Violet noticed the connection.
"Grandpa likes you," she said.
"He likes it when I say thank you," I joked.
But one night, Rick asked something unexpected:
Have you ever considered getting married for security reasons?
I thought it was a joke.
It wasn't.
"Are you asking me to marry you?", I asked.
“Try.”
That should have been the moment I left.
Instead, I asked why.
"Because I trust you more than I trust my own family," he said.
When I told Violet, everything changed.
She didn't laugh.
“I thought you had more self-esteem,” she said softly. “But you’re just like everyone else.”
That hurt more than anything.
“Pride is expensive,” I replied. “You had the privilege of keeping yours.”
She sent me away.
So I did.
Three weeks later, I married her grandfather.
The wedding was small, expensive, and uncomfortable.
There was a fifty-year age difference—and no romance.
Violet didn't even look at me.
At the reception, his daughter, Angela, approached me with a cold smile.
"You were too fast," she said.
