Chapter Sixteen
Jorja
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I CHECKED MY WATCH . It was nearly seven, which was when Seth had told me to come meet him at the restaurant.
I still had no idea what we were going to be doing there. He hadn’t told me what to expect when I arrived, and I didn’t have a single guess as to what it might have been. He’d told me to trust him, and, after everything that had gone down, I doubted he would have blamed me for having trouble putting my faith in anyone else. But, if it was going to be anyone, it would be him.
Of course it would be.
I was perched on the chair in the living room, staring out at the first few drifts of snow floating down from the sky. I knew it was going to come in heavy tonight, but right now, it almost seemed peaceful. Beside me, the Christmas tree that the two of us had put up together was standing tall, the star he’d placed on top gleaming in the light. I could still remember the look on his face when he had put it there, that sweet smile, the way the silver glittered in his eyes, like the tinsel draped around the branches.
I still didn’t know why he seemed so determined to help me. I couldn’t figure it out. Sure, he had said at first that it was about keeping the store open, but now? I got the feeling it was more personal than that. I got the feeling that this was about me, not just the Bookshelf, and whatever he had planned this evening was an extension of his dedication to finally paying off the taxes I needed to.
I didn’t think I would have made it this far if it hadn’t been for him. I would never have been able to stand up at the city council meeting and ask them to give me the permit, that much, I knew for sure. But when he was there beside me, his hand squeezing mine tight, I felt as though I could have taken on anything in the world.
And maybe that was what I needed right now. The promise that, no matter what, I had someone by my side who was going to be there for me, someone who was going to do everything they could to look out for me. I didn’t know what I had done to deserve someone like that in my life, but maybe my grandmother had been right when she had told me that Christmas was a time for miracles.
I dropped a kiss on Mia’s head, and then made my way to the door, pulling on my coat as I headed toward the Italian restaurant where we’d had our first date. It was a little chilly, but I didn’t mind the cold. As I got closer, though, I realized with a sharp jolt of surprise that I wasn’t the only person headed to the restaurant this evening—no, there was a line of people, wrapping around the corner, lined up outside the entrance.
“What the...?” I muttered to myself. I knew the garlic knots were good, but a line this long? I had never seen it before.
And, as I joined the back of the line and got a better look at the people in it, I realized something—they were all women. All of them. Most of them I recognized, but some of them I didn’t. They must have come from out of town! What the heck could have been going on in there that was so exciting?
“You’re Jorja, right?” A voice cut through the noise around me. I turned, to find a woman who I was pretty sure I recognized as the owner of the restaurant standing behind me.
“Yeah, I am.”
She jerked her head toward the store. “You come with me,” she told me. “He’s waiting inside for you.”
Seth, she had to be talking about Seth, didn’t she? I just didn’t understand why so many people would have been lining up outside of the restaurant to what—meet him? As far as I knew, he was just an event planner, and, even though this town did tend to show a little too much interest when new people arrived, there was no way they would have gone to these lengths to meet him.
But, when I stepped into the restaurant, my jaw dropped.
Seth was posing next to Ally, an older woman who was a regular visitor the bookstore. She usually picked up a stack of romance novels, and, though I didn’t read them, I was glad for her custom. She was holding one of the books as she grinned down the lens of a camera held by one of the waiters who worked at the restaurant, and, once the photo was taken, she handed Seth something.
She brushed past the waiting line and grinned when she caught my eye.
“Can you believe it?” she remarked, pointing to the front cover of the book she was holding.
I frowned, glancing down at it—and then, finally, everything clicked into place.
It was Seth. Seth, smoldering, on the front of that romance cover. One of those sexy models I had barely glanced at before putting the books up on the shelves. This was why he had been so reticent about talking about his past! This was what he had been doing! I couldn’t believe it. I stared at the cover for a long moment, then back up to Seth, then back to the cover again, feeling dumb. How could I not have seen this? How could I have let this go completely unnoticed for so long? I had been stocking these books in my store, for goodness sake! I should have recognized him the moment he stepped through the door.
But I brushed that thought aside, and made my way to Seth, who was taking a quick break from the line of women in front of him. I raised my eyebrows at him, pointing to the stack of books sitting on a table in front of him.
“What on earth is going on?” I demanded. I couldn’t believe this. None of this felt as though it could be real, not by a long shot.
“I took a few copies from the store,” he admitted. “Hope you don’t mind.”
“What’s all this for?” I asked him, gesturing around. “What... what’s even going on here? I don’t get it.”
“I got recognized while I was manning the table today, and it gave me an idea,” he explained. “I didn’t want to make a big deal of my modeling work, but I figured, hey, if I could get the word out, I could pull in a crowd, sign a few books, take a few pictures, and make some money.”
My heart skipped a beat. Make some money? Was he doing this for the store?
“Here, let me show you,” he told me excitedly, and he cracked open a small lockbox that was sitting just a few feet away from him. It was filled with checks and crisp bills. I squinted down at the amount, trying to crunch some quick numbers inside my head.
“This is...”
“Enough to keep the store and the house?” he finished up for me. My eyes nearly bugged out of my head.
“You’re doing this for...?”
“For you, Jorja,” he replied, grinning. “You’ve worked so hard. You deserve to be able to keep the house and the store. You shouldn’t have to choose.”
I clamped a hand over my mouth. I could hardly wrap my head around this. It was...it was more than anyone had ever done for me before, at least since my grandma had passed. The kind of sweetness, this investment in me, his willingness to go this far to make sure that I had everything I needed, it was almost more than I could take.
And, as I cast my eye over the rest of the women waiting to have their picture taken with him and for him to sign their books, I calculated a little more. I didn’t know exactly how much he was charging, but I could take a good guess based on the money he already had. If I was anywhere close to right, the cash he was going to bring in would be more than enough to pay for everything.
A rush of emotion overwhelmed me, and I reached up to give him a hug. I didn’t know if I would ever be able to express just how grateful I was for everything he had done for me—I didn’t know if I would even be able to come close.
“Thank you,” I whispered to him. “Thank you so much, Seth. I... I don’t know what I would have done without you.”
“I’m just glad I could help,” he replied, as he gave me a quick squeeze. “And tomorrow, if the weather’s not too bad– I told everyone to come by the book fair, too.”
“You did?” I replied.
He winked at me. “It would be rude not to give them something else to look forward to,” he remarked.
I laughed. I had no idea what he had in mind, but I was more than happy to help out with it any way I could. After what he had done for me, I was willing to do anything to show him how grateful I was. I was just so happy that he had found this way to keep the store alive, even in the face of everything Wharton was trying to do.
“Is there anything I can do to help?” I asked him, and he shook his head.
“You just relax,” he replied. “I’ve got this, okay?”
“Sure,” I agreed, feeling a little giddy as I cast my eye over the queue waiting impatiently for him to turn his attention back to them once more. I couldn’t believe it. Seth, a model? Let alone a model for book covers—let alone romance book covers! I had always been so certain that men like that didn’t exist in real life, because I just couldn’t believe they would have been able to. Someone so perfect, so handsome, so charming, it didn’t feel like they could exist out here in reality with the rest of us.
But I should have known there was something special about Seth from the moment I saw him. Something different.
And now that I knew what it was, well, I was damn sure I was never going to let him go.