Chapter 7 #2
No one else was out on the street in the mid-afternoon. It was quiet. She was just being paranoid.
Trying to shake off that feeling, she headed down the street. With the afternoon free, she decided to stop by Jenna’s shop. She’d moved to town the same time as Tiana, for wildly different reasons, but they both opened businesses, so they had that in common.
Jenna’s ex-husband, Asher Ford, was the first to relocate with their teen daughter, Blake, who was going through some behavioral issues at the time.
The plan had been for Blake to spend the summer with her dad and then return to the East Coast where Jenna lived with her then husband.
That relationship crumbled when Jenna discovered an affair between her husband and her best friend.
With nothing tying her down, and Blake thriving in California, Jenna relocated.
Tiana was grateful she had. Hope Falls was a welcoming community, but it was nice to have a fellow newcomer by her side.
The bell chimed as Tiana pushed the door to The Beauty Spot open. Her plan had been to hang out until Jenna had a free moment, but it seemed she wouldn’t have to wait for that time. Her friend was sweeping up around her station, and the rest of the shop was surprisingly empty.
“Hey Chickadee! Did we have an appointment I didn’t write down?” Jenna’s brow wrinkled.
“No, this is an impromptu drop by.”
“Oh, good! I love a gossip sesh.” She rubbed her hands together conspiratorially.
“Who said anything about gossip?” Tiana countered.
“Your ex and his entire family are in town with a sexy redhead, if you stopped by for Bible study, I’m going to be deeply disappointed,” Jenna stated matter-of-factly.
It didn’t surprise Tiana at all that word had spread to Jenna that Brock and his family were in town and that he was there with another woman. This was Hope Falls.
“Okay, maybe a little gossip.”
“Yes!” Jenna rushed past her. Flipped the sign to closed, locked the door, and opened the mini fridge behind the front counter. “I have a quinoa bowl and spinach and hummus wrap, Blake is on a serious health kick.”
“I’m okay, but thanks.”
“Green tea?” She held up a Snapple.
“Sure, thanks.”
Jenna selected the wrap and her own Snapple, and the two women settled in the employee area in the back of the salon.
“Okay, let’s hear it.”
“Yesterday at the wedding, I got a text from my mother-in-law, ex mother-in-law, saying that they were staying at Mountain Ridge and would be in town until after the New Year, would love to see me, and were looking forward to taking my classes.” She took a breath.
“Then I got a text from Jess, a girlfriend of one of Brock’s teammates, of a photo Brock had posted of himself and a woman I didn’t recognize.
I was at the wedding when I got the texts, it was right after AJ proposed to Poppy. ”
“Was it so sweet? I’m so bummed I missed it.”
Jenna had done Mrs. Costas’ makeup for the wedding, but she’d had another wedding look she was booked to do in the afternoon, so she wasn’t able to stay for the nuptials.
“I missed it, actually. I was in the tent. But Sue Ann said there were some videos, so I’m sure we’ll be able to see it.” Tiana took a breath. “Anyway, when the text came through, AJ recognized the woman, it’s Niko’s ex, Gianna.”
“Whoa, that’s a crazy coincidence!”
“No, I don’t think it is. Just like Brock showing up to Hope Falls isn’t.
Niko and Brock had this competitive thing all through college.
Even though they didn’t play the same sport.
From what I’ve heard, it was more on Brock’s side than Niko’s.
Brock wanted to be the big man on campus, and it pissed him off that Niko was. ”
Jenna’s face scrunched as she took a bite of her wrap and chewed. “Yeah, but that was college, he’s in his thirties.”
“You don’t know Brock. He never lets anything go. Honestly, I think he’s with Gianna to mess with Niko. Just like I know he’s in Hope Falls to mess with me. He has no other reason to be here. He’d never even heard of Hope Falls until he met me.”
“So what is his plan? Is he just going to hang around town and do nothing for five weeks?”
“I don’t know. I don’t know what his plan is.”
“What are you going to do?”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, you can’t just wait around for him to start fucking with you.”
Tiana bit the inside of her mouth. That had basically been Niko’s sentiment.
“What?” Jenna questioned. “There’s something you’re not telling me.”
“Niko stopped by after my final class today.”
Jenna wagged her brows. “Ohhhh.”
“No. It’s not…” Tiana shook her head. She could feel her cheeks heating up, which she knew gave away just how attracted she was to the man.
“He came in when Valerie and Helen were trying to set me up with their nephew. He didn’t know what they were doing, he just asked if he could borrow me because he’d spoken to his publicist and had some information he needed to pass on to me.
They jumped to conclusions and thought he and I were dating.
I tried to correct them, he played into it.
When they left, he suggested…” She took another breath.
“He suggested you two pretend that you are a couple while your exes are in town,” Jenna relayed as if it was a totally sane solution to a ridiculous situation.
“Yes, how did you know?”
“Because it’s perfect! She clapped her hands together. “Absolutely perfect!”
“No. It’s not. Who would believe that?”
“Who would believe that two ridiculously hot, successful, kind, funny people would be into each other…hmmmm, I don’t know…maybe everyone.”
“I’m not—”
“You are ridiculously hot, so help me if you are one of those women who look like you do and then sit there and argue about how insanely attractive you aren’t—you and I will have serious issues.
Tiana wasn’t going to say that. She was going to say, successful. Hot was objective.
“It’s lying,” she pointed out.
“Okay, first of all, who is it lying to? If you guys are hanging out, which you will be, then who is it lying to? And you are constantly being set up, so that would give you a slight reprieve.”
“That’s what Niko said.”
“And Niko could probably use a break from women throwing themselves at him.”
Tiana rolled her eyes as she smiled.
“I’m not kidding, you should know that better than most. I’m sure he’s had women sneak into his rooms and hide in the back of his cars when he hired car services.
Did you watch that documentary that showed professional athletes are basically objectified for their paychecks and fame the way women are for their appearance and sexuality?
And the better looking and more high profile your position and team are, the worse it is.
Niko is ridiculously sexy, tall, and actually has a personality, he’s the pitcher, and he’s led his team to the World Series and won. ”
Tiana hadn’t watched the doc, but that was mainly because after divorcing Brock, she hadn’t wanted anything to do with athletes.
Her phone buzzed, and she glanced down to see a number she didn’t recognize.
When she opened up the text, it didn’t take long to realize who it was from.
It was a GIF of Niko’s face superimposed onto Julia Robert’s body from Notting Hill in the scene where she’s in the bookstore with Hugh Grant wearing a light blue V-neck sweater and cardigan, a black skirt, and black sandals with the words underneath saying, “I’m also just a boy, standing in front of a girl, asking her to be his fake girlfriend. ”
Tiana couldn’t help but smile. In fact, she couldn’t help but laugh. He’d done a really good job with the Photoshop.
“What?” Jenna demanded. “What is it? I haven’t seen you smile like that in…a while. Probably not since our Girl’s Night, and you were drinking, so that doesn’t count. Alcohol smiles don’t count the same as sober smiles.”
It was true. With Pops’ health and the financial strain she’d been under, there hadn’t been a lot of smiling and laughing.
Tiana turned the phone around to show Jenna, whose face immediately split into a wide grin. “If you don’t say yes, I don’t think I can be your friend anymore.”
“Jenna.” Tiana rolled her eyes.
“I’m serious,” Jenna maintained. “If you can turn that man down, I don’t think we have anything in common, and I have to seriously question your sanity.”
Tiana knew it was an empty threat. She also knew that there was no way she could actually turn Niko down, not that it was a real proposal of a relationship. It was fake. There were no stakes. So why did she have butterflies? And why was her hand shaking when she typed back, okay.
Niko wondered if he’d gone too far. He was good at reading people and knew that Tiana was someone who would overthink something to death. She would talk herself out of a good thing, which is what he was afraid she was going to do.
As he sat staring at his phone, he wondered what the feeling he had in his stomach was.
Then he realized he’d never been rejected before, that wasn’t something he was bragging about, it was just a fact.
So he really hoped that his first rejection didn’t happen when he asked someone to be his fake girlfriend.
He hoped if he caught her off guard and made her laugh, maybe, just maybe, he’d get her to agree to his—unfortunately for him—totally platonic, completely decent proposal.
Or, the other way this could go was that she could feel like he was trying to pressure her and it was creepy.
He’d gotten her phone number from his sister, which she may not appreciate.
It was so difficult to tell with Tiana. Most women threw themselves at him.
So to have someone who wouldn’t even commit to pretending to like him was putting him in very unfamiliar waters, ones he couldn’t quite navigate.
His phone dinged less than a minute after he sent the message. When he looked down, he wasn’t sure what he expected to see, but what he saw surprised him. One single word.
Tiana: Okay