The Hate Vow by Nicole French

Twenty-Six

The entire beach, up and down every dune, was dark before we returned to the house that night. Or, as we both suspected, morning, since the sun was starting to glow by the horizon as we stumbled down the path again.

Now both of us were a muddy, sandy mess. My hair was a waterlogged, salty, sandy black-running disaster, and even Eric’s short hair was still plastered with sand too, along with his now-sludge-colored pants and demolished shirt.

“Celeste,” I said. “Do you think she’s mad we ran off?”

“Honestly,” he said, “she’s probably more upset that we weren’t there for the announcement.”

I looked up. “You think she still made it?”

Eric nodded. “If there’s one thing I know about my grandmother, Jane, it’s that she hates missing her schedule.” He gave me a curious look. “Actually, I think she likes you.”

I blinked. “You know, for a while, I thought so too.” I looked down at my skirt. A lot of the paint had been washed away, but there was enough of a stain that I still looked like an accident victim. We both did. “Now I’m not so sure.”

Eric grimaced at the remnants of paint. “I’m sorry about that. We’ll figure out who did it.”

“It’s okay,” I replied quietly. It wasn’t, but I wanted to move past it. The closer to the house we came, the more mortified I felt, remembering how I had broken in front of all these people. Why had my bravado deserted me when I needed it most?

“It’s not,” he said. “They’re fucking vultures. And I’m sorry you’ve been alone with them for so long. They don’t deserve you.”

He stopped walking and pulled my hand to his lips, feathering over my knuckles and lingering over my ring.

“We could bypass the house completely,” he said. “Hijack my uncle’s car again and take off for the city. No one would even know we were gone until morning.”

I giggled. “We’d probably ruin the interior in these wet clothes.”

“I’ll buy him a new one.” Eric smiled wickedly as another thought occurred to him. “Or you could just take them off. I wouldn’t mind looking at you naked for a few hours back to the city.”

I had to clear my throat as his teeth lightly bit my knuckles. The thought was tempting. But before I could answer, a bit of light glinted at his neck. A necklace I hadn’t noticed before when we were caught in the throes of passion.

“What’s this?” I asked, reaching up to touch the small medallion hanging from a thin gold chain.

It was also gold, so it shined despite a layer of grime of the type that took years and years to build. It looked like a coin, but not one I had ever seen before. There was a man with two faces looking in either direction, each side wearing identical laurels. Likely a facsimile of something Greek, or maybe Roman. But very unlike Eric, with his penchant for more modern fashion.

Eric stood up straight again, then covered my hand—and the pendant—with his. “It’s nothing,” he said. “Just an old necklace I found in my dad’s things.”

I frowned. “I didn’t think you were into antiques.”

In return, I got a bright smile. “I guess I’ve been surprising you a lot tonight, haven’t I, pretty girl?”

The name reignited the embers in my belly all over again. “I guess you have, Petri.”

He slung a heavy arm around my neck and pulled me into his side roughly. ‘You’re going to pay for that later.”

The fire in my belly glowed. “I love you, Eric.”

He looked down with genuine surprise, but I found I wasn’t. The words were already out there. The dam had been breached. And now it was easy to identify that warm feeling that spread through me whenever he was around. It was simple. Love. It just was.

Glad you finally figured it out, Jane Brain.

My heart twisted a little at the echo. If only Eric could have met him. Dad would have liked him, I’m sure.

Still wrapped up in each other, we trudged back onto the lawn, where the remnants of the party were still being dismantled. The band and guests had long since gone, the caterers had packed everything up, and right now the dance floor was being taken apart, piece by piece, under the still-glowing lights strung from pole to pole.

“Well, this thing is definitely toast,” Eric remarked, shaking his waterlogged Rolex.

I looked at it sadly. It was a very pretty watch. “Can I have it?”

He looked at me strangely. “What for? There’s no way it’s going to work again.”

“It’s still a beautiful watch. And I don’t mind things that are a little broken.”

“Is that so?”

Eric stopped in the middle of the grass. He turned to me while he removed the expensive timepiece from his wrist.

“Consider it yours,” he said with a quirk of his mouth.

I watched as he slid it over my wrist and fastened it there. It dangled loosely—Eric’s arms were much bigger than mine—but his large hands wrapped around it, clasping it into place.

“Jane Lee Lefferts,” he said softly with shining eyes. “Will you marry me?”

I looked up. Would this man never stop surprising me?

I genuinely hoped he never would.

“Ah, I think you already asked me that question…” I said, but the joke was cloaked in a whisper.

He massaged my hand between his two, brushing his thumb over the shining black diamond on my ring finger while the other held the oversized watch in place. Of the two, the watch seemed more important.

“I did,” he said, and when he looked up, his eyes glittered like the stars in the sky. “But I’m asking again. No contract. No time limit. Just me. Just you. Will you marry me?”

For several moments, I couldn’t speak. Aside from this ridiculous agreement, I had never really considered marriage, and I was sure that Eric hadn’t either. We weren’t the marrying type…were we?

“Eric, are you…are you sure?” I looked down at my ripped skirt, which I had clutched in one hand to keep the wind from blowing the fabric apart. I grappled for each rented side again, not particularly caring to show the remaining waitstaff my newly waxed nether regions.

But instead of answering my question, Eric sank slowly down to the grass on one knee and spoke.

All that touches us, you and me,

takes us together, like the stroke of a bow,

That draws one chord out of two strings.

His deep voice sang through the air, holding me still with its lyrical quality. He took a deep breath. “That’s Rilke, you know.”

“You never give it up, do you?” I jested lightly.

Eric stood back up, and his arms folded around me. This time, I didn’t fight it. I was too relieved. Too starved.

“It means, ‘what speaks to you here, speaks to me. It’s always been, and always thus will be.’”

I tipped my head. “More Rilke?”

For that, I was rewarded with a distinctly crooked smile. His long nose touched mine, and something in me exhaled. “De Vries.”

I opened my mouth, prepared to launch a new quip. But none came out.

“But…but look at us.” I gestured down at our ruins. My shredded, stained clothes, his torn shirt. The sand that plastered everything. “It’s one thing to love a mess, Eric. It’s another to pledge your life to it.”

But Eric’s smile just broadened, that curious smile that lit up his face and turned it into something truly extraordinary. “I want to make a mess with you for the rest of my life, Jane,” he said. “Not just for the next five years. For always.” He leaned down. “Say yes,” he said, his salty lips cool against mine.

I inhaled his fresh scent. I could stay here forever.

Well, then. Why don’t you, kiddo?

It wasn’t exactly my father’s permission, but it was the closest I’d ever get.

I blinked. My eyes watered again, but this time with tears I had never known before: tears of happiness.

“Yes,” I whispered as I pulled Eric close. “Yes, I will marry you.”

* * *

Somehow,we made it all the way back to the house, arms all around each other, laughing and whispering as we stumbled across the lawn, catching the curious glances of the staff members whenever we paused for another kiss or brief tumble.

“Upstairs,” Eric murmured against my lips as we turned one corner toward the stairs of the west wing. “I need a shower more than my life right now. Preferably with you in it.”

“Oh, really?” I said, though I couldn’t stop stealing kisses for myself. “And what are you going to do up there?”

“Well, first I’m going to wash the sand out of my ass,” he said, suddenly walking a little bow-legged, as if to emphasis his discomfort. “And then I’m going to make you pay, like I said.”

“Pay? For what, Petri?”

“For all those fucking years without you.” He delivered a loud smack to my ass that echoed up and down the marble halls. “And for that stupid goddamn nickname.”

“Oh, come on, my little test tube. It’s cute now.” I bit my lip with glee. “You’ll never be rid of it.”

I jumped as his hand found my ass again with a loud, wet slap.

“Just try it,” he said with a steely look that made my stomach flip in the best possible way. “Say it again and see what happens to you, pretty girl.”

I opened my mouth, enjoying the look on his face as he waited for the words to drop. Dared me to say them. Challenge him.

“Whatever you say,” I said. “Petri di—”

“Jane?”

I jumped in Eric’s arms, then whirled around toward the familiar voice. Eric stilled and looked over my shoulder.

“Who is that?” he asked.

My vision was still blurry—only Eric, close as he was, was crystal clear. The rest of the house, cast in the shadows of early dawn, was still unfocused, and so was the small figure slowly walking down the steps of the grand staircase.

But I still would have known her anywhere.

“Eomma,” I said softly. “You made it.”

One, two, three more steps, and she stood at the bottom so we were eye to eye. Close enough that I could see she was wrapped in her favorite mauve robe, the terry cloth one that was frayed at the bottom because she rarely bought anything new for herself. Her makeup, however, was still done, and her short black hair was neatly combed. I wondered then if she had ever gone to sleep. And without her daughter there to greet her.

Some daughter I was.

“Jane,” she said. “I arrived at nine, but they said you were gone. Where have you been? What happened to you?”

My mother’s gaze traveled over my wrecked dress, my wet, faded black hair, my uncharacteristically makeup-less face, now that it had all been washed free with sand and ocean. Concern radiated from her tiny body.

“I—we—”

My head hung. I didn’t know what to say. All I could feel was shame. How had they treated her? I didn’t even want to imagine how she had fared at the party without me.

I could imagine her in the hired car, face full of shock as she had rounded the circular driveway and taken in an estate overrun by rich, white, gleaming people. I had told her about the party, but who knew if she had come dressed for it, scatterbrained as she was these days. Who had welcomed her? Had anyone brought her to her room? Told her what happened to me? Made her, the mother of the bride, feel at least somewhat comfortable in my absence?

Or, considering the company, very uncomfortable?

I was a terrible, terrible daughter.

“Mrs. Lefferts.” Eric’s voice was stiff and polite as he stepped around me, gracefully pulling his torn shirt closed. He walked with his shoulders straight, head tall. Like the aristocrat he was, no matter the mess. He held out a hand. “I’m Eric de Vries, Jane’s fiancé. It’s…it’s a pleasure to finally meet you.”

Yu Na’s sharp, quick gaze traveled over Eric too, taking in his height, his bearing, his clothes, and resting on his face.

“I’m so sorry we weren’t here to receive you properly,” he continued. “You can blame it on me for distracting Jane. I was—she was—” Unable to procure a decent excuse any better than I could, he shrugged boyishly. “Sometimes we get a little wrapped up in each other,” was all he could say with a sheepish smile. “Your daughter is very absorbing.”

I grinned.

But my mother wasn’t amused. “This party…this house…it belongs to you?”

She wasn’t asking because she was impressed with its size, though she likely was. It was more because she wanted to know he was for real. She had been shocked when I’d informed her over the phone of the pending nuptials—even more when I told her who Eric actually was.

Eric smiled. “It is, Mrs. Lefferts. And Jane’s too, soon enough. Which, in a way, will also make it yours.”

My mother turned to me with even more shock. Clearly she hadn’t really considered what “billionaire” meant when I told her about Eric’s company. She didn’t have internet. She probably had thought a shipping company was just a bunch of trucks rented out to Walmart.

“I’m so sorry we weren’t around, Eomma.” I reached for her arm, but she shied from my touch. I couldn’t lie. It hurt a little.

“Did my grandmother make the announcement?” Eric wondered. “We weren’t here when that was supposed to happen either.”

“Yes,” my mother said numbly, her eyes still fixed on Eric. “She did. Everybody drank champagne and laughed. Because you were not there.”

My face wrinkled, and Eric swore lightly under his breath. Of course they laughed, the overgrown hand puppets. Of course they all thought it was just hilarious that the bride and groom had gone missing for the big announcement. I’m sure Celeste was pleased with us as well.

But I didn’t care about that right now. All I cared about was the reaction of the only other person in this castle I could call my blood. Things between Eric and me were finally real. I didn’t have to lie to her anymore. About any of it.

And so, I desperately needed to know:

“Is that…is this okay, Eomma?” I ventured.

At first, she opened her mouth, and I knew she would say yes. Eric had charmed her the way only he could, and there was no way my mother would ever disapprove of a life that would keep her and her only daughter in comfort many times over.

But then her eyes landed on the pendant swinging from Eric’s neck. As he leaned over, the light from the first rays of the sun caught on the edge, sparking in the middle of the empty hall.

My mother’s eyes widened.

“No,” she said, shaking her head slowly, back and forth, stepping back on the stairs. “No, it is not.”