Chapter 14
14
NIALL
T he morning of the block party, I woke up excited. Not in the sexual way but excited for the actual party.
Although the morning-glory thing was real too. It had been every day since Tallulah had become a more permanent fixture in my life. I didn’t touch my hard-on though, rolling out of bed and hitting my shower instead.
I wanted to be done at the office well before the party started, and in order to do everything I needed to get done, I had to get to work as soon as possible. All through my shower, getting dressed, and all the way to my office, however, she was still on my mind.
I seemed to be cultivating something of an obsession with the woman, and I was genuinely excited to see her later. While I’d simply asked her to attend the party without specifically saying whether it was a date, I was happy that she would be on my arm.
I hadn’t seen her since I’d lent her my old truck, and the mere thought of her in it was skyrocketing my level of attraction to her. Moreover, the knowledge that she’d been at my house all week was making me miss her presence when I got home—even though I hadn’t been there while she had.
As I strode into my office, my only solace was in the fact that at the very least, I’d finally be seeing her again later. After the party, I would call a therapist or something to help me deal with this developing obsession, though.
Of course, according to the all-knowing Doctor Google, it wasn’t an obsession. It was a crush. I scoffed as I sat down behind my desk, shaking my head at myself and firing up my computer. It’s not just a crush. It can’t be.
Thankfully, my computer distracted me by asking for my password, and as I entered it, I put my thoughts of Tallulah, crushes, and obsessions aside and finally got to work. Jake came in a little while later, smiling strangely at me for some reason.
“I just got back from a visit to the plantation,” he said. “Tallulah and I did a walkthrough with some of the vendors for the festival.”
I glanced at him, my eyes narrowing. “Okay. That’s nice. Why are you looking at me like that?”
“I saw the most curious thing while I was over there,” he said cheerfully, dropping into the chair across from my desk and leaning back like he was settling in for a day on the beach.
I frowned. “You’re going to have to speed this up, Jake. Also, you’re at work. Act like it.”
He smirked. “Why is your old truck parked at the guest house?”
“That’s what this is about?” I rolled my eyes and turned back to my computer. “I’m letting her use it for now. She doesn’t have a car, and while she seems fine with Ubering for the foreseeable future, I don’t like it. It’s not safe and the truck was just sitting there. It’ll be good for it to be driven again and it’s a reliable vehicle for Tallulah to get around in.”
He arched a disbelieving eyebrow at me. “As it happens, I know you better than you think I do.”
“What are you talking about?” I bit out, but I knew what he was getting at.
He cocked his head, a knowing gleam in his eyes. “I’m talking about that truck being your most prized possession.”
“It’s not,” I said. “It’s one of four cars I own.”
“Sure, but you’ve had this one since high school and you refuse to get rid of it. It’s the car you drove here from New York when you moved, and you’ve never even let me sit in it.”
“So what?”
Jake narrowed his eyes at me playfully. “So have you hit your head?”
“No. Have you hit yours?”
He laughed. “No, but when I met my girlfriend, I just asked her out. I didn’t give her a house and car before we even had our first date.”
“Tallulah is not my girlfriend,” I said dryly. “The house came with the job and the car is simply to ensure her safety. Stop reading things into it that aren’t there.”
“Oh, I know she’s not your girlfriend. Yet. What I want to know is when you’re just going to ask her out. Come on, man. There’s obviously something going on between the two of you. I didn’t know you were that shy.”
“I’m not,” I argued. “Is there any room in that big head of yours for the possibility that perhaps I’m not asking her out because it would put her in an awkward position?”
Before he could respond, I shook my head. “Regardless of what I may or may not feel for her, I am her boss, Jake. Any relationship between us that’s not of a professional nature would require a much more delicate approach than a simple offer to have a drink or to go to bed together.”
He sighed. “Fair enough. I heard you’re taking her to the party, though.”
“Sure. I invited her. She put in a lot of work this week and it only seemed right that she should get to witness people enjoying the fruits of her labor.”
“ I put a lot of work in this week,” he retorted. “I don’t recall getting an invitation.”
“Would you like to come?” I asked. “You can bring Melinda, of course. Give her an excuse to get dressed up. She would probably get along well with Tallulah.”
“It’s so sweet that you want my girlfriend to meet your future girlfriend, but we’ve already got plans. Next time?”
“Sure.” Part of me was relieved that my friend couldn’t make it. It would’ve been fun to have him there, but this way, it would just be Tallulah and me… and all my neighbors.
Jake leaned forward, fixing me with an amused look. “You’re really not going to admit that there’s something going on between you guys?”
I shook my head. “Gentlemen don’t kiss and tell.”
His eyes widened. “You’ve kissed her?”
“If I have, I’m not telling,” I said firmly. “Look, I’ll admit that the truck means a lot to me, but so does the safety of my people. You know that. By the very nature of her job, Tallulah will often be out late and I wasn’t comfortable with her waiting around in the dark for a ride. If she could even get one that would take her all the way out to the plantation every time.”
The way his chin lowered told me he wasn’t buying what I was selling. “You have other cars you could’ve loaned her. Why give her the only one that means something to you?”
“It was the first set of keys I picked up,” I said, which was true, but if it had been anyone else, I wouldn’t have surrendered said keys. I would have dropped them back in the bowl and looked around for another. “Don’t make this into more than it needs to be, Jake.”
“I’m not. I’m just saying that I think you have feelings for her and I’m pretty sure she returns those feelings.”
My heart twitched. “What? Why?”
He scoffed down a laugh. “See, you wouldn’t have cared if you didn’t have feelings for her, but fine. I’ll tell you. Every time I’ve seen her this week, which was a lot, she mentioned you. Like, not the way that people just happen to mention the boss. It was Niall this and Niall that. She talks about you, even when she doesn’t have to.”
I sighed. “You think that means something?”
“I know it does.” He propped his elbows on his knees and leaned forward, eyes locked on mine. “All I’m saying is that if you have developed a little thing for her and she returns it, there’s nothing to be ashamed about.”
“Why would I be ashamed?”
He shrugged. “Fuck knows, but the fact that you don’t want to talk about it makes me think you are.”
“I don’t want to talk about it because whatever is going on between her and me is between her and me. I’ve never talked much to you about women before, and you never thought I had feelings for any of them.”
“It’s hardly the same situation,” he pointed out. “I’ve walked into your house the morning after when your hookups are still leaving and you’d already forgotten their names. It’s different with her.”
“Well, she does work for me. I have to know her name.”
He let out an exasperated huff of air. “Okay, have it your way. Just know that I’m onto you, and that I’m on Team Talliall.”
“That’s a terrible couple’s name.”
“Nah, I like it.” Jake chuckled and stood up, that knowing gleam still in his eyes as he smirked again. “Have fun tonight, boss man. I hope you’ve been practicing that delicate approach of yours.”
He winked and strode to my door, slamming it behind him before I could protest. Alone now that he was gone, however, I finally gave some consideration to what he’d said.
While my situation with her didn’t allow me to simply ask her out, especially not after the way she’d run out of my house when we’d kissed, that didn’t mean I couldn’t go after her at all.
Things were different with her. I was different with her.
The fact was that I wanted Tallulah. I couldn’t stop thinking about her, and despite how our evening had ended last weekend, I’d seen the way she’d looked at me this week. She’d wanted me to kiss her again, and I’d wanted to do it. I just knew I didn’t want it to end the way it had before.
At least her spark was back. So that was something, and it was huge. Almost giving me a heart attack had been good for her, and frankly, I’d enjoyed the burst of adrenaline.
Deciding to see how the night went and to play it by ear, I finished my work and finally left my office, arriving home with just enough time to get ready. The vendors Tallulah had arranged were crawling around every inch of the place, frantically trying to finish setting up for the party they’d had so very little time to prepare for.
I grabbed the arm of the first guy that hustled past me, a clipboard in his hand and sweat pouring down his face. “Excuse me, I’m Niall Morrison. This is my house. Have you seen my events manager, Tallulah Pruette?”
The guy blinked at me a few times, then finally seemed to snap out of his frenzied rush enough to respond to my question. “Tallulah. Right. Of course. No, she left about ten minutes ago. I walked her out to her Uber myself. She said she had to go get dressed so she could get back here on time. We’ve got this handled, though. She left us with very detailed instructions.”
“I’m sure,” I said, releasing him. “Thank you, and thank you for all your hard work here today. We’ll see to it that you’re properly compensated.”
“Just a positive review online would be great, sir,” he said. “Tallulah has already seen to payment of our invoice.”
“Of course.” I nodded and thanked him again. Then I took off, my mind torn between admiring the creepy, Gothic palace she’d turned my house into and wondering why she was still Ubering when I’d let her have the truck.
Eventually, there was just too much going on in the house for me to keep wondering about the transportation issue. In just a couple days, she’d transformed the space completely, and right now, if I hadn’t known that someone— I —lived here, I would’ve thought that it was exclusively an events venue.
The company that did the themed bars had set up along one wall of the main hall, and their equipment fit so well that it looked like it belonged there. Meanwhile, the caterers were busy putting final touches on the cocktail tables and the decorating team was placing a few more curated items in spots marked with brightly colored post-its.
When I’d left here this morning, the place sure hadn’t looked like this and I could hardly believe what she’d managed to pull off today. Honestly, I was impressed. More than impressed actually.
Making my way upstairs, I suddenly couldn’t wait to see her. I raced through a shower, tucking a towel around my hips when I got out and striding directly to my dressing room. A walk-in closet in my bedroom, it had been renovated and expanded by my interior designers to become a cavernous his-and-hers dressing area.
At the time, I’d thought it was a waste of space making it so big, but when I walked in now, I could almost see Tallulah’s things filling all the empty rails and shelves. Immediately when I realized what I was thinking, I shut it down.
Kissing her was a far cry from having her move in with me. Shaking my head, I picked out a suit for the evening and quickly put it on, wanting to be ready and downstairs when she arrived.
When I got back down there, the party had begun on the street but there was still no sign of her. I left the house, moving into the cool night air and joining my neighbors on the street for the fair, but I kept an eye out for Tallulah, not wanting to miss her when she arrived.
Miss Jenny sidled up to me as I got a drink from one of the stands. “How about it, child? Did you a bring a date tonight, or are we setting you up?”
I chuckled, setting my drink down to take her hands and then moving back a little bit so I could look her over. In a spectacular purple creation complete with peacock features and large golden jewelry, she was a vision to behold.
I smiled. “You look stunning as always, Miss Jenny. How do you do it?”
“Do what?” she asked.
“How do you strike awe into our hearts and minds with every last one of these events? Seriously, how many outfits like this do you have?”
She laughed, squeezing my hands before she released them. “The benefit of growing old is that you’ve had many years to accumulate your treasures, my boy. I know what you’re trying to do though and you’re not going to distract me. Did you bring a date or not?”
I looked around again, seeing the street fair in full swing with people milling all around, but Tallulah still wasn’t here. “I didn’t bring one, but I do have someone joining me a little bit later. Perhaps that was the mistake. I should’ve brought her.”
“A woman likes to be collected from her home by her beau, Niall. Remember that for next time, and do introduce me to your friend when she arrives.”
If she arrives , I suddenly thought, wondering if maybe she was waiting somewhere to scare me again. As the night started to drag and there was still no sign of her, however, I couldn’t help but wonder if she’d changed her mind about coming after all.
I desperately didn’t want to doubt her, but I realized it was probably time to resign myself to going stag tonight. No matter how excited I might’ve been to spend an entire evening with a woman for a change.