Page 26 of Work It Out
“But Mason’s not a girl.”
“Mason could be the ring bearer!”
“I don’t know if I want to be a flower girl,” the third girl murmured. She couldn’t be more than six. She tugged on Rayah’s hand. “I’ve never been to a wedding before. What do flower girls got to do? If they got to grow flowers, you should know that my mom tried to teach me how, and I was real bad at it. They all died.” Tears welled in her eyes. “It was awful.”
Pierce, damn him, laughed so hard he didn’t actually make any noise. His shoulders shook and he had clamped a hand over his mouth, but there was no sound except the occasional gasp for air.
“I— What?” Rayah stood beside Jake, her mouth opening, then closing, then opening again. “I don’t need flower girls.”
“But Miss Summers,” Sammie pleaded. “Don’t listen to Tasha. You have to have flower girls! And me and Angelica would be really good at it. I mean, so would Tasha, since flower girls just carry flowers, not grow them.” She tossed the smaller girl a withering stare.
“Oh, please, Miss Summers,” Angelica begged.
Rayah glared up at him, her message clear.Fix this.
“Sorry, girls. That wasn’t the secret. Miss Summers and I are just friends.” He leaned down to whisper in her ear. “For now.” Refocusing on her students, he said, “But now my secret will sound lame, so maybe I should keep it to myself.”
The girls were quick to reassure him. “Please, please, please?”
Mason could give two shits. He’d boarded cloud nine the second Jake joined the friend-zone club.
“I don’t know.” Jake looked to Rayah. “What do you think?”
Her chocolatey eyes sparkled but her expression was convincingly stern. “I think not. They haven’t been very polite.”
The girls gasped. “We were, too. We just—”
She cut them off with a tinkling laugh. “Go ahead. I’m sure they’ll be properly impressed.”
“You’re sure they can be trusted?” Though he’d been talking to Rayah, the girls nodded frantically.
“I think it’ll be all right if they pinky promise to keep it to themselves.” One eyebrow arched high as she spread her stare among the girls.
Three pinkies hit the air like lightning.
He probably should’ve felt stupid, sitting them in a tight circle and hooking pinkies with one little girl after another while Pierce lost it behind them. He didn’t, though. At all. He truly adored this part of his job. The show was nothing without diehard fans. And, though he felt like an ass thinking it, this moment might be one they remembered for the rest of their lives. He’d be damned if it wasn’t a good memory.
The girls waited with bated breath.
“You swear?” Jake asked, his voice hushed. “You won’t tell anyone what I’m about to divulge?”
“Divulge?” Mason snorted. “Don’t be such a drama llama. Just spit it out.”
“Mason, don’t be rude,” Rayah chided, but the minx was fighting a laugh.
Jake huffed a sigh worthy of his newfound drama llama status. “Fine. If you’re going to suck all the fun out of it.” He smiled at the girls. “You’re right. I am Jake Newman, and I play Alek York on TV.” There was no telling how much of what he said was heard over the ear-splitting screams.
The girls all asked him questions at once. Mason looked more ready to spike his water bottle with MCT oil by the minute. Pierce stuffed his fingers in his ears and beat feet for the door. Leaning back against his hands, Jake let the girls go, knowing it’d be a while before he’d get another word in edgewise.
Something tugged at his left pinky. He glanced over to see the little finger of Rayah’s right hand entwined with his left. When he looked up, the most amazing smile crossed her face. Just like her hug, that simple grin lit up every place inside him that had gone dark, every cold, lonely corner. He wasn’t sure if she was promising him something or if she was extracting a promise from him. In the end, it didn’t matter. He’d give her whatever she wanted, so long as she kept smiling at him like that.
Oh, hell. He could get in deep with this one.
He’d known the woman a handful of days, but he saw the writing on the wall. It would happen before he could stop it, and there was no fairytale ending for them. He’d have Christmas with her, maybe New Year’s. Then…what? Date long distance? His schedule would be insane for at least a year. Preproduction. Filming. He’d been told they were scoping locations in Canada and Europe. She was scrambling to save her business here.
Jake shook off the thought. Talk about getting ahead of himself. For all he knew, she’d drop a giant F-bomb on his head, too. Maybe she’d be hell to live with. She might catch him drinking straight from the milk carton and ship him off to Granny Jean.
Or, for once, he could stop overthinking and enjoy the moment.
