I promised you forever. That promise doesn't have an asterisk next to it for parental approval."
Mara wants, desperately, to believe him completely. She mostly does, standing in a quiet corner of a crowded banquet hall with his forehead against hers, his hands steady around hers, his voice certain and warm.
She doesn't yet understand — won't understand for months, not until it's far too late to do anything but survive the aftermath — exactly how much pressure two loving, well-intentioned twenty-one-year-olds can actually withstand before something in even the most certain promise finally, catastrophically, gives way.
That understanding is still months away. Tonight, there's just a banquet hall, and a promise renewed, and two people who believe, entirely and without reservation, that love is going to be enough to outlast anything two disapproving parents can throw at it.
They are, in this moment, more wrong than either of them could possibly imagine.
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