Page 16 of A Complicated Bride

I gave her a grin of solidarity and she returned it, moving a step closer. There was no way she even realized she’d been drawn to me. Literally.

“I’m surprised your phone’s not ringing off the hook,” Nora said, swiping a lock of hair from her face as she worked.

“I turned my phone off when I got on the plane and haven’t felt a need to turn it back on yet.”

“You ran away too, truly.” Lily turned to him now. “Why?”

My heart jumped into a gear I hadn’t know it had, right past third and four straight into fifth, thudding as if I were being chased with a knife to cut it out.

“It’s a long story.” I tried sounding calm and cool and felt none of that. I knew I wanted to tell her. Everything. But I had no idea what to say, truly.

And unlike her, I wasn’t prepared to bare all in front of Nora.

If I were the type, I’d be ashamed of myself, but I’d lost the ability years ago. Being shameless had been part of my nature since I’d left town. Since I’d last seen my sister.

“I’d love to hear it.” She spoke softly, in deference to the prying ears of Nora. “That is if you want to talk about it. I would understand. I promise.”

“I bet you would.” Tension drained away and the guy chasing me with the knife evaporated. My heart calmed, but not completely. It still thudded at an unnatural pace, but it wasn’t fear driving it now. This lust-fueled racing heart I was more familiar with. But I still felt tentative. This was a big test to see if I could be as genuine as the object of my desire, to see if she would accept me at face value.

To see if I could deliver face value, the genuine Bradley Simmons minus the world-renowned photographer tag of pretention.

This wasn’t the time.

“So what else did you do besides bake when you were here for the summers?”

“Oh, we spent time on the lake, the usual kid stuff. But …” She paused and turned her attention to slicing apples with a knife that reminded me of my tension and my heart literally gulped in my chest. She diced the apple with staccato chops of the knife onto the cutting board that was as impressive as it was scary.

“But what?” I expected her to tell me she won a cooking competition as a child and turned down the opportunity to study with Julia Child.

“My favorite time was when we did a play with the community theater.”

“I remember that,” Nora put aside her rolling pin and my ears pricked up. “You played the lead in Annie and Julie was a stage hand. That was fun, quite a production for a group of amateurs.”

“Well then, miss child star, let me know if you need any professional photographs.” I was impressed and horrified at the same time. An actress was the last thing I was expecting from Lily. I’d had enough of aspiring actresses. I found myself backing up a step.

“It was fun. Do they still have that community theater group in town, Aunt Nora?”

“Yes they do. Tammy and Roark are involved with them. They’re starting up a production of South Pacific. You should talk to them if you’re sticking around for a while. I’m sure they could use your talents.”

My heart sank at the same time as my mind spun while I witnessed Lily’s face light in a way I hadn’t seen in our short acquaintance. She went from gorgeous to spectacular and that it girl vibe I’d gotten from her appeared in full force.

She was breathtaking. I was having trouble breathing. The last thing I’d expected or wanted was to find a new It Girl who wanted to be an actress.

And I most definitely hadn’t wanted it to be Lily, my genuine angel. Had she fooled the master of seeing through everything? Had I been vulnerable at the wrong time with the wrong girl? I didn’t want it to be so and I still couldn’t believe it.

There was no way Lily could have known I’d be at the Inn, or that he could help her get ahead as an actress. I calmed myself, kicking myself in my cynical ass for assuming the worse, as I always had.

“I’d love that.” It wasn’t just her eyes that lit, more like her entire face glowed. “I’d love to stay around for the summer and do South Pacific. It would be great fun.”

Then she turned to me.

“How about you Brad? How long are you going to run away for? Can you stay and do summer theater with us?”

“Why not? I don’t know what role I could play, but I’d give anything to see you on stage.” I meant it. Deep down to the soles of my feet. Heaven help me before I get sent to hell.

She threw her arms around me then and gave me a hug as if we’d just agreed to get married instead of doing community theater.

“That’s all well and good, sweetheart,” Nora said. “But what will you do for a living?”