Page 81 of Snow

“Of course it does.”

Another small laugh slipped from her, but he could already see what she was doing. She was rebuilding the wall she had allowed to fall a few minutes ago.

Snow wasn’t going to let her hide behind it. Not with him.

He brushed another tear from her cheek, letting his hand linger there as his voice softened. “You don’t always have to be the strong one, Nova. Whatever happened, you don’t have to pretend you’re okay just because you’ve stopped crying.”

Something shifted in her expression, and for several seconds she stared at him.

Then she swallowed hard, and he noticed her bottom lip begin to quiver. “I’m really not okay. My family sucks.” She sniffled before quickly adding, “Well, my mom and dad do.”

Snow’s chest tightened at the admission. He slid his thumb gently along her cheek once more, wiping away another tear. “Want to talk about it?”

She wiped at her face and drew in a shaky breath. “Not particularly, but you’ve already survived the ugly crying and the snot, so I guess you’ve earned the rest of the story.”

Snow’s mouth twitched, and he took her hand. “Come on, let’s go sit down.”

He led her over to a makeshift bench that one of the crew members must have made.

“God, I don’t even know where to start,” she said.

“How about the beginning?”

She chuckled. “I don’t know if we have enough time.”

Snow studied her for a moment. Damn. Just how much had she been carrying around behind that smile of hers?

Once Nova started talking, Snow mostly kept his mouth shut and listened. She began with her parents and what it had been like growing up in the Hart household, where appearances seemed to matter more than feelings, and her father’s expectations weren’t so much suggestions as carefully disguised orders.

She told him about joining the family law firm, the pressure that came with being Leonard Hart’s daughter, and how her father had always possessed an uncanny ability to make her feel as though disappointing him somehow equated to betraying the entire family.

The more she talked, the less Snow liked the man. Her mother wasn’t scoring many points with him either.

From what Nova described, the woman wasn’t necessarily cruel, but she had spent years standing quietly beside her husband while he manipulated their daughter, which Snow wasn’t sure was much better. There were a few things he could forgive in life, but watching someone you loved get hurt when you had the power to stand beside them wasn’t high on the list.

Then she told him about Rick. Snow had to work considerably harder to keep his opinions to himself after that.

Nova explained how her parents basically shoved Rick down her throat, and although the relationship hadn’t been perfect, she had believed they could build a future together. Until the day she walked in on him in bed with another woman.

Asshole.

What pissed Snow off even more was what happened afterward. Instead of her parents rallying around their daughter after she had been betrayed, her father had apparently treated the entire situation like an inconvenient business problem that needed to be managed.

Rick came from the right family, which led to important connections, and apparently all of that mattered more to Leonard Hart than the fact that the bastard had humiliated his daughter.

By the time Nova finished explaining the role both families had played in trying to push them together, Snow’s jaw hurt from clenching it.

He couldn’t imagine his own parents reacting that way. Hell, he would be lying if he said that he wasn’t nervous about what his mother might do if Yvette ever showed up at the house again after knowing what she had done to her son. His father sure as hell wouldn’t have sat around discussing how the relationship could still benefit the family.

But Nova's parents had. And somehow, the woman sitting beside him had survived all of it without becoming bitter.

At least, Snow thought that was where the story ended.

Nova grew quiet, staring out across the dark water as she rubbed her palms over her thighs. “Which brings us to today.”

“What happened today?”

She released a humorless laugh. “Apparently, I’m getting married.”