Total pages in book: 78
Estimated words: 73665 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 368(@200wpm)___ 295(@250wpm)___ 246(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 73665 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 368(@200wpm)___ 295(@250wpm)___ 246(@300wpm)
In this? Or in everything?
I know why I agreed to the wedding. Bellatrix isn’t wrong about a single thing she said. But why am I agreeing to this? I have no motivation other than that…
I want to.
And I haven’t done something I truly wanted to do for a very long time.
Especially when it’s dangerous, off-limits, taboo, and roughly half my age.
She said to experience life, not go out and ruin mine. She said to live, which involves making mistakes and messes. She didn’t imply that she’d want a repeat of what happened in the lounge that night. There was no innuendo in her eyes.
She said to live.
Have I ever really?
I flip the contract to the set of blanks on the last page.
“Don’t sign that yet. I said I’ll plan your wedding, but my terms are that you give me a chance to prove to you that you can be happy if you don’t do this.”
I frown. “You want to make the wedding succeed all while making it not succeed?”
She nods with every ounce of confidence, as if both of those things can happen at the exact same time and make perfect sense.
“The chance can’t just be one chance. It has to be three,” she says.
“Like three wishes.”
“Yes, but the ones you aren’t sure about and then find were the best thing that ever happened to you, not the ones you hoped like crazy for and then regretted ever having that hope come true.”
This is crazy.
Crazier than a fake marriage.
“Why would you do this for a stranger? Even if I were a client, it’s counterintuitive to your job.”
She stares steadily back at me, doing her soul-seeing thing that really brings out the green spokes in her eyes. “You gave me two thousand dollars, and you didn’t expect me to pay you back. I was a stranger. Even if you wouldn’t miss the money, it was a big deal to me.”
This is all so bizarre that I can barely wrap my head around it, but I know one thing. I want to see this woman again. Wants don’t usually land very high up on my list of important things in my life. Needs come first, and my needs always involve logic.
Why the hell am I grasping the pen, touching it to paper, and scrawling my name on the line at the bottom of the last page? I even write down my personal phone number and pull out my credit card from my wallet with a slight tremble in my hand that I can’t pretend isn’t there, just like I can’t pass off the shiver of excitement that wraps around the back of my neck.
“You have an unlimited budget to make this happen,” I tell her.
The wedding.
And maybe the other stuff too.
Even if there shouldn’t be anything else.
Wants and needs. For once, I’m giving in to both.
Chapter six
Bellatrix
How did I go from having to seduce my best friend’s dad, maybe sabotaging his businesses a little to throw shade all over his name, and wrecking his wedding to trying to find the best, life-changing places in Providence?
I can think of a few experiences that are right up there for me.
Watching a sunset over the water. Eating what is probably the world’s best tacos. Sitting on a swing alone at the park at night. Skinny dipping at the beach. Going to the botanical gardens. Hiking a few of the trails around here, stargazing, cooking, visiting my favorite bookstore, hitting up a few of the antique stores, going to a symphony or a play, meditating for half an hour in the morning, along with my morning yoga routine. Oh, and petting a cat when I can find one that wants to be petted. Scratching a dog’s ears…
There are so many great and wonderful underrated and unappreciated things to do in life that bring real joy, but I have this feeling that Rowleigh will scoff at half of them and flat-out refuse to do the other half. He’s probably experienced many of them already.
Yes. Rowleigh. Rowleigh Bellhopper. The. Rowleigh. Bellhopper.
I have to start thinking about using his name, not Mika’s dad, the bartender, the mystery stranger, the total hottie, the zaddy guy…
I have a sort of date that’s not a date, the first of three wishes, to help him discover the secret of happiness that all the money in the world can’t buy because if it could, he’d already know it.
My god, what have I gotten myself into?
Also, going skinny dipping or swinging in a park after dark when we don’t have children are good ways to get arrested, and while that’s certainly an experience, it’s not exactly the vibe I’m going for.
I caught the bus, and it’s only a few blocks to Where the Sun Do Shine. It’s the best taco place in Providence. It’s so busy that you need a reservation to get in, which I made a few days ago as soon as Rowleigh left my office. I had to take the eight-twenty-eight spot since I couldn’t get anything near the dinner hour.