29. Chapter 29
Chapter 29
N inety-two days later, Stone opened the front door, saw his mom and siblings, and tried to shut the door in their faces.
He knew an intervention when he saw one, and he wasn’t in the mood.
Tonight marked another month since Sophie had walked out of his life. And, as he had with the prior two anniversary months, he planned to get drunk.
Three months of pure hell. Three months in which he’d operated on autopilot. “If you guys are here to cheer me up, that ship has fucking sailed.”
“Language.” Clarabelle twirled her wand in the air, and the next thing Stone knew, he had a bar of soap in his mouth.
He spat it out and glared at her. “You used to count to three before you did that.”
“You used to be a child who needed guidance, not tough love.”
“Let me guess,” Stone said caustically, his attention on his brothers. “The lot of you have shown up uninvited to tell me to stop pouting and get back out there and get laid?”
Ryder, the middle of Clarabelle’s three adopted sons, held out a hand to Montgomery, who was the oldest. “I told you that’s what he’d think.”
Montgomery passed money to Ryder.
“Dang it, dude,” Montgomery said to Stone. “I thought for sure you were smart enough to know the answer to your problem without our having to interfere.”
Stone did know the answer. But getting over someone like Sophie E. Clark was easier said than accomplished. “Are you saying this,” Stone asked Montgomery as he motioned toward the other two, “wasn’t your idea?”
“Hel…heck no,” Montgomery said. “I’ve got better things to do on a Friday night than—”
Ryder elbowed Montgomery. “Dude. We’re a family. Family breaks dates and shows up to kick each other’s asses when asses need kicking.”
Clarabelle raised her wand. “Language—”
“No offense, Mom,” Ryder said, “but sometimes a guy’s got to cuss.”
She pursed her lips but lowered her wand.
“Could we just skip the pleasantries and get to the point of why you’re all here?” Stone grumbled. “I’ve got a date with Jack later.” He glanced toward an empty Jack Daniel’s bottle and frowned. When had he finished it?
“Stone, if you miss one more monthly meeting, the elders will have no choice but to relieve you of your wand. Is that what you want?” Clarabelle asked.
“They can do that?” Stone frowned. “I thought once a fairy godfather, always a fairy godfather.” He drained the beer in his hand and tossed it toward the pile of other cans by the couch.
“Oh, you’ll still be one,” Clarabelle said. “Just not one with powers. You’ll be a figurehead only.”
“Fuck that,” Stone said. “If I can’t have a wand, I’m not keeping the title.”
“That’s why we’re here,” Ryder interjected. “Do you want out?”
“Out of the magic business?” Stone asked.
“Out of it all.” Montgomery clarified. “Out of security, out of magic, out of all the things that have been your steadfast reasons for why you couldn’t pursue Sophie.”
Stone sighed. “I’m not turning my back on my family for a woman. Even if I have fallen for the girl. We’re the three musketeers, abandoned by family once, but never again.”
They all smiled. Except him. Stone didn’t smile.
“We’ve got a plan,” Clarabelle said.
“The kind that’s going to require groveling on your part,” Ryder said. “But we’re pretty sure you can pull it off if you put your heart into it.”
“What your brothers are trying to say is we’ve figured out a way for all of you to have your cake and marry it too.”
For the first time in three months, Stone found himself harboring hope. “I’m listening.”
“Before we go any further, do you love Sophie?” Clarabelle asked.
“I do.” Stone had no idea how that had happened. He’d been so careful not to get emotionally involved with her. But despite all his efforts, she’d stolen his heart.
“Do you trust Sophie?” Ryder asked.
“Absolutely.”
“Then here’s the plan,” Montgomery said. “You’re going to go up on the auction block as one of her book boyfriends. If she loves you, she will move heaven and earth to win you at auction.”
Stone made a buzzer noise. “She doesn’t have money to spare. There’s no way she could bid even if she wanted to.”
“Darling, I have spoken with Ms. Birdie, and we have come to an agreement,” Clarabelle said, not looking him in the eyes.
“What kind of agreement?” Stone asked, suspicious.
“With Ms. Birdie’s help, Sophie will be able to bid on you at auction.”
“How?”
“Sophie will participate in the silent auction. She will offer a bundle of all her T-shirt designs. Ms. Birdie will offer to match the highest bid and give that money to Sophie. You are going to covertly be the highest bidder.”
“Me?”
“Your bid will be outrageous,” Clarabelle said. “So incredible that Sophie won’t even think twice about worries she can’t afford to spend money bidding on you. Her only thought when you’re up on the stage will be if she wants to win you at auction.”
“And Ms. Birdie has approved this idea?” Stone asked.
Clarabelle nodded. “The only thing we can’t control is the choice Sophie makes when she sees you on stage.”
Stone ran a hand over his beard. “Trust me when I say she won’t want to. The last thing I said to her was I’m a bachelor for life and you should leave now.”
“You’re such a moron,” Montgomery said. “I can’t believe we’re related.”
“Fuck off,” Stone sneered.
Clarabelle made a tsking noise, but Stone’s mouth stayed free of soap.
“You’re right, she won’t want to,” Clarabelle said sharply. “But you’re going to show up in the hopes that she does anyway.”
“And which book boyfriend trope am I to represent? If it’s the damn cinnamon roll, you can count me out. She’ll know that’s bullshit.”
“You’ll go up there,” Clarabelle snapped, “and be whatever it takes to win back the woman of your heart.”
He opened his mouth to argue and shut it. When she got that look in her eyes, there was no getting around her will. Mightier than Stone had tried and failed. “Yes, ma’am.”
“As it turns out, her book boyfriend with a secret—that he would reveal to the highest bidder—backed out,” Clarabelle said.
“Backed out or was asked to be a no-show?” Stone asked, smelling a rat.
“Do not take that tone of voice with me, young man,” Clarabelle said.
He sighed. “I wasn’t aware Sophie had found such a book boyfriend.” Who had it been, and who had she taken with her to the interview for protection?
“She did, and he’s perfectly lovely, so stop scowling,” Clarabelle ordered.
“I’m not scowling. I’m thinking.”
“Well, stop it. It’s going to give you wrinkles.”
He forced himself to have no expression. “Better?”
She nodded. “As I was saying, you will take his place. Once Sophie wins you at auction, you will tell her you are a fairy godfather. If that doesn’t cause her to run, you’ve been cleared to offer her a job as a Fairytale Coordinator for you and the boys. It’s been preapproved by the Grand High Enchanter of Fairy Affairs.”
“How did you pull that off?”
“Let’s just say we have theories about Sophie that coincide.”
Stone went on full alert. “You’re saying I can tell her my secret without her saying I love you first?”
“Yes,” they all said in unison.
“But what if she’s not great at keeping secrets?” he forced himself to ask, because accidental telling of secrets can and do happen. And he wanted to know the outcome should that occur. Protecting her was still his focus. When they’d all been sworn in as Fairy Godfathers, there’d been a strong emphasis on the need to keep what they did out of the limelight. According to Clarabelle, if the wrong group of people learned of their existence, bad things could and would happen to the magic in the world.
Clarabelle smiled sadly and patted him on the cheek. “For starters, if she tells your secret, both of your memories of each other will be erased.”
There was no world in which he’d want to exist where he didn’t remember someone as perfect as Sophie E. Clark. “Starters?”
“Darling, stop borrowing worries. Now is the time to embrace possibilities. Go for the gold. Grab your own fairytale ending.”
“In other words, grow a pair,” Montgomery said.
“Man up,” Ryder added.
“Indeed, indeed,” Clarabelle said, causing both of his brothers to double over in laughter.
Stone let the ribbing slide. His gut told him Sophie could keep an important secret, especially if she knew the consequences of letting it slip. Which meant there was nothing stopping him from saying yes to offering Sophie a fantastical job. The realization caused him to laugh.
Hell, he had no idea what he and his brothers would do with a Fairytale Coordinator—mostly because he didn’t know what one of those did—but it didn’t take a sober genius to know Sophie would love the title. He could just imagine the T-shirts she would design for all of them to wear. “I’m in.”
“We thought you might be,” Ryder said, clapping him on the shoulder.
Montgomery puffed out his chest. “It was my idea, and I came up with the title.”
“Suck up,” Ryder jibed.
Clarabelle made a tutting noise at her boys.
Reality—a bully who’d been hiding in the fucking shadows like a coward—chose that moment to jump out and sucker punch Stone, wiping the grin from his face and the joy from his heart. “Your plan doesn’t keep Sophie emotionally or physically safe. As much as I like your plan, I’d rather die alone and unhappy than to be the reason one hair on her head is ever hurt.” Which is why he’d spent the last three months miserable.
“That’s the beauty of the plan, “Clarabelle said. “She’ll be protected by fairy magic. The same as any Fairy Godperson.”
“Why all the hoopla? Why can’t I just go to her tonight, and tell her?” Stone asked.
“Because Sophie deserves a grand gesture,” Clarabelle said.
Fuck. “What am I supposed to do for a grand gesture?”
“You’re getting up on that stage—all in the hopes the girl you love will bid on you—will be your grand gesture,” Clarabelle said. “It’s lowkey, and she might not get it at first, but when she does, it will seal the deal.”
“Are you sure she’ll get it? Because I don’t,” Stone said.
Clarabelle gave him a sad shake of her head. “Darling, the mere fact you don’t is why you need that girl in your life. If I recall, you mentioned she once said your fatal flaw was your unwillingness to ever lose control. Thus, your getting up on that stage, hoping for a certain outcome, but having no control over the actual way it turns out, is you losing control for her.”
“He always was the dumb butt in the group,” Ryder said, under his breath.
Stone flipped him the bird. “And if that’s not enough?” he asked Clarabelle.
“Honey, I have faith you’ll figure that one out when the time is right.”
“The way I see it, there’s an eighty-eight percent chance she’s going to tell you to go hump yourself,” Montgomery added.
“The math genius is right,” Stone replied. “Sophie won’t know what I’m hoping for when she sees me on that stage, so she won’t see it as a grand gesture.”
“As I said, darling,” Clarabelle said. “She probably won’t see it as a grand gesture until it’s all over, and that’s okay.”
“If she doesn’t see it as one, why would she bid on me?” Stone asked.
“Because she loves you,” Clarabelle said.
“Yeah, keep up, bro,” Ryder added. “Weren’t you paying attention at the beginning?”
“Why would Ms. Birdie be willing to get involved in any of this, let alone match the highest bid on Sophie’s product?” Stone asked.
Clarabelle’s cheeks went deep pink. “Because she’s a lovely person.”
Stone studied her. “The two of you are in fucking matchmaking cahoots, aren’t—”
A bar of soap in his mouth kept him from finishing.
“That is for me to know, and you to never find out,” Clarabelle said primly.