Promise Me This: a friends to lovers, slow burn romance (Wilder Family Book 3)

Chapter 24

“I’m sorry, can you repeat that?”

It was a good thing my sister couldn’t see me through the phone because even though Adaline was the gentler, nicer of my stepsisters, even she would hit her limit with the way I was glaring.

“You heard me.”

“Hmm, maybe there was a connection problem,” she said innocently.

Wasn’t deep breathing supposed to help calm you? I took one. Then another. The annoyance was still there, and I was still very full of regret that I’d made the call in the first place.

But humbling myself to one of my younger sisters was a worthwhile price to pay. “Adaline, if you could be so kind,” I said through a tight jaw, “I really need your help to get something set up quickly for Harlow’s birthday tonight.”

“That’s what I thought you said.” Her voice was so full of obnoxious glee that I lay my head back on the seat rest and closed my eyes. “Forgive me if I bask in this rarest of moments. Am I allowed to rub it in Greer’s face that you called me first?”

“No,” I barked. “You own a party planning company, for fuck’s sake. Of course I’m going to call you.”

She laughed in absolute delight. “Doesn’t take away this small moment of victory, and I’m still going to savor it.”

“Whatever floats your boat. But I am on a bit of a time crunch. She’s at a spa thing with Sage, and they’re shopping afterward.”

“A girls’ day,” she said. “That’s cute. And what are you trying to pull off by the time they’re done?”

Her perfect birthday, but I didn’t say that out loud.

The moment I’d walked in the door on Sunday night and saw that box-mix cake sitting on the kitchen counter, I knew. From the looks of the glass pan, she and Sage had enjoyed it thoroughly because a quarter of the cake was already gone, but it didn’t stop my chest from caving in a little when I realized what it meant.

Something went wrong at her parents’, and she’d ended up home, baking her own birthday cake. Maybe it was a silly thing to anyone else, but I knew what that might symbolize for her.

By the time she came downstairs, I’d schooled my expression.

Lunch was whatever,she’d said. And when I gave her a long, searching look, she waved it off. Seriously, it’s not a big thing. My mom was being her usual self, and I didn’t feel like putting up with it, she insisted.

And she was craving cake.

That was all.

When I tried to ask again, she cut me my own massive piece, shoved it in my hands, and said, “Eat the delicious cake, Ian, and stop overthinking it.”

So I did. And it was delicious.

She let Sage stay home from school so they could do girl stuff all day, and I knew that was telling too. I couldn’t stop that gnawing sensation that if her birthday passed and even the slightest hint of what she’d feared came true, she’d go to bed and feel empty. Feel that yearning she talked about. And as a couple of days passed, I couldn’t ignore the screaming in my gut to do something, anything, to make it as perfect of a day as possible.

“Ian?” Adaline asked. “Did I lose you?”

I cleared my throat. “Sorry. I want to make movie-watching beds in the family room. Like that fancy sleepover shit you see on Pinterest where everyone has their own spot, and you can have popcorn and theater candy or whatever.”

“You moving the couch out?”

My thumb tapped against the steering wheel. “Can’t move it out completely, but it can be pushed back.”

Through the phone, I could practically hear the wheels turning in her head. “Okay, unless you’re going to buy some new mattresses, I’d suggest air mattresses or a mattress pad and a lot of blankets so it’s a bit easier to set up.” She pulled the phone away from her face. “Kenz, what’s the name of that bakery we used in Redmond for my dad’s birthday party last year? They did the cake.”

A muffled voice answered her in the background.

“Ian, I’m going to text you the bakery information. And a list of things to get at the grocery store. You might need to borrow pillows and fuzzy blankets from Mom’s, because I highly doubt you have enough at your place.”

The mere thought of having to face Sheila and Poppy for something like this had me pinching my eyes shut. “I’ll buy them, it’s fine.”

Adaline paused. “You’re going to buy multiple new pillows and blankets for one movie night for her birthday?”

“Yup.”

“Ahh. That way you don’t have to explain any of this to Mom, which means Poppy would know, which means Greer would know.” She paused again. “Because if Greer knows, she’ll?—”

“Be obnoxious about it,” I interrupted. “And I’m just … making sure she has the birthday she wanted. That’s all,” I said gruffly. “I’m sick of missing people’s birthdays, and maybe I want to make up for it.”

The excuse was about as flimsy as wet cardboard, and I just wanted off this fucking phone call.

“Okay.” The light tone of her answer had me grimacing because she wasn’t buying it either. But I could handle Adaline knowing this. “For what it’s worth, I think it’s really thoughtful, Ian. She’ll love it.”

My jaw went tight again. “Uh-huh. Thanks, Adaline. I owe you.”

“Enough to stand up for Emmett when we get married in the spring?” she asked.

The air pressed hard from my lungs. “He’d want me to? I hardly know him.”

“You’re my brother,” she said. “Of course he would. It’ll be you, Parker, Beckett, Cameron, and one other teammate. Mom will be walking me down the aisle,” she added softly.

Emotion had my throat feeling tight. I’d missed Greer’s wedding to Beckett, but this was something I’d be here for. I blinked a few times and took a deep breath.

“Erik doesn’t get to stand up for him? I’ll make sure to rub that in the next time I see him.”

She laughed. “He’s marrying us, you dick.” Adaline paused again, inhaling slowly through her nose. “Is that a yes?”

“Yeah,” I answered in a rough voice. “I’d be honored.”

“Good. Now, I’ll text you the list, and if you have issues setting it up, FaceTime me because we want this to look nice, okay?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

At my dry tone, she sighed. “You’re not going to FaceTime me, are you?”

“Probably not.”

Adaline let out a disgruntled groan. “Okay, well… if I send you pictures, will you at least try to make it cute?”

“Trying is about all I can do right now. Thanks, Adaline.”

“Love you,” she said.

“You too.”

Within a few minutes, the promised text came through on my phone, and I let out a huge, slow breath. “Good Lord,” I muttered. “What did I do?”

By the time Harlow’s car pulled into the driveway, I was ready to shove everything out of sight, pretend I’d never called my sister, that I didn’t give two shits about how this evening went, and I was also maybe sweating. Just a little.

To appease my sister, I’d snapped and sent one picture. It helped a little in that whole I-think-I’m-gonna-puke feeling.

Adaline: OH MY GOSH, IAN! That’s so cute, I could scream!! The little popcorn buckets with candy! The balloons that match the blankets!!!! I CAN’T BELIEVE YOU MATCHED THE BALLOONS!

Me: Please, please stop with the exclamation points, I beg you.

Adaline: Sorry. But you did SO GOOD. She will love it. Best birthday present ever.

And it was all those exclamation points that kept me even the slightest bit sane when Harlow and Sage walked into the house and then stopped short at how the family room had been transformed.

An odd pressure slid around my ribs and squeezed in the vacuum of silence that followed. At first, she didn’t say anything. Her hand fluttered up to her chest and settled there as her mouth hung open.

Sage just grinned and held out a fist toward me.

In the middle of the room, I’d pushed together a queen-size air mattress and a twin, the larger for them. Heaped along the back of each, using the couch as a headrest, were mounds of white and pink pillows. Over the air mattresses, I’d laid down a frankly ridiculous amount of fuzzy white blankets and one overly large pink one on their side. Tall columns of pink, rose gold, and white balloons flanked the TV screen, where I’d cued up her favorite movie—The Cutting Edge.

“What the hell?” Harlow whispered.

“This is so cool,” Sage breathed.

When Harlow finally moved her eyes back to me, they were glossy with tears, and that was before she caught sight of the perfect chocolate cake sitting in the middle of the table. There was one candle in the middle, and the smooth coat of frosting around it was only interrupted by a line of perfectly piped pink tulips along the base.

“Ian,” she whispered.

I cleared my throat, shifting a little on my feet, crossing my arms over my chest just to have something to do with my hands. “Adaline helped me,” I said. “She, uh, she owns an event planning company, so she sent me a really big fucking—um , a really big list of what to get.”

Sage snorted, and Harlow emitted a soft, breathy laugh, only the slightest shake of her head as she continued staring.

“You gave me my dream birthday,” she said so quietly, I almost didn’t hear her.

Almost. Maybe later, I’d think about how it might have felt different if I hadn’t heard her, or if she hadn’t said it. But I did hear, and she knew exactly what I’d done. That doing this for her felt like the only way to make up some penance for being gone for so many of them—each just as important, no matter what number was on the cake. That doing this for her was the only way I knew how to show her that the life she was building for herself was fucking amazing, even if it looked a little different than she’d hoped.

I could hardly meet her knowing gaze. “I missed a lot of them, you know. Just trying to make up for it.”

She didn’t hug me, and I was strangely relieved. With Sage watching us both carefully, it felt like too much. Instead, Harlow walked over to stare at the cake. “Chocolate?” she asked after another eternal silence.

“As much as they could cram in there.”

Harlow’s answering laugh was a little shaky, a little unsteady, and I didn’t miss the way she dashed her hand across her cheek.

“We starting the movie?” Sage asked. “I’ll go change into comfies.”

Harlow’s ribs expanded on a deep breath, and after a second, she turned to nod over her shoulder. “Good plan, kiddo. I think I will too.”

When she walked past me, her fingers brushed against my wrist, a touch so light it could have been accidental, but the way her eyes stayed fixed anywhere but on my face, I knew it wasn’t. The possibility that this was a mistake had me sinking into a chair the moment they went upstairs to change. Elbows on my thighs, I clutched the sides of my face and took a few deep breaths.

Maybe it was too much. Too much for a friend to be doing, anyway. Everything built up inside me since the day she moved in shook dangerously, great big, thick vines pushing up through the foundations of those walls I’d built. As I sat there and wondered what the fuck I was doing, and why I was doing it, I felt a great crack bloom in the middle of all my reserves and there was nothing I could do to patch it back up again.

It was like that story about the kid who tried to plug the hole in the dam with his finger. The pressure simply built and built and built. All those waves I’d felt were no longer a soft ebb and flow, something that I could ignore because of the way they eased in and out of my head. This hurricane was bearing down on me with no hope to survive the effects.

I ignored all the visuals that came with it and took a few deep breaths, trying to slot all those feelings into neat little boxes to be dissected later. Much, much later. With the help of alcohol, preferably.

I stood from the chair and went to change myself, swapping out my work jeans for some gray sweatpants and a white T-shirt.

They came back downstairs a few minutes later, and Harlow’s eyes darted down to my pants. Her cheeks looked slightly pink in the dim light of the room.

Sage found her container of candy and immediately tore into the Sour Patch Kids package. “How did you know these are my favorite?” she asked.

“I didn’t,” I admitted. “I just got the same crap your mom and I used to eat when we watched movies.”

“Argued about watching movies,” she countered. Her eyes finally flicked to mine, and my chest unclenched because this was normal Harlow—a smile hidden in the deep brown. “I can’t believe you’re conceding this one so easily.”

We each settled onto our spots, and I tucked my arms behind my head. “Only on your birthday, Keaton. Tomorrow, you don’t get this kind of preferential treatment.”

She laughed, such a light, airy, happy sound, that I felt my heart turn over in my chest as I watched her and Sage ooh and aah over their candy choices while the movie started. Harlow started with some chocolate, which I expected. I opted for the Skittles.

As the movie began, the flickering lights filling the room, Harlow snuck a shy glance in my direction and smiled.

I smiled back.

It wasn’t too much.

It was just right for us. For what we used to be to each other.

Sage had never seen the movie, and even though I’d watched it at least ten times with Harlow in high school, I found myself laughing along with them as the couple bickered, doing their best to ignore the building attraction between them, even when it was obvious to everyone else.

My skin felt tight and uncomfortable as the similarities clicked into place, the dull thump of my heart echoing in my ears. At one scene, I risked a look at Harlow’s profile, and she was watching the screen with a surprisingly earnest look.

Usually, I could always sense what she was thinking, but I couldn’t right now. Maybe that was part of growing up in your friendships, especially when you haven’t been in the other person’s orbit for so long. I’d lost the right to know all her thoughts and guess what was going through her head.

So I took a deep breath, focused on the movie, and eventually relaxed. When it was over, I turned on my side, and Harlow immediately held a finger up to her lips to let me know Sage was asleep.

I moved up onto my elbow, smiling when I saw her curled up on her side, sound asleep with the pink blanket wrapped around her. Harlow carefully eased off the air mattress, and I did the same.

When we stood, I watched her pick up the extra blanket and wrap it around her shoulders. Her hair was a little messy, long past staying in the ponytail she’d fixed it in.

“Should we wake her up for some cake?” I whispered.

Harlow sighed, giving her daughter a fond look. “No, let’s let her sleep. She already sang to me over pancakes this morning.”

My eyes traced her face. “I’m sorry I missed that,” I murmured.

“You were gone early.”

I nodded. “My boss is kind of a dick like that.”

She laughed, then covered her mouth with her hand when Sage shifted on the air mattress. “Cut me a piece?” she asked. “I need to use the bathroom real quick.”

While she was down the hall, I used a cake knife to cut two wedges from the cake, then pulled forks from the drawer. When she came out, she smiled. “Your cake piece isn’t quite as obnoxious as the one I cut myself last night.”

“I noticed,” I said dryly.

With a quiet laugh, she picked up the plate, that blanket still wrapped around her shoulders, then started toward the front door. Curiously, I watched her. With her hand on the doorknob, she glanced at me over her shoulder.

“You better come sit and eat cake with me,” she said in a hushed tone. Her eyes were glowing as she stared at me, and it knocked the breath clean from my lungs.

I nodded, my voice a little rough as I answered. “Yeah. Of course.”

Could she hear the way my heart hammered in my chest? It seemed impossible that she couldn’t.

Harlow smiled, then went outside. I rubbed the back of my neck, then grabbed my cake and wondered for the hundredth time what the hell I’d done.