Chapter 14
14
Kieran
I looked up the street to the administrative building, where I spotted Stewie’s signature blue hair as his head tipped down while he did something on his phone.
“Hey,” I said as I approached, my breath visible in the cold.
“Salutations!” Stewie took a moment to look up from his phone. “Wow! You cleaned up a bit,” he said. “Your ladylove here yet?” He scanned the street, and I shook my head.
“Not yet.” I shoved my hands in my pockets. “Thanks for doing this,” I added, realizing too late I’d never had a conversation with Stewie without Lila, and I felt old and deeply uninteresting standing next to him.
“Are you kidding? People love this story—my views and engagement are off the charts. Great for my bottom line, too.”
That was comforting and troubling in equal measure, and I tugged on my collar, scanning the area for Sybil. I’d expected the office to be in a high-rise, but the building was tucked away in the suburbs, a modern-looking two-story building with natural landscaping and wooden beams crisscrossing the front. The area wasn’t crowded, but I was anxious for this thing to begin. It had been a miracle we hadn’t been found out in the shop and Sybil had slipped out through the crowd with no one noticing. Even with my head in overdrive about what I’d agreed to do, I marveled that anyone could take one look at her and not see what I’d described in the video—someone who lit up the room.
I shuffled from foot to foot in the cold. “So, how does this work?”
Stewie looked at me quizzically. “Not much to it. We’ll snap a photo and a quick video of you two. You don’t have to say much—the story has taken off, but if you look like you’re half as into her as you looked in the first video, it’ll go well.”
“Sure,” I said, seeing Sybil walking toward us. She’d changed and wore a flowy dress that hugged her upper body and blew in the chilly breeze. The outfit was completely impractical for the cold weather, but my gaze snagged on her legs as the dress blew around her, before taking in her red-painted lips. Her coat was open, and the afternoon sunshine made her skin appear kind of golden.
“Just like that,” Stewie said.
“What?” He was still holding up his phone when I turned. “Did you just take my picture?”
He laughed and was already tapping on his phone. “Your face when you saw her—it was perfect. Captioning it with ‘Guess who just showed up?’?” He chuckled again, holding the phone away from me. “Don’t worry. People will be all over this.”
My stomach lurched at the idea of the attention and how little control we had over any of it.
“Hi, again.” Sybil held out her hand but then leaned in for an awkward hug, something I picked up on a second too late, so we kind of collided, with my hand nudging her side and her forehead knocking my chin.
I shot a glance at Stewie, who was tapping the screen of his phone. “Don’t worry. Deleting that one.” He turned to Sybil. “Hey, I’m Stewie. I posted the original video.”
“I know who you are,” she said with a wide smile, leaning in for a hug. It annoyed me because it looked so much more natural with Stewie than it had with me. “Your Des Moines Fails posts are everything.”
Stewie beamed, and I wondered if Sybil made everyone feel like that—she’d certainly made me feel that way, but maybe that was just how she was. “I’ll just get a couple of pics and maybe a video we can post later.”
“Did your friend come with you this time?” I looked around for the big guy who’d come to the shop with her, the one I’d been immediately jealous of, especially when Sybil had casually wrapped her arm around him. Lila told me she liked him—by the time we’d come out, the two of them had been behind the counter and he’d been talking about baking and obscure bands with her. The jealousy had lingered, though.
“Nah. He was in the middle of a complicated-looking meal that involved a lot of chopping and whisking, and I told him you’d protect me.” She moved to my side, remembering we were supposed to be smitten.
“I’m protecting you?” I followed her toward the door, Stewie saying he’d catch up in a few minutes.
“Well, sure. I assume letting me get kidnapped would put a damper on this publicity stunt.”
“Yeah, but then I would have to lead the charge to get you back.”
“That might be better press. Well, better press for you…it would definitely suck for me.”
My posture eased slightly as I opened the door for her to walk in. “I guess so. I’ll just try my best to protect you.” We crossed the sunny lobby. “Did your family not want to come?”
Sybil avoided my gaze. “I…haven’t told them about winning the lottery yet.”
I let her enter the elevator ahead of me, my gaze dropping to the curve of her butt on instinct, but, damn winter, her coat blocked my view. “Must be hard to keep that secret.”
“I wanted to turn in the ticket first,” she said, pulling it from the small bag in her hand. Her voice was lower and just a little less bright when she spoke again. “Just in case something goes wrong. I have a reputation for mistakes in our family, so if I messed up this big and it really wasn’t a winner or something…well, I’d rather just be sure first.”
I nodded, watching the numbers tick slowly as the elevator ascended. “If it helps, we did double- and triple-check,” I said. “The ticket, I mean. It’s the winning numbers.”
She nodded. “I know. I checked it a hundred times.” She placed a palm over her chest and took a deep breath.
“Are you nervous?”
She laughed, the bark kind of escaping, as if without permission. “Well, yeah.” The elevator doors dinged and opened, revealing the lobby. “I mean, what am I supposed to do with this much money? I can’t even hold down a temp job.”
“Well, those are temporary. I don’t think you’re supposed to hold them down.”
She narrowed her eyes for a second, but then I could see her wheels spinning again. “I don’t even have my own place.” Her face fell again, something else behind her words I couldn’t place, but she was visibly anxious, breaths coming faster and her eyes darting left and right. “I’ve never once dated a decent guy who treated me well, and now I’ve got you and no one will believe it.” She sucked in a ragged breath. “This whole thing is going to blow up.”
“You’ll be fine,” I said, trying to keep my eyes ahead. “It’s fine.”
“I’m gonna screw this up. I know I will.” Her breathing sped and she started talking faster, the words tumbling out. “And so many people will see it. There are so many things I have to do, but I don’t know what they are. Do I take a lump sum or payments, and what about taxes?” She looked up into my eyes, her irises catching the light in the room, and her voice was a whisper. “What if I screw it up?” She was panicking, and a drop of sweat slid down her neck, leaving a trail along her throat, where I saw her pulse.
I fought the urge to touch her there, to wipe away the evidence of her anxiety, but instead I took her hand in mine, earning a startled expression as we waited in the elevator vestibule.
“Breathe,” I said, squeezing her hand. “That’s the only thing you have to do right now. In and out.”
She clutched my hand, chest expanding as she inhaled. Her eyelids fell as she exhaled, lashes casting shadows on her cheeks from the harsh overhead lighting before she looked at me again, expectant.
“Good,” I said. “Again. Nice and slow.” I modeled for her, our breathing in sync, and she kept her eyes with mine, the sensation of breathing together oddly comforting for me, too. “One more time.”
I lifted her hand, rotating her wrist so her palm was up. “There’s a pressure point on your wrist,” I said, gliding two fingers down her thumb to the place I wanted. “Here,” I said, pressing my fingers gently but firmly into her skin, ignoring the jump in my chest when touching her. “It’s said it can relieve physical signs of anxiety.” Sybil stepped closer, watching me work my fingers over the spot.
“Does it actually work?”
“Do you feel better?” I circled the spot on her wrist, taking in the smoothness of her skin and inhaling the scent of her.
“Yeah, I think I do,” she said, moving her gaze from our joined hands to my face, and I listened to her breaths slowing. “That might just be you talking to me, though.”
I kept talking, seeing how my voice was calming her and ignoring how good that felt. “Acupressure has been part of Chinese medicine for centuries. Western medicine is catching up,” I said. I had a mentor in school who taught me some things. “This is called the Great Abyss point.” I turned her hand, pressing my thumb into the connection between her index finger and thumb. “Hegu point,” I said, ignoring the way her eyes fluttered closed at the pressure. “You’ll figure it out. It will be fine,” I added. “You’re lucky like that, right?”
She nodded, the corners of her lips tipping up. “I am,” she said, eyes on mine, that hint of a smile. “I am lucky.”
“Perfect!”
We both startled apart at Stewie’s voice. I hadn’t even noticed the elevator open again as he came up behind us, but I dropped her hand and we stepped apart. “What’s perfect?” Sybil was holding the hand I’d dropped, and my gaze snagged on how she skirted her thumb over the spot I’d rubbed.
“The lottery sign was in the background, and you two looked all intense with your hands together. Great photo. You want to see?” He held his phone forward, but the receptionist returned to us just then, interrupting.
“Can I help you?”
Sybil’s eyes widened, and she pulled the ticket from her purse again, but she didn’t say anything.
“Um, yes. She has a winning ticket,” I said, nudging Sybil forward with my hand at the dip of her lower back.
“Congratulations,” the receptionist said, tapping on her keyboard. Sybil approached as if the woman was typing on a boa constrictor and not a keyboard, and held the ticket out for inspection. The receptionist nodded, taking the ticket and typing in something until her fingers froze and she made an O with her mouth as she checked the ticket again. “You won big,” she said, finally handing the ticket back to Sybil, who looked like she was going to vibrate out of her skin. I couldn’t very well give her another hand massage, but I lowered my hand to brush hers, and she linked her fingers with mine, squeezing. The gesture surprised me, and I tried to remember the last woman to hold my hand.
The receptionist was about to say something else, but her gaze snagged on me, and she slapped the desk. “Oh my gosh! You’re the guy from the donut video!”
My face heated—I had not planned to be part of this other than for Stewie’s documentation.
“Gail! Come out here!” Another woman strode from behind a partition. “It’s the guy from that video. He found her. It’s them!”
“Love and donuts!” Gail looked from Sybil to me. “My daughter showed me that video. How sweet!”
“Um, that’s us,” Sybil said, squeezing my hand tighter. It wasn’t a romantic move, it was a grip of panic that I interpreted as “If I’m going down, you’re coming with me.”
“This is just the sweetest thing,” the receptionist added with a warm smile. “I love stories like this,” she said. “You sit tight for a minute while I get our manager, who will take you from here.”
“So,” Gail said, a fist resting under her chin. “Was it just sparks and romance at first sight? Was there a reason you never told him your full name, sweetie?”
I looked over at Sybil, whose panic didn’t seem to extend to making things up on the spot, because she looked more relaxed than she had since we’d met in the parking lot. And I guessed Gail was going to be the first to know about our fictional relationship.
“It all happened so fast,” Sybil deflected. “I can’t even put words together yet.” I gave her a mental high five. “But I’m glad we found each other again,” she said, looking up at me with a grin. “And he’s here with me.”
Gail said something else, but I was focused on Sybil’s quick wink, and then a tall man came around the corner. “Sybil Sweet?” He extended his hand. “Congratulations,” he said, motioning to an office nearby. “Are you ready for your life to change?”
She looked up at me again, and I returned her vise grip.
“Yep,” she said, looking back at him. “Let’s go change our lives.”