Chapter 18
Chapter 18
The evening of Nick’s No More Bad Dates vetting arrives, and I’m surprisingly nervous. Not because I don’t think he’ll pass, of course. We’ve spent a lot of time together talking and sharing our lives, so I feel like I’ve already begun to get to know him. It’s not that. It’s just, well, each of the guys who have been through the No More Bad Dates Pact Vetting Process has either failed spectacularly with us uncovering some deeply off-putting aspect of them or passed and then fell spectacularly at the first hurdle. Really, our track record for the pact is far from stellar.
I’m confident Nick will be the one who bucks the trend.
Still, here we are, the three of us sitting at our usual table at Cozy Cottage Café’s Friday Night Jam. Tonight is Open Mic Night, which means anyone can get up on the tiny stage and perform a song. Darcy and I have dazzled the crowd with our ABBA tributes before, and it’s been so much fun. Not tonight. Tonight is all about Nick. No distractions.
I glance at my watch for about the gazillionth time already. It’s still a full ten minutes before Nick’s due to arrive. Actually, now it’s nine minutes and fifty-three seconds, fifty-two, fifty-one… Yup, I need to find something else to focus on here.
“I’ve got three glasses of the café’s finest champagne, girls,” Sophie announces as she places some full champagne flutes on the table.
Darcy cocks an eyebrow. “Champagne? Really? Did you win the lottery or something, Soph?”
Sophie grins at us as she takes her seat. “It’s probably more like cheap white wine someone blew bubbles in behind the counter, but we can pretend, right?”
“Thanks, Sophe. I’m sure it’ll do the trick.” I lift the glass to my lips and take a sip and then another, hoping the bubbles will go at least some way to quell my vetting anxiety.
“Don’t be nervous, babe. You know him a whole lot better than other guys we’ve vetted for each other. It’ll be fine,” Darcy says.
“I know. He’s in the public eye, so he’s not likely to have a weird pastime no one knows about,” I reply.
“Like stealing women’s shoes,” Darcy says, her eyes dancing.
“OMG, I forgot about that guy,” Sophie says with a giggle.
I throw my eyes skyward. “That was ages ago!”
“Hey, at least he didn’t take you to his girlfriend’s funeral,” Darcy says.
“At which you played a song about someone calling from the other side,” Sophie adds.
Oh, they are so enjoying this.
Before long, both my friends are snorting with laughter at my terrible dating record. And really, I cannot blame them. A guy who took me to his girlfriend’s wake and Ivan, whose past times included competitive mooing, herding ducks, and dating his cousin. And lest I forget the guy who stole my shoes to do who knows what with last year.
It’s not exactly a list to go bragging about on Instagram, is it?
“Thank you so much, ladies,” I say with more than a note of sarcasm in my voice.
“We’re sorry.” Darcy wipes tears from her cheeks. “You’ve got to admit though, you sure can pick ’em.”
“Do I need to remind you about your dating disasters before you got together with your boyfriends?” I say to them.
Darcy shakes her head. “No way.”
“ Please don’t go there,” Sophie implores.
“Let me see,” I begin, counting off my friends horrible dates on my fingers, “there was the guy who dumped you during Bailey’s wedding, Sophie, and there was the guy who thought it was okay to play with stuffed toys for you, Darcy, and then there was—”
Darcy throws her hands in the air. “Okay! We’ve got it. Between the three of us, we’ve made some extremely poor dating choices.”
“And strangely, a lot of them have had super weird past times,” Sophie adds.
“Thank you,” I sniff, only half meaning it. We’ve all had to kiss some pretty horrible frogs to find our princes—and I only hope Nick is truly mine. My prince, that is, not another horrible frog. I’ve had enough of the frogs.
Bailey arrives at our table. She’s got a clipboard in her hands, her habitual beautiful smile on her face. “Hey there, girls. Are you singing in the Open Mic Night tonight? I don’t have any of you on the list, and that’s not like you.”
“Oh, we’re not here to sing,” Sophie says with a shake of her head. “We’re here to vet Erin’s date.”
Bailey’s face lights up. “Oooh, that’s exciting, Erin! But aren’t you already dating Nick Zachary?”
“Oh, she is, but we haven’t had the chance to get to know him yet. That’s all,” Sophie replies hurriedly, and I shoot her a grateful smile. The world thinks we’ve been together for some time now, after all.
“Okay, it makes sense now,” Bailey replies.
“What does?” I ask.
“Your boyfriends are lurking around over there, trying not to be noticed,” Bailey says with a head bob toward the back of the café. “They asked me to put them at the most dimly lit table in the coffee house, which I thought was weird at the time. It makes perfect sense now.”
“They’re here?” Darcy asks in surprise.
My eyebrows ping up as I gawk at my friends. “You told them?”
We all turn and spot Jason and Alex trying desperately to merge into the background and not look like they shouldn’t be here. They’re not doing a convincing job of it, either.
“I told Jason, but he promised not to come. I’m going to have a word with them.” Her face like thunder, Sophie waves them over.
“Well, I’ll leave you to it,” Bailey says, bowing out before the scolding. “Let me know if you change your mind on singing. We’re a little light on performers tonight.”
As Bailey leaves, the guys arrive, their metaphorical tails well and truly stuck between their legs.
Sophie glares at them, her arms crossed. “Explain yourselves, please.”
“Oh, we were in the neighborhood, that’s all,” Alex replies. “Weren’t we, Jas?”
“Yeah, that’s right. We were passing by and thought, hey, it’s Open Mic Night at Cozy Cottage . We like Open Mic Night, so we thought we’d drop in for a beer.”
“A likely story,” Darcy says as she crosses her arms.
“Hey! It’s totally plausible,” Jason protests.
“And there are no other places that serve beer on a Friday night in the city, right?” Darcy asks.
“Would you believe we came here to sing?” Alex says hopefully.
“Honey, did you forget that you hate to sing and you’re terrible at it?” Darcy replies.
“Oh, yeah. There is that ,” he says with a grin aimed to melt his girlfriend’s heart, and it does just that.
“You’re impossible.” Darcy gazes lovingly up at him.
“That is my goal. It’s all part of my allure.” Alex leans down to plant a kiss on her lips. “Jas really wanted to see Nick again, and he promised we could go shoot some pool after. It’s good to see you.”
“You, too,” Darcy coos.
I raise my palms into the stop sign. “Okay, enough of this lovey-dovey stuff. We’ve got a job to do, and you guys are not invited.”
“Why not?” Jason protests. “We can offer a guy’s perspective, remember?”
“Jason, all you’ll offer is staring at one of your rugby idols with your mouth dropped open,” I quip. “And don’t pretend that’s not true.”
“She’s got a point, babe,” Sophie says to him.
“So, off you go, men. Shoo,” I say with a flick of my hand.
“Can we come over to say hi to him once you’re done?” Jason asks as Alex gets the message and turns to leave.
“We’ll let you know, honey,” Sophie says and reaches up to give him a quick kiss.
With the guys skulking back to their corner, I glance at my watch. Nick is due to arrive anytime now. I sweep my eyes around the room. When I spot him standing in the doorway, searching the crowd for me, my belly does a flip.
“He’s here,” I say breathlessly to my friends. I catch his attention with a wave and note with satisfaction the way his face creases up into a smile when his eyes land on me.
A few short strides of those long, athletic legs of his, and he’s at our table. “Hey,” he says, a soft smile on his lips, his brown eyes warm as his gaze locks onto mine.
My heart gives a little squeeze. “Hey, yourself,” I reply, a wobble in my voice giving away my nerves. I push myself out of my chair to greet him with a quick hug. As I pull away from him, I can feel my friends’ eyes on us, and I’m suddenly self-conscious. I drop my hands to my sides and say, “Do you, ah, want to sit down?”
He turns to my friends and greets them.
They smile and say hello, and I can tell they’re both a little star struck by the rugby royalty who just arrived at our table.
“I’ll go get a Coke first,” he replies. “Do you want anything?”
“No alcohol, Nick?” Sophie enquires, and I shoot her a look.
“Can’t. I’m training,” he replies with an easy smile. “So, you’re all good?”
We tell him we’ve already got our drinks, and he makes his way to the counter.
“See? He’s a changed man,” I say once he’s out of earshot.
“No more drinking, no more partying, no more girls?” Sophie asks pointedly.
“Nope. Just me.” A few moments later with Coke in hand, Nick arrives back at the table.
Once we’re all settled, Sophie says, “Thanks for meeting with us, Nick. We know this might seem weird, but as Erin has explained to you, we’ve all agreed to vet one another’s dates.”
“No problem.” He takes a sip of his Coke. “How does this thing work? Should I just come out with it and tell you that I’m crazy about Erin so you can give me your blessing?”
I beam at him while trying to look cool and relaxed, like this isn’t the big deal it could very well be.
“Oh, we have questions,” Darcy says as she flips open her notebook with the Labrador puppy on the cover. “Lots of questions.”
“Oh,” he says, his brows raised as he looks at the handwritten list. “This is serious.”
“Oh, yeah. Be afraid, Nick. Be very afraid,” Darcy teases.
I give him a rub on his arm. “She’s only messing with you.”
“Good, because this is beginning to feel like a scene from that movie Meet the Parents .”
“Oh, the scene with Robert de Niro and the ancient polygraph machine?” Darcy says.
“Great idea,” Sophie says.
Darcy’s face lights up. “I know! Why hadn’t we thought about it before?”
“Because we’re not ex-CIA and don’t have access to polygraph machines?” I reply. I take in the look on Nick’s face. “Don’t worry. There’s no polygraph machine.”
I shoot my friends a look that says don’t spook the horses , or more specifically don’t freak Nick out so he runs away screaming, thank you very much .
“Shall I kick things off?” Sophie asks, her phone in her hand.
Nick eyes her phone and raises his eyebrows at me. “Sure.”
“Okay. Our first question is this: how do you show a girl you’re dating that she’s special to you?” Sophie asks.
“Oh, that’s easy. I send her flowers, heart-shaped chocolates, and dress up as a pink gorilla and embarrass her at her office.”
“All of which you’ve already done, right?” Sophie says with a smile.
“I think the gorilla was my favorite. I mean, who can resist a dancing pink primate? I knew I’d make her fall for me the moment I began to bust out my ape moves.” His eyes light on mine, and I smile at him. “There’s more in my arsenal of tricks, though.”
“More than a gorilla suit in the office?” I ask with a joyful giggle.
He nods. “Oh, yeah. I’m big on the wooing . That’s something you should know about me from the get-go.”
“I’ll look forward to more wooing then.”
We share a smile, and my nerves morph into happy, dancing miniature gorillas in my tummy.
“What else do you do to show the girl you’re dating she’s special?” Sophie asks.
“Well, I could tell you that, but then none of it would be a surprise for Ernie, would it?”
Sophie’s eyebrows ping up to her hairline at the mention of my family-only nickname. “You call her Ernie?”
“Only because she hates it,” he replies with a little smile in my direction.
“Good to know,” Sophie replies. “I guess we don’t want to ruin any future surprises for Ernie here, so let’s move on to the next question.”
“I’m up next.” Darcy runs her finger down her list until she finds what she’s looking for. “Tell us about trust.”
“Well, it’s when someone tells you something and you believe it,” Nick says, a mischievous twinkle in his eye.
“Ha ha, very funny,” Darcy replies with an attempt at a formal tone, but I know she thinks his response is as cute as all heck. Just like I do. “Seriously, Nick. Trusting guys is tough when there are so many jerks out there.”
“I guess you’re asking me if I’m trustworthy. My answer is that that yes, I will do anything for the people that matter to me, and they can put their trust in me one hundred percent. But of course I’m going to say that, right? What kind of idiot would sit here with a girl’s friends and tell them he can’t be trusted?”
“A big one,” Darcy replies.
“I will admit to being a bit of jerk a while back, though, and I probably wasn’t the world’s most trustworthy guy. But all of that has changed now.” He flicks his eyes to mine, and my heart gives another squeeze.
“About that,” Sophie leads, and I sit more upright in my chair, wondering what’s to come. “Why were you partying so hard?”
He lifts a shoulder nonchalantly, as though it’s really no big deal at all. “It was a phase. A dumb phase, nothing more. I got in with a partying crowd and got myself into trouble. I paid the price with the media.”
“No particular reason for it?” Sophie asks.
He gives a slow shake of his head. “Nope. Just me being a dumb guy. I guess you all know about that, right? Guys being dumb?”
“We sure do,” I reply. “Avoiding dumb guys is one of the reasons we set up the dating pact in the first place.” I chew on my lip and ask, “But you’re definitely over that now, aren’t you?”
His own lips lift into a smile. “Totally over it.”
“Maybe you just needed the love of a good woman?” Darcy teases, and I know she means it.
His eyes are still on mine when he replies, “I guess you could say I’ve got a thing for puppets.”
“For puppets?” Darcy questions.
“Because my family calls me Ernie,” I explain.
“Right. I was beginning to wonder whether we had another weird pastime on our hands,” Darcy says.
“Any other questions, or do I have your permission to take the girl I’m dating out now?”
I look from Darcy to Sophie. “I’m happy if you’re happy.”
They confer quietly between themselves, and Nick leans closer to me. “Do you think I passed?”
I catch a hint of his intoxicating scent as I reply, “Oh, I’m not sure. It looks like they’re really nutting this one out. I bet they’ve got some serious Sesame Street -related concerns.”
He glances at my friends and then back at me. “Well, I say we pack up your rubber duckie and make a run for it. You and me, off into the sunset.”
I giggle. “On a horse?”
“What else?” His eyes grow darker as he takes my hand in his. “There’s one thing I didn’t tell them.”
“What’s that?”
“That I think I’ve fallen for their totally hot, non-tall friend.”
My heart thuds hard against my ribs. “You do?” I ask, my voice breathless.
“As long as you think that’s okay under the stringent rules of Project Weka.”
I grin at him. “I’m not sure Miranda will approve.”
“I don’t really care about what Miranda approves of. I care about you.”
I feel heat bloom in my cheeks as my heart does double time. “I care about you, too.”
“So, we’re doing this thing? No more faking it, no more posing for photographs and getting talked about? Just you and me, no one else?”
“You and me, no one else,” I echo. I feel as though I’m soaring through the sky. I’m so full of lightness and joy. This is really happening!
Nick finds my hand and his features grow serious. “I want you to know you can trust me.”
“I do.”
“Good, because what I feel for you is real, no matter what crap they write about me.”
This again? “I know that.”
Sophie’s voice pulls me reluctantly back to the room. “We’ve made a decision, you two, when you stop gazing into one another’s eyes like freaking Romeo and Juliet.”
“There won’t be any double suicides here,” I reply with a grin.
“Nick Zachary, you have passed the No More Bad Dates vetting process,” Darcy announces, and I half expect to hear trumpets blaring in the background to herald this momentous occasion.
I mouth thank you to my friends before I turn back to Nick. “You passed. Go figure.”
“I knew I would.”
“Don’t you go becoming an arrogant sports pro on me now,” I warn.
“Why? Whatcha gonna do about it?”
I look up to see Sophie’s hand in the air, waving Jason and Alex over. “You’re about to be inundated,” I say to him.
He furrows his brow. “By what?”
“Your biggest fan.”
“Hey, Nick,” Jason says with his hand outstretched, right on cue.
I look up to see not only Jason, but a bunch of other people at our table all focused on Nick. I recognize them all as café regulars.
Nick stands up. “Jason. Good to see you again.”
“It’s good to see you again, too,” Jason says enthusiastically. “You remember Alex, of course,” he says and continues to introduce Nick to every person in the group.
I sit back and watch as Nick shakes hands and says hello to everyone with charm and ease. He answers their questions about the Hawks, about his chances of getting back into the All Blacks, all with a smile on his handsome face.
I grin as I watch him, joy enveloping me. Nick Zachary: the guy I’m now officially dating, the guy who passed the No More Bad Dates vetting process. The guy who’s told me he’s falling for me.
The guy I know beyond a whisper of a doubt I’ve fallen for, too.