Chapter 9 #2
And I have a light-bulb moment. That’s why Sam is here. He’s sizing Josh up. Not because he’s Violet’s new boyfriend and Sam is jealous, but because Sam wants to win this contest and sees Josh as his number one opponent.
Well, he’s right.
“Sam, this is Josh Evans,” I say. “As you heard, he’s a firefighter and paramedic. He does marathons and donates the prize money to animal shelters. And he’s going to propose to Violet on Christmas.”
What.
The.
Hell.
Did.
I.
Just.
Say?
Sam’s eyebrows rise, and I hear Josh choke behind me.
“Uh, hey.” Sam extends his hand to Josh. “I guess Nora left some of that out of your intro.”
“Well, the proposal is a secret,” Josh says easily, shaking Sam’s hand, as if I didn’t just stick both of my feet and one of his in my mouth. “So it’d be great if you didn’t say anything to anyone.”
I avoid looking at Josh.
Because I’m sure he’s wondering what the fuck? And I have no idea how to explain it.
“Of course.” Sam turns to Ashley. “And this is my fiancée, Ashley. Ash, this is Thea, Violet’s sister.”
“Yeah, I caught that,” Ashley says, giving me a smile that actually seems genuine. “It’s nice to meet you.”
“Fiancée?” I ask. “Nora missed that part of your intro, too.”
“Yeah, we just told our families this morning,” Sam says, smiling down at Ashley. “She didn’t want to tell the whole town from the stage in a big, public announcement. She wants to be sure friends and other family hear it from us first.”
I narrow my eyes. I’m not ‘other family’ and I definitely do not consider myself a friend of his. “Well…great.”
This is why I said Josh is Violet’s fiancé. Because Sam does not get to come back to town after ripping up four years of her life and stomping on her heart and be all happy and at peace and… triumphant.
Okay, he might get to be happy and at peace. I’m not sure I can actually ruin that. But he will not be triumphant. Not on my watch.
“When are you getting married?” I ask them.
“Next summer,” Ashley says, practically glowing.
“When do you think you and Violet will get married?” I ask Josh.
He looks at me with a very clear what the fuck look. I was right about that.
“We haven’t talked about it,” he says.
I’m sure that’s true.
“She loves the spring. March maybe. Oh, March twentieth. First day of spring. Life feels fresh and new then, you know?” I look at Sam. “Throwing off the cold, old, dead shit and starting over? Love that. That’s what we’ll do.”
Josh coughs. Sam actually takes a step back from me.
“That sounds…great for you all,” he says.
The fucker is probably thinking how glad he is not to have me for a sister-in-law.
Yeah, he should be glad.
“So, we’ll see you around this weekend, I guess,” Sam says, taking Ashley’s hand.
“For sure,” I say. “A lot. Though you’ll mostly see our backs.” I laugh, but it sounds a little maniacal. I might need to work on that. “You know, because we’ll be in front of you. Winning.”
“Right.” Sam smiles at me, then looks at Josh. “Good luck to you.”
Josh gives a short laugh. “Thanks. You too.”
I watch Sam turn and leave the stage.
Hey, did he wish Josh luck with Merry Mayhem, or was he wishing him luck dealing with me? That’s what that sounded like.
Fucker.
Josh immediately turns to face me. “What the hell was that?”
“What?”
“Well, for one, I do not run marathons. I have donated money to animal shelters, but not prize money.”
A twirl of warmth twists through my stomach. “You support animal shelters?”
“Of course.”
“That’s—”
“Thea, you have me marrying your sister in March!” he interrupts.
I nod. “You’re welcome.”
“I am not proposing to Violet on Christmas.”
I wave that away. “Sam doesn’t need to know that.”
“What if he slips and says something to someone, and Bruce or Harley hears it? Or your mom?”
Yeah, that would be bad. I shake my head. “He won’t. If he does, I’ll tell them he’s lying.”
“It is lying.”
“But that doesn’t matter. I just did it to intimidate him.”
“Why would that intimidate him?”
“He came over here to show us that he’s perfectly happy and not at all worried about facing us in this competition.”
“Did he?”
“Yes! He wants me to see him happy without Violet. He thinks that will get to me and I’ll be flustered and not perform well.”
“You do seem a little flustered.”
“Well, now he can be flustered thinking about letting Violet go, and every challenge we win will just reiterate that you’re the better man.”
Josh shakes his head. “Thea, there’s something I should probably—”
He’s interrupted by Nora sliding in between us and grabbing my arm, “I don’t know what to do.” She’s ditched the microphone and is now almost whispering.
“What do you mean? What happened?” I ask.
“Muriel and Patty are competing in Merry Mayhem!”
“Well…yeah, I know,” I tell her. I gesture toward the now-empty chairs where the women had been sitting.
Her eyes are wide. “How? How are they going to do that? We have a rock wall…” She trails off. “Crap. I can’t tell you that. You’re a competitor. I can’t tell you the challenges ahead of time.” She drops my arm and looks around. “Where are Andi and Everly?”
“I need to talk to Andi too,” I say quickly. “And you.” I look up at Josh. “You’re heading to Autre to get clothes and things, right?”
“If it’s still okay that I come back here late?”
“Of course. It’s fine.” I take my phone out of my pocket. “Give me your number. We should have each other’s anyway.”
We exchanged numbers, and I text him my address and directions.
“I’ll see you later then,” he says. He hesitates as if he wants to say more, but then just says. “Okay. We’ll talk later.”
I nod. “Yep. Later. Drive carefully.”
He leaves the stage, and I turn to watch him go. Once he’s heading through the crowd toward Bruce and Harley’s, I face Nora. “He’s really hot, right?”
Her eyebrows climb. “Uh…yes.”
“I mean, like anyone would think so. It’s just a fact.”
She nods. “Yes.”
I puff out a breath. “Good.”
“What is going on?”
“I needed to be sure that I’m attracted to him just because he’s attractive, not because of…you know, anything more complicated.”
She looks very interested now. “More complicated, like what?”
“He’s Violet’s boyfriend. So I can’t be attracted to him. But I can find him attractive. That’s different. You think he’s attractive, too. So it’s…fine.”
“I do find him attractive. But that is different from being attracted to him.”
I nod. She’s confirming what I just said.
“So are you?” she asks.
“What?”
“Attracted to him?”
“I find him hot.”
“Why?”
“Because he’s sweet, and charming, and fun, and heroic, and…” I frown. “Why are you looking at me like that?”
“Because I find him attractive because of his blue eyes, his big biceps, and his nice ass.”
My frown deepens. “I don’t understand.” Except, I think I do.
“Okay.” She nods. For a few seconds. Then she says, “It will be okay. What’s going to happen?”
“I could spend three days with him and like him even more in the end, and then have to watch him and my sister together when she comes home?” I groan. “Oh God, I’m horrible. She’ll be coming home from the hospital. How am I even thinking this way?”
“Oh, come on, that’s dramatic. You just met him, right? It can’t be that much of an attraction,” Nora says.
“I met him last June. He’s the paramedic who was there with Harley.”
“Oh.”
I told Nora about Josh then. And that he visited Harley. And that they still text sometimes.
She agreed that he sounds amazing.
“Well…that’s…a weird coincidence.”
I sigh.
“So, you are attracted to him, but it’s not…” She trails off, clearly not sure how to finish that.
I just look at her, lips pressed together. Then I confess, “This has never happened to me before.”
Her eyes widen. “Oh.”
“I hate it.”
“Oh.”
“We might need to pull out of Merry Mayhem.”
Nora shakes her head. “Too late. Besides, you and Josh are the fan favorites. Right behind you are Sam and Ashley. If you pull out, they move into the lead.”
“How do you even know that? We just did the kickoff.”
“We polled people during the Get to Know the Contestants event,” she says, as if that should have been obvious.
I roll my eyes. “So, my choices are spend all this time with Josh and just ignore my feelings, or let my sister’s jackass ex win this contest that means so much to her? The one thing she did not want to happen?”
Nora nods. “Pretty much.”
Great. My only shot at being a good sister is to spend the next three days in close proximity with her boyfriend, having fun, making merry, and being perfect partners so we can win this thing.
And trying really hard not to fall for him.
“Are you going to have the hot chocolate booth open all weekend?” I ask Nora.
“Of course.”
“Be sure you keep the schnapps well stocked.”