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“Hilarious,” she deadpanned. “They’re in here. Where they belong.”
I frowned as she patted her temple. “I don’t think that’s where feelings live.” Then I stepped closer, reaching out and tapping her chest directly over her heart. “I’m pretty sure they’re supposed to be in there.”
It was barely a second of contact, but when the tip of my finger connected with the soft fabric of her shirt, we sprang apart like repelling magnets.
“Anyway, um, what were we talking about before the feelings thing?” she asked, crossing and uncrossing her arms a few times before finally leaving them wound tightly around her middle.
I wet my lips. “Uh, I think you were about to tell me what you were so upset about.”
“Oh, was I?”
“You were.”
She considered me for a long moment, then she dropped her arms and sighed. “It’s my grandma. She’s very…persistent.”
I waited for her to say more, but when she didn’t, I arced my hand through the air. “Go on.”
“She’s trying to set me up with Ms. Hattie’s son.”
“Oh.” It was all I could manage, and it fell out of my mouth like a rock. A lava rock, maybe. One that steamed quietly from the ground at my feet.
“Yeah, I guess he’s going to be at my sister’s wedding, and she wants me to go with him. But it’s a whole thing, and I’m not going to do that,” she paused to take a breath, which gave me time to register my own relief. But then she looked up at the sky with a huff. “But Iwillhave to dance with him, and she’s trying to move him to our table for dinner. I don’t think Layla’s going to allow it, though. Wedding party only or whatever.”
My throat felt dry as I watched her, grateful that if the table were, indeed, only for the wedding party, that’d put me there. Possibly even right next to her.
But then again, why did I suddenly care?
I’d been attracted to Lyndi for a year—I’d be blind not to be—but I’d never been as drawn to her as I was now. I’d never hung on her every word or been jealous of any of the random guys she briefly dated. Let alone one she was beingtoldto date even though she didn’t want to.
Not until…Oh no.
My pops.
This deep longing in my chest was allhisfault. That crazy old man and hismake-me-a-promisedying-wish nonsense had me looking at Lyndi in a whole new light, and I couldn’t believe I hadn’t realized it sooner.
But what was I supposed to do? Tell her my dad wanted me to fall in love for real and ask her if she wanted to hire me for Layla’s wedding so she didn’t have to deal with Ms. Hattie’s son?
I didn’t know the guy but judging by the way she talked about this whole thing, I could tell she wasn’t interested in him. Maybe he had a big nose or weird teeth or was a huge jerk to her in the past. Which, by the way, I’d have to have a little talk with him if that turned out to be the case.
Regardless, it was kind of my thing to save women from whatever problem they needed a fake date to fix, so maybe this was my chance. Maybe I could ask Lyndi to hire me, and then maybe—justmaybe—the way I felt about her wasn’t one-sided and she’d be the one I’d find something real with.
“But like I said,” Lyndi went on, a visible shudder rocking her body, “none of that is as important as what’s happening with Aria. So, I’m just going to suck it up and hang out with him, knowing it won’t go anywhere.”
“Why won’t it go anywhere?” I couldn’t help but ask.
“Because he lives in Okinawa.”
I shrugged. “You don’t like Okinawa?”
“I’ve never been,” she said with a light laugh. “But I’m not going to start dating a guy who would take me out of Bluffton. I love it here.”
The level of certainty in her voice caused a current of emptiness to stream through me. It promptly swept away all those bright ideas about asking her to hire me and left a puddle of disappointment in its wake.
There goes that plan.
She stilled, looking up at me as if she’d just thought of something. “Hey, where are you going by the way?”
Since I hadn’t made a move to leave, I twisted around to see if she was asking someone else. But no one was there, so I faced her again and put a hand on my chest. “Me?”
