Her Midsummer Billionaire (Tycoons of Pleasure Valley #6)

1. Eloise

ELOISE

The best man was late.

I checked my binder again. Hadley’s handwriting, neat and sure at the top of the groomsmen page.

Tristan Titus. Best man. Will be late…don’t worry!

She’d drawn a smiley face next to it. I’d drawn a question mark next to her smiley face three hours ago and had been staring at it ever since.

The rehearsal dinner was in forty minutes.

The rooftop was almost ready. Chairs aligned, linens pressed, place cards centered, the caterer set up along the east wall with silver chafing dishes that caught the late afternoon sun.

I’d been up here since noon, and everything was exactly where it was supposed to be.

Except the best man.

I tucked the binder under my arm and adjusted my earpiece. “Hadley, your best man still isn’t here.”

She laughed from somewhere near the elevator. “He’ll be here. Tristan runs on his own clock.”

“His own clock is forty minutes behind mine.”

“Eloise.” Her voice went warm, the way it always did when she thought I was spiraling. “He’ll be here.”

I didn’t spiral. I managed. There was a difference.

The rooftop looked beautiful. I’d spent three weeks on this, ever since Hadley had asked me to coordinate the wedding and I’d almost dropped my coffee.

The Pixel Lofts rooftop wasn’t a traditional venue.

No ballroom, no built-in sound system, no bridal suite down the hall.

But Hadley hadn’t wanted traditional. She’d wanted the place where she fell in love.

So I’d turned it into one.

The fireplace alcove was dressed in white peonies and trailing greenery, framing the spot where they’d stand tomorrow for the ceremony.

The pool was roped off for the weekend, its surface flat and still behind a row of potted palms I’d arranged to keep guests from wandering toward it with champagne glasses.

I’d chosen the date myself. June twentieth.

The summer solstice. The longest day of the year, which meant golden hour would stretch past nine, flooding the rooftop in warm amber light while they said their vows.

No artificial lighting needed until well after ten.

No harsh overhead spots, no rented fixtures fighting the sky.

Just the sun doing what it did best on the one day of the year it stuck around the longest.

I’d been proud of that detail. Hadley had cried when I explained it.

Now I just needed a best man.

I crossed back toward the stairwell door, mentally running through the rehearsal sequence.

Officiant at the alcove, bridal party from the east side, Beckett entering from the stairwell with his best man.

Beckett was already here, leaning against the railing with a beer, talking to Maddox Vale.

Relaxed. The groom wasn’t worried, which made one of us.

I checked my phone. No messages from the best man. No messages from Hadley about the best man. Just a text from Saylor asking if she should bring extra ice from 3C.

Yes please, I typed, and pushed through the stairwell door backward, balancing my binder and my phone and the extra box of place cards I’d stashed on the landing.

I hit something solid.

Not something. Someone.

The box left my hands. My phone went one direction, my binder the other, and then arms came around me. Strong, steady, pulling me in instead of pushing me back. I grabbed the front of his shirt on instinct—fistfuls of linen—and my face pressed against a chest that smelled like cedar.

I went still.

Not because I was startled. I was startled, but that wasn’t why I stopped moving.

The buzzing that had been running under my skin since dawn, the constant hum of check this, fix that, where is the best man…

it just went quiet. Like someone had reached inside my chest and turned a dial I didn’t know existed.

Three seconds. Maybe four. His arms around me, my hands flat against his chest, his heart beating slow and steady under my palms. I could feel the rhythm of it. Unhurried, like the rest of the world could wait.

Then my brain caught up.

I stepped back, heat flooding my cheeks, and looked up at him.

Tall. Broad. Tan skin, dark beard trimmed close along a jaw that could have been carved.

Dark hair, short and clean. The linen shirt was unbuttoned enough that I could see the edge of dark ink at his collarbone—bold, dense lines disappearing under the fabric.

More ink on his forearms—intricate patterns with heavy shading that looked deliberate and cohesive, like a decision made once and committed to fully.

He was looking down at me with an expression I couldn’t read. Not amused, exactly. Not concerned. Something steadier than both.

“I’m so sorry,” I said, already crouching to grab the binder and my phone. “I didn’t see you. I was coming through the door and I had the box and I wasn’t looking…”

“You’re fine.”

His voice was low, easy. He crouched too, picking up scattered place cards and stacking them neatly before handing them back. His fingers brushed mine, and the buzzing that had gone quiet surged right back to life, but different this time. Warmer.

I pulled my hand away a beat too late.

“I’m Eloise,” I said, straightening. Professional. Coordinator mode. “Eloise Sterling. I’m coordinating the wedding.”

“I know.”

I blinked. “You know?”

“Hadley warned me about you.” He said it with warmth, not teasing.

He straightened too, and I had to tip my chin up to hold his gaze.

He was taller than I’d realized when I was pressed against his chest. “Said you’d have a clipboard and an earpiece, and I shouldn’t take it personally if you put me on a schedule before I got my name out. ”

My stomach flipped. “You’re Tristan.”

“I’m Tristan.”

“You’re late.”

He didn’t flinch. Didn’t apologize. Just looked at me with those steady, dark eyes and said, “I’m here.”

Something about the way he said it made the reprimand I’d been rehearsing dissolve before it reached my mouth. I’m here. Not Sorry I’m late. Not Traffic was bad. Just the fact of his presence, delivered like it was enough.

It shouldn’t have been enough. I had a timeline.

“The rehearsal starts in thirty-five minutes,” I said, pulling my binder against my chest. “I need you at the alcove for the walk-through. You’re entering from the stairwell with Beckett. You’ll stand to his left.”

“Got it.”

“And I need your toast finalized by tonight so I can coordinate the timing with the caterer for tomorrow’s reception.”

“It’s finalized.”

“And…” I faltered. He was watching me with that same patience, hands in his pockets, shoulders easy. Leaning against the doorframe like he’d been there for hours instead of seconds. “You should probably go say hi to Beckett.”

Something shifted in his face. A softening around the eyes that was almost a smile.

“Yeah,” he said. “I probably should.”

He held the door open for me, and we walked onto the rooftop together.

Beckett spotted him before we’d taken three steps.

The sound he made wasn’t a word. It was something deeper than that—the kind of sound that came from seventeen years of knowing someone.

Beckett crossed the rooftop in four strides and grabbed him, one arm around his neck, pulling him in hard.

Tristan’s hand came up to grip Beckett’s shoulder, and for a second, they just stood there, these two massive men holding on to each other in the late afternoon sun.

“About time,” Beckett said against his neck.

“I’m here,” Tristan said again, and this time I heard something underneath it. Not a casual response. A promise. I’m here, the way I’ve always been here.

Beckett pulled back but kept a hand on Tristan’s shoulder, grinning. “Hadley’s going to kill you for being late.”

“Hadley told me not to worry about it.”

“Hadley tells everyone not to worry about it. She worries.”

“No,” Tristan said, glancing back at me. “Her coordinator worries. Hadley’s fine.”

I felt the flush hit my ears. He’d known me for ninety seconds, and he’d already figured that out.

Beckett followed his gaze, then looked back at Tristan with an expression I couldn’t quite catch. Something between curiosity and recognition. Then it was gone, and Beckett was pulling Tristan toward the railing to introduce him to the rest of the wedding party.

I watched them go. Beckett’s arm around Tristan’s shoulders, the easy way Tristan folded into the group.

He shook Maddox’s hand. Nodded at Sebastian.

Said something to Sayer that made him almost smile, which I’d learned over the past few weeks was the equivalent of a standing ovation from Sayer Drake.

When he got to August, they clasped hands and August said something quiet that made Tristan’s jaw go soft.

He knew them all. Not the polished way you know colleagues or casual acquaintances. He knew them the way you know people who belong to your best friend—knowing Beckett meant knowing everyone Beckett loved.

But the way they looked at him was different.

Respectful, warm, glad to see him. And then their attention shifted back to their own conversations, their own women, their own orbits.

Saylor leaned into Maddox. Lark was already barefoot, leaning against the railing with her chin tilted up, Kit beside her with one hand in his pocket.

Tatum said something to Sayer with her face tipped toward his, and his hand settled on her lower back.

Eliza and August were by the railing, her hand resting on his forearm while he said something quiet that made her smile.

Tristan stood in the middle of all of it, drink in hand, and he was fine. Comfortable. Genuinely at ease in a group of couples where he was the only one standing alone.

Something about that made my chest ache in a way I recognized.

I knew what it looked like to be the person holding the room together while everyone else lived in it. I knew what it felt like to stand at the edge of a beautiful moment and feel grateful and invisible at the same time.

I pulled my binder open and got back to work.

The rehearsal went smoothly. I walked them through the ceremony sequence twice, adjusted the processional spacing, confirmed the music cues with the sound tech, and made sure Beckett knew to wait a full beat after the music changed before he started walking.

Tristan stood where I told him to stand. Didn’t fidget, didn’t check his phone, didn’t crack jokes during the timing run. He just stood at the alcove with his hands at his sides, steady and present.

At one point, while I was repositioning the florist’s arrangement by two inches, I caught him watching me. Not staring. Just…tracking. The same way he’d tracked the conversations earlier, quiet and careful, like he was learning the room.

I looked away first.

The rehearsal dinner was simple by design.

White lights, long tables, good food, the rooftop doing most of the work.

The sun was already turning everything gold.

Nine fifteen and the light was still warm, still holding.

If it looked like this tonight, tomorrow would be even better.

The solstice. The longest day. The light I’d planned the whole wedding around.

Hadley found me near the drink station and wrapped me in a hug. “It’s perfect,” she whispered. “All of it.”

“It’s not done yet.”

“It’s perfect already.” She pulled back and held my shoulders. “Thank you. For everything. For the solstice idea, for the alcove, for all of it.”

I felt my eyes sting and blinked hard. This was the part I loved. The part that made every spreadsheet and every vendor call worth it. The look on a bride’s face when the room matched the picture in her heart.

“Go sit with your fiancé,” I said. “I’ve got the rest.”

She squeezed my hands and went back to Beckett, and I watched her tuck herself against his side, his arm going around her like breathing. Natural. Inevitable.

I picked up an empty glass from the railing and carried it to the caterer’s station.

Because that was what I did. I picked up the empty glasses. I adjusted the linens. I made sure the night was perfect for the people who got to live in it.

And tomorrow, on the longest day of the year, I’d do it all over again.