Page 68 of New Roots
“Ohhhhhh…noooooo… How will I ever live a full, meaningful life now?” Luna drawled sarcastically, making her voice sound like Ben Stein.
He rolled his eyes at her, shaking his head.
“Not that you wouldn’t rock a good bedazzled nail, Milo, but girls’ night is forgirls,” Luna told him. “Plus, I have to fill Stella in on all my recent dates, and I don’t want your tender ears to hear some of those details.”
The look on his face displayed his confirmation that he did not, in fact, want to hear about Luna’s recent sexcapades either.
Milo groaned. “I’m going back to the kitchen.”
The second he turned to walk away, Luna turned to me. “However, I’m going to have to take a raincheck until tomorrow because I have the train wreck party tonight—also known as my sister’s wedding planning festival of spreadsheets.”
I cringed, knowing that Luna’s description was sadly not an exaggeration. Luna’s sister Terra was the epitome of a bridezilla. Terra was a decade younger than Luna and me at twenty-five years old, and her goal in life was to be a trophy wife—something she could not understand why we didn’t want as well.
“You want me to call you halfway through and fake an emergency so you can leave?” I offered.
“I appreciate it, but my mom knows all of our tricks and would totally kill me if I left her alone at this circus tonight, but thanks, bestie.”
“Okay, but call me if you change your mind,” I told her, feeling bad for her.
“I brought three bags of clothes for you to look through though,” she mentioned, reminding me of the giant bags she had planned to bring in this morning.
Before we donated them, Luna and I would raid our closets and offer each other our clothes we didn’t want anymore.
“Thanks, Luna. With all the craziness from Braden, I’m okay with having a quiet night at home, trying on some clothes, and reading a good book. I honestly have fallen behind on my latest romance book with everything going on.”
“You mean because you’ve been living areal-liferomance novel with mister hunky Viking,” Luna said, raising her brows and shimmying her body.
I rolled my eyes and shook my head at her comment, but I also smiled.
Axel definitely gave me the butterflies in my stomach you read about in romance books. I was falling hard for this man and could picture spending the rest of my life with him.
We’d only known each other for a few weeks, so on the surface it felt too soon for love, but I also knew it felt different with him.
The bell chimed over the door, and I looked up to greet whoever came inside. My eyes did a double take as I swore I was looking at Axel but thirty years older.
I shook my head slightly, trying to clear my brain. Since I had just been thinking of Axel, my mind was now seeing him in other people.
“Hello,” I greeted Axel’s older lookalike and the woman carefully draped on his arm. “Welcome to Scandinavian Sweets. What can I get for you?”
“Are you Stella?” the older woman asked, and I noticed she had a similar accent to Axel’s.
“Yes, I am. Can I help you?” My voice stayed pleasant as I tried to figure out what was going on.
“I’m Ingrid, Axel’s mother,” she announced with a polite smile on her face.
His mom is here?
“Oh, hi. Hello. Ummm. I’m Stella. Sorry. You already knew that.”
Wow, I sounded like a bumbling idiot. Way to make a great first impression.
I cleared my throat and stuck my hand out over the counter. “It’s nice to meet you.”
She took my hand and shook it gently and then turned to the man next to her. “This is Axel’s father, Karl.”
“Pleasure to meet you,” he said to me as he stuck out his hand.
I was a very outgoing person and loved to talk to people, but her body language and his standoffishness made me very nervous.
