14. Cole

My eyes werebleary as I pulled into the garage and parked. Today had been a fourteen-hour day, and last night, I hadn't gotten any sleep. Part of that was due to Luke being up sick. Leo had shared the 72-hour bug with his brother. Right after Leo stopped puking, Luke was down for the count. So, the past week had been spent getting up in the middle of the night with the twins so my sister could rest. She needed the sleep a lot more than I did.

The other cause of my sleeplessness was Bailey. Every time I closed my eyes, I saw her. I heard her voice in my head. I smelled the fresh floral scent of her hair.

I couldn't remember ever being so infatuated with someone. Even when I actively tried not to think about her, she was still there, at the forefront of my mind. It made no sense. I knew that nothing could happen between us. I was not in the place to have any sort of relationship, and she hadn't shown the slightest bit of interest.

But none of that stopped me from obsessing about her.

When I turned the corner from the garage, I was sure my sleepless night had caught up with me, and my eyes were playing tricks on me. I saw an angel. Not just any angel; it was an angel in the form of Bailey, in a white sundress, sitting on the steps that led up to my building. White was the one color I could actually see. A halo of light from the setting sun surrounded her, giving her an even greater ethereal appearance.

"Bailey?" I said to myself, half expecting her to disappear, to vanish after I spoke her name out loud.

She didn't. Instead, her head turned toward me, and she quickly stood.

"Hi!" The white sundress she wore floated up, and she pushed the material down in a very Marilyn Monroe-esque move. Once her skirt was tamed and she was no longer in danger of flashing me, she lifted her hand in an awkward wave and greeted me again. "Hi."

Fuck, she was adorable.

"Hi," I repeated. "Is everything okay?"

"Oh, yeah, I was just. Um, I wanted to talk to you."

I motioned to the door. "I would invite you up, but my neph?—"

"Oh, no, it's fine. I can ask you out here if that's okay."

"Okay."

"Um, right, so, um, I guess first, are you free next weekend? The weekend of the twenty-eighth?"

"The twenty-eighth?" I repeated buying myself some time. I knew that I was free, but I wasn't sure what I should do here. Should I tell her about Sara and the kids? I didn't want to lead her on. I didn't want her to think I was capable of something I wasn't.

"I'm asking because I was wondering if I could hire you."

"Hire me?" My heart sank in disappointment. It shouldn't have. This was actually better than her asking me out. I could spend time with her and not feel guilty about leading her on.

"Yes. Hire you. I have a wedding that I am coordinating and am also a guest. It's my ex's wedding, actually. His fiancée hired me without him knowing about it, and then he said he wanted me to be a guest and not work at his wedding. But then she seemed upset, so I agreed to do both. Then I remembered the reviews that I saw on your app. Oh, I looked up your app. I hope that's okay. Anyway, I remembered the reviews, and I thought, that's perfect. I need a plus one, and you are a plus one. I know it's last minute. I've known for a few days. I found out on Monday. Right after I ran into you, actually. Which is sort of weird when you think about it. But I don't know, maybe it's fate or—" She stopped herself from speaking a mile a minute and shook her head. "It doesn't matter. The point is, it's in Napa. It's a three-day event. I'm going up there on Thursday and staying until Sunday."

"Um…" Three days. The weekend. I never went away for work. Or for pleasure, for that matter. Not since Sara had her first seizure.

"The wedding is on Saturday, so I don't know how that works. If you would just come up for the day, or if you would want to come up on Thursday and stay the weekend? If you are even available and want to go. I mean, I totally understand if not."

My head was spinning with the information I was hearing. She wanted me to be her plus one. She wanted me to go away with her. She was working and attending her ex's wedding. It was a lot to take in. I was trying to gather my thoughts when I heard a familiar voice.

"Well, hello there, young lady."

I turned my head and saw Arthur walking up, carrying several bags of groceries.

"Hi." Bailey smiled sweetly and moved off the porch steps.

"Arthur Reynolds, this is Bailey Bliss," I said by way of introduction.

"Hi, Mr. Reynolds."

"Well, hello, Bailey Bliss. Bliss. Huh?" He tilted his head to the side. "Now, you wouldn't by chance be related to William Bliss, would'ya?"

Her face lit up at the mention of the name. "Yes, I am. I'm his granddaughter."

"Oh, well, looky there. I served with your granddad in Vietnam. How's old Willy doin'?"

"He passed away about ten years ago."

"Ah," Arthur didn't' seem surprised by the news. "Last I heard about him, he was fixin' to propose to a pretty thing with red hair. I think her name was…"

"Betty, yeah, my grandmother. They were together for over sixty years."

Arthur smiled. "He kept a photo of her in a locket."

Bailey put her hand in her large black purse, pulled out a gold locket, and opened it. In it, there was an old black-and-white photo of a woman who looked like a Hollywood starlet.

"That's it. Wow." Arthur pointed at the photo. "I can't believe it. You're Willy's granddaughter. It really is a small world."

"Yes sir, it is." She smiled and put the photo away.

"Well, I better get this ice cream inside. I don't want it leakin' all over."

Bailey moved to the side.

"Do you need help up?" I offered as I hurried in front of him and opened the door, not that I wanted to leave Bailey; even for the few minutes it would take me to carry up the bags. But Arthur lived on the sixth floor, and like Sara, I worried about him on the stairs.

"Oh, no. I'm just fine. This is my workout for the day." Arthur lifted the bags in a bicep curl as he walked inside. "Nice meeting you, young lady."

"You, too, Mr. Reynolds."

Once the door shut, I turned back to Bailey, unsure what to say. "How did you know where I lived?"

I was buying myself time, but I was also curious. It couldn't have been from my app because I was careful not to have anything on there of any personal nature.

"Oh, right." She dug into her bag once more and pulled out the order slip that had been on the cake with my name, address, and phone number and handed it back to me. "You dropped this."

"Oh, okay."

"I'm so sorry I just showed up like this. I just, I don't know, I was just nervous, and I guess most people, well, they'd probably just text or use your app because doing this in person would be worse. And I thought about that, but then I thought, if I texted you or used your app, I would have to wait for your reply, and that would be torture. Also, I didn't think I'd actually go through with it if I didn't do it face-to-face. I can't tell you how many times I picked up my phone to call, text or message you on your app, but then I chickened out. And I asked myself, what would Olivia do? She's my best friend and a total badass. Anyway, I thought she would just face her fear head-on and ask. So here I am."

I couldn't believe this angelic creature actually seemed nervous about asking me out. Although she wasn't really asking me out. She was asking if she could hire me as her plus one. There was a difference.

"But now that I'm here, I realize that I put you on the spot. Which is rude. So, yeah, I clearly haven't thought this through." She pulled out a pen from her purse.

I glanced down and watched her write her name and cell phone number on the receipt.

"So, think about it, and let me know. Take all the time you need." She waved her hand and spun around but then turned back. "Well, not all the time. The wedding is in ten days, so I'll need to know by?—"

"Yes," I said cutting her off, even though I would gladly stand there and listen to her talk for hours, days, hell, for the rest of my life. I'd never found anyone so fucking entertaining. She was the cutest thing I'd ever seen.

"Yes?" she repeated. "As in yes, you'll think about it, or yes, you'll let me know by?—"

"Yes, I'll go with you."

Her mouth dropped open.

Was she really that shocked?

"You will?"

"Yes."

"Okay, um, for just the wedding, or would you want to go up with me on the Thurs?—"

"You said it's in Napa?"

"Yeah."

"We can go up together." I hated leaving Sara and the kids, but if there was an emergency, I could be back here in two hours.

"Oh, okay. And do I just, um, Venmo you or…"

"We can work out the details later." I didn't want to take money from her. There was no way I was going to take her money.

"Oh, okay, and the NDA, do I sign that now or just?—"

"Don't worry about it. Just text me your address and what time you need me to pick you up."

"Oh, I can drive?—"

"I'll drive."

Her nose scrunched. "Are you sure?"

Shit.What if I had to go back for an emergency? "Um, actually, we might have to take two cars."

I could see the disappointment in her eyes that we wouldn't be driving together, which made me want to do a backflip with excitement. "Oh, okay."

"It's just, my nephew is still not feeling well, and if there's an emergenc?—"

"Oh, well, my sisters are coming up too, so if you did have to leave, I would just ride home with them."

"Good. Then text me your address and what time to pick you up."

She was nodding her head, but no words were coming out. Finally, she said, "Okay, okay, okay, yeah. So that's…this, this is happening. It's happening."

I was fairly sure that she was just vocalizing her internal dialogue, and again, I found it fucking adorable.

"Okay. Good. Good." She started to reach out to hug me, but stopped herself and offered me her hand, and I shook it. "Okay, thanks. That's good. This is good. Um, yeah, good. I'll text you."

"Sounds good," I teased her, but she either didn't think it was funny or didn't notice.

As I watched her walk down the street to her car, one of the many questions that had crowded my mind for months came to the surface.

How in the hell was a woman that sexy, that cute, that adorable, that sweet, that kind, that fucking perfect still single?