Total pages in book: 138
Estimated words: 133682 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 668(@200wpm)___ 535(@250wpm)___ 446(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 133682 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 668(@200wpm)___ 535(@250wpm)___ 446(@300wpm)
I handled the situation with our parents when we were kids. Now, I can’t think of this fake romance with Wilder as lying. It’s simply…handling a complicated situation. Yes, that’s it. And handling a complicated situation is an act of love.
On that note, I delete the text and try again.
Fable: Funny thing. I’m going out to dinner this weekend with Wilder Blaine. And we’re going to your wedding together too.
Then I hit send, hoping she’s too frenzied with flower ideas to think much about it.
No such luck. A few minutes later, I get off the bus and walk to the shop, where I spot Charlotte waving me down on the sidewalk, bursting with excitement. “You’re dating your billionaire boss?”
It’s a shriek. More like a shriek heard ‘round the world.
“Yes. I am,” I say, but I lower my hands, the gesture saying let’s keep this quiet.
“Details!”
“He asked me to dinner this weekend.” That part’s true.
She grabs my hands, her smile wider than the city block. “And to the wedding? Like, you’re going to the wedding together too? The best man and the maid of honor. Oh my god, Fabes,” she says.
She’s too excited, and I’m too big of a jerk.
But I tell myself all of this is true. Wilder and I are having dinner this weekend. We will go to her wedding together. “Well, we have to do that competition. Someone, cough-cough, is kind of obsessed with games,” I say, deflecting a bit, then I stage whisper, “You and Leo.”
“We are! And this is so cool. I’m so excited,” she says, hooking her arm through the crook of my elbow as we head to the shop to check out succulents for a Christmas Eve wedding bouquet. “But it’s early days,” I caution. “So, we’re taking it slow.”
“Of course, of course. You’d better keep me posted.” We reach the shop. “And I’m happy for you.”
“Thanks, Charlotte,” I say as a kernel of guilt wedges into my heart. I don’t want to be a liar like my snake of a father. But this is absolutely not the same kind of lie he whispered in my mother’s ears, telling her he was working late again, telling her he was out of town, then telling her he knew it was a mistake and he’d never do it again. Everything I said to my sister was true. When Wilder and I inevitably split up after Christmas, that will be totally true too.
No need to add my drama to everything she’s worrying about while planning a last-minute wedding. If I tell her we’re fake dating, I’ll need to tell her why—that the caterer she recommended for Thanksgiving was enjoying Brady’s eggnog special—then Leo would insist on kicking Brady, his own cousin, out of the wedding party.
That’s not fair to them. It’s not their circus or their monkeys.
Brady’s my monkey and Wilder’s the new ringmaster.
Or something like that.
We head inside, and I spend the next twenty minutes oohing and aahing over green succulents. We choose an unconventional but low-maintenance flower style for her bouquets. There’s a sister shop of Kiss My Tulips in Evergreen Falls, so we can look at their options here and pick up the final arrangement in the cute little Christmas-obsessed town where my sister will get married.
When we’re done I say goodbye, then head home, nearing a bell-ringing Santa on the next corner. I reach into my purse for some bills, then drop them into his shiny red bucket.
“Ho, ho, ho, and Merry Christmas. May all your Christmas wishes come true,” the jolly man says.
“And yours as well,” I say to the guy in the red suit and long white beard. Once I pass him, I wonder though—what are my holiday wishes? Simply to survive the wedding without feeling like a doormat? Sure, that’s definitely one. To make a point that I won’t let people think they can walk all over me? Yes, definitely. But Wilder also said the other day in his office that he’d like to show my ex how a man should treat a woman. And I’d like him to show me as well. I suppose maybe that’s a secret wish of mine now too.
To know what that’s like.
No.
It’s my wish to know how Wilder Blaine treats a woman.
Even if we have to keep it a secret from my sister, I want this wish to come true. I need to tell someone. This secret is clawing at my heart, nagging at my brain. Then, like a cartoon anvil landing on my head, I know who to tell. My friends Josie and Maeve, and of course Everly too. Josie’s a librarian, Maeve’s a painter, and Everly is the publicist for the Sea Dogs, one of the city’s hockey teams. They aren’t connected to Wilder’s world, and we’ve spent a lot of time together since Josie moved to San Francisco last fall. Plus, Maeve has been insisting she had a feeling about him ever since we ran into him in the lobby of his hotel one time and he offered to comp us a room. We didn’t need one, but when he left, Maeve promptly declared, Someone has a crush on you.