Chapter Twenty-Three Lily
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
Lily
I ’ve given my sister plenty of time to stew in her emotions before I decide to approach her and get this awkward conversation out of the way.
Giving her space was a given since she spent most of our time apart out of town for a few work projects and filming some content for her show, but I’ve had enough.
I miss Dahlia, and I don’t want a guy to get between us ever again.
So today, during my lunch break, I seek her out at the office she shares with Julian.
Compared to the rest of the modern office, my sister’s private one fits her personality to a T, with warm wood tones, bookshelves full of design samples, and a trendy wallpaper that adds a touch of personality to the space.
Dahlia looks up from her tablet when I knock on the door.
“Hey. Isn’t this a surprise.”
“Brought you some lunch.” I hold up a paper bag from her favorite sushi place in town. It’s nothing fancy like Julian’s imported rolls from Aomi, but Dahlia will never turn down a food-related peace offering.
She waves at the chair across from her desk. “To what do I owe this visit?”
I pull out one container and pass it to her. “I miss my sister.”
“We live together, dork.”
“Yeah, well, if it weren’t for the lack of hot water at night, I would’ve forgotten you moved back in.”
She snorts as she pops the lid off, and I grab my box and place it on top of her desk.
“Tell me how to fix this,” I say before stuffing a roll into my mouth.
“For a while there, I was mad at you.” She snaps her chopsticks at me.
“I could tell.”
She drops her gaze. “But eventually I turned that anger inward.”
“Why?”
“Because how could I not notice that my sister was in love? How could I be so focused on myself and my own love life that I didn’t think to ask more questions about yours?”
Guilt hits me harder than ever before because I hate that Dahlia is taking this out on herself.
“Dahlia…” I try to work up the courage to tell her the truth, but what she says next makes me pause.
“I’m the one who’s sorry, Lily.” She glances up at me with a trembling bottom lip. “I’m sorry for not being a good sister.”
“Who needs a good one when you’re the best one?”
She laughs to herself. “I don’t feel like that lately.”
Neither do I.
I decide to put the past behind us and hope she wants to do the same. “Can we stop avoiding each other now?”
She nods.
“Great, because I was wondering if you wanted to go shopping this weekend for the fundraiser gala?”
Her eyes light up. “It’s been so long since we’ve gone shopping together.”
“Yeah. I’m thinking we could make a day out of it.”
Her gaze dips to my clothes—a simple black cotton dress and a jean jacket—before her entire face lights up. “You know what? I love that idea.”
A shopping trip might not cure my guilty conscience, but some retail therapy always does wonders for the soul, and mine is in desperate need of a little pick-me-up.
The next morning, I pause working on a floral wreath for a funeral to answer an incoming call from my sister.
“Hey. What’s up?” I ask.
“So…I have some bad news. It turns out Julian and I have an issue with our Chicago project that we need to address this weekend.”
“Oh.”
“I know.” She groans. “We’ll need to stop by the house sometime on Saturday, so I was thinking, what if we went on a weekend trip to the city instead? We’d have way more options than Grand Rapids too.”
I scrunch my nose. Usually I don’t mind hanging out with Julian and Dahlia, but I was looking forward to spending some time with my sister one-on-one.
We might not be twins, but she can sure read my mind like one. “I want us to have time alone together though, so I was thinking Julian and Lorenzo could hang out while we go shopping and have a girls’ day.”
I end up coughing from how sharp of a breath I take. “Lorenzo?”
“Yeah? Do you not want him to come?”
“No. I’m…surprised.”
She chuckles under her breath. “I think it would be good for them to bond. Or, at the very least, grab a drink at a bar and glare at each other in silence.”
The visual makes me laugh before I sober up. “I don’t know… Is that a good idea?”
“Lily, you’ve avoided bringing Lorenzo to Sunday lunch for an entire month. Eventually you’ll have to let Julian and Lorenzo be in the same room together, especially if it’s serious.”
Ugh. I hate that she has a point. “I guess.”
“It’ll be fun!”
Will it? Because the idea of going on a couples trip with my sister sounds like the final boss level of fake dating.
She expects you to be excited about this, not hesitant.
With a shaky breath, I say, “I’ll have to ask Lorenzo—”
“He’s totally going to say yes.”
“How do you know?”
“Because why wouldn’t he want to spend a whole weekend with you without Mom’s rule about no sleepovers?”
Shit. That’s totally something I’d look forward to if this was a real relationship because my mom is strict with boys. I’m talking no moving in before marriage strict—and definitely no sleepovers because apparently Dahlia and I are still virgins in my mom’s mind.
My sister continues, “So, I’ll have Julian book us two rooms. If Mom asks—which you know she will—tell her we’re sharing one while the boys take the other.”
Oh no.
No. No. No .
It hits me that I’ll have to share a bed with Lorenzo because it will look too weird to ask my sister for a room with two queens.
Well, you did want him to admit that he wants you.
Perfect. This is fate smiling down on me. Really. I couldn’t have planned this any better myself.
Then why are you so nervous about sharing a room?
Dahlia, completely unaware of my struggle, promises to send me the hotel info before she hangs up. I decide to get my call with Lorenzo over with so that way I can concentrate on the rest of my work.
“Are you okay?” Lorenzo asks first thing.
“Hi. Yes, I’m fine. Why wouldn’t I be?”
“Just checking.”
My heart, which was already beating faster after the conversation with my sister, picks up speed. “About that… I’m sorry to bother you in the middle of the workday—”
Rustling on his end of the line makes my phone’s speaker crackle. “No worries. Give me a second.”
I hear him excuse himself from whomever he was talking to before I interrupted him.
“I can call back later if you’re busy.”
“It’s fine.” A door shuts in the background. “What’s up?”
“So…I planned a shopping trip with my sister this weekend.”
“And?”
“ And it turned into a lot more than I originally bargained for.”
“Lily, as cute as your conversational cliffhangers are, I’m in the middle of a meeting.”
I stop listening once he drops the word cute . I mean, who could pay attention after something like that—
“So if you don’t mind getting to the point…” His sentence hangs there.
“Right!” I’m in such a race to get the words out, I don’t process my thoughts before saying them.
“Uh, basically she wants us to join her and Julian on a couples trip to Chicago this weekend, and you and I will have to share a room—and a bed since I can’t ask her for two queens without it looking weird—and she also wants you and Julian to hang out together while we go shopping, so I hope you don’t mind. ”
It’s so quiet, I have to check to make sure he didn’t hang up.
“Are you still there?” I ask.
“Appears so.”
“It’ll be fun!” I repeat Dahlia’s words.
“Should we review the meaning of the word?”
I laugh him off. “Maybe fun was a bit of a stretch, but it won’t be the worst weekend ever.”
“With Julian attending, I can guarantee it.”
“Who knows? By the end of it, you two could become the best of friends.”
“In that case, I’ll start making our matching friendship bracelets.”
With a laugh, I hang up the phone, and the smile on my face remains, along with a hint of nerves about spending an entire weekend with Lorenzo, showing him exactly what he’s missing out on by denying himself what he clearly wants.
Me .