I wanted to tell Taylor that I wasn’t sure if his math actually checked out, but instead, I kept my thoughts to myself as I continued to watch Kimmie cry her eyes out.
“Can you do it?” Kimmie asked. “Taylor, do you think you can be my wedding planner? I know it’s super last minute, but I don’t know what else to do!”
“Yes.” Taylor’s answer came quick. “Of course, I can be your wedding planner, Kimmie. Just give me whatever you’ve gone over so far with Marilyn, and I should be able to take it from there.”
“Oh my God!” Kimmie excitedly yelled while she jumped up and down. “Oh my God! Thank you, Taylor! Thank you so much! I’ve heard so many good things about you!”
“I’m just happy to put a smile back on your face.” Taylor grinned. “I also know a baker who can have a secondary wedding cake made last minute, for a hefty fee. A very hefty fee.”
“I’m totally fine with that,” Kimmie said.
Taylor smiled. “Now, you should go call Marilyn and let her know there’s been a change in guard. Wedding planners can be sort of emotional, so I don’t want her thinking I stole one of her clients. She should be fully aware that you came to me, and not the other way around.”
“Got it.” Kimmie beamed as she turned to walk out of the bakery. “I’ll just give her a call outside, and then, we can get back to the cake tasting.”
I waited until Kimmie was out of earshot before I got Taylor’s attention. “Taylor?”
“Yeah?”
“Don’t you already have a wedding this weekend?”
“Yep.” Taylor nodded.
“But you just said that you’d take care of Kimmie’s wedding, too.”
“I sure did.”
“How?” I pressed. “Didn’t you tell me that you never double book because it’s impossible for you to be in two places at the same time?”
“Oh, right, about that,” Taylor continued. “I thought I already told you. I found a way to clone myself. The technology isn’t perfect yet, but it does the job when I need to plan two weddings back to back.” Taylor chuckled at his own joke before he took another bite of the carrot cake. “Fuck. Why is this so bad? It’s like I’m eating a cinnamon salad.”
“You don’t have to eat the cake, Taylor,” I reminded him. “Just like you don’t have to do this wedding.”
“I said I was going to do it, Morgan. I’m going to do it,” Taylor said. “Or are you just tired of working with me?”
“No. I love working with you,” I admitted. “I just don’t want you to stretch yourself too thin, because when you get all stressed out, you get all melodramatic and weird.”
“I do not get melodramatic and weird.”
“Do you remember that time you lost a client? Because you forgot she wanted some detail on her veil? Something about yellow diamonds?” I replied. “And then, you were so down about it for a week that you came to the office wearing all black, like someone had actually died?”
“That wasn’t melodramatic and weird. That was a very normal response,” Taylor said. “But if you want to prevent me from having any more very normal responses, you should help out where you can.”
“Of course.” I smiled. “As long as I get to volunteer Avery to help out, too.”
“Avery isn’t even here right now. How could he agree to that?”
“Don’t you see? Avery is always around us in spirit.” I waved a hand around my head for emphasis. “Plus, he owes me.”
“For what?”
“I don’t know. I’ll think of something,” I replied just as Kimmie came back into the bakery.
“Marilyn says she understands about the wedding planner change,” Kimmie started. “Oh, but she also said that she hopes there’s a pox on both your houses? Whatever that means.”
“Hmm. Sounds like a very normal response to me, from another very normal wedding planner,” I quipped.
Taylor discreetly nudged me in the arm.
“You look tired,” Taylor said as he took a seat across from me at the restaurant. “Has Kimmie’s catering menu been keeping you up all night?”
Taylor and I had come to an Italian place for lunch after Kimmie had picked out cupcakes for her wedding at the bakery. Thankfully, we were able to talk her into going with a classic vanilla option, even though she’d argued for carrot cake until she was blue in the face.
But all it took was one taste of a vanilla slice, and she hastily changed her mind.
“It’s not the menu,” I admitted.
And right after I spoke, there was a huge grin that appeared on Taylor’s expression. “So, if it’s not the menu, does that mean that it’s the man?”
“What man?” I asked as innocently as possible, my eyes now on the wine list on our table. I wasn’t in the mood to talk about Harrison, especially since he’d been preoccupying my every other thought. I’d imagined my lunch with Taylor was going to give my brain a break from wondering about him, and I was hopeful that Taylor was going to take the hint.
Taylor laughed as he slid the wine list over to his side. “I’m guessing it’d be the same man who’s been keeping you up past your bedtime?”
Dammit.
I should’ve known that Taylor wasn’t going to let things slide. His genuine interest in my life made him a good friend, but it also made him irritating when I wanted to pretend like nothing was wrong.
“He hasn’t been keeping me up past my bedtime,” I explained. “Actually, he’s been helping me fall asleep…”
Taylor gasped as his eyes went wide. “Wait. Has Harrison been staying the night? I knew you two were hooking up, but I didn’t know things were getting more serious—”
“They’re not,” I interrupted. “Harrison and I are just friends with benefits. Less than that, even.”
“Less than that?”
“Yeah. I don’t know if we’re even friends,” I replied. “I mean, it’s not like we’re going to keep in touch when he leaves after the wedding.”
“Do you not want to keep in touch?” Taylor asked. “Couldn’t you two just add each other on Facebook or Instagram or something?”
“I don’t think that would be a good idea.”
“Why not?”
“Because…” I struggled to find the right words. “Because it just… wouldn’t work.”
“What wouldn’t work?” Taylor lightly chuckled. “Keeping up with each other on social media doesn’t exactly require a lot of effort, Morgan. And that way, you’ll know if he’s ever in town again and you two can go right back to hooking up—”
“It won’t work because I’m falling in love with him.”
The phrase had come out of my mouth before I’d even had a chance to think about it.
I tried to convince myself that it was a lie, waiting to feel the telltale signs of lying take over my body, with my heart starting to race or my palms breaking out into a sweat. But instead, my body remained perfectly calm as if me admitting my feelings for Harrison was the truest thing I’d ever said.