She wasn’t sure what the distinction was in his mind, but if she had to guess what was on it, it was a request for more paper. Her little crafty boy could never seem to get enough paper.
Nick and Holly caught up with them just as they turned and nearly bumped into Rachel’s brother, Jack, as he came out of the gazebo with his fiancée, Noelle.
“Uncle Jack!” Aiden said, jumping up to give him a starfish hug before sliding back to the ground.
Rachel introduced her brother and Noelle to Nick and Holly. The entire time that Jack and Nick made small talk and shook hands, with Nick’s focus entirely on Jack, Noelle’s was onRachel. She raised her eyebrows, grinning, and mouthed, “He’s cute.”
Rachel smiled, knowing that it wasn’t just her who noticed. Of course, the more she got to know Nick, the cuter he became. Between today and working on the fireplace with him, the man had practically stepped up a good seventeen spaces on the attractiveness scale.
Noelle gave Rachel a questioning look that she knew meant “How serious are the two of you?” and Rachel loved that she instantly knew what Noelle was asking. For almost her entire life, she’d only had a brother. But after Saturday night, she’d finally have a sister. Well, technically a sister-in-law, but that was every bit as good. She couldn’t think of a better gift her brother could give her.
Rachel gave a slight shrug, and Noelle seemed to understand that she wasn’t quite sure what was going to happen between her and Nick and that it was much too early to try to pin a name to anything between them.
Aiden was talking to Holly, and Rachel finally tuned into what he was saying. “And there are so many things to put in the hot chocolate, and we get to go to the wedding on a hay ride and it’s the best! It’s so much fun and one of my favorite things about Christmas. And,” Aiden said, puffing his chest out, “I even get to carry the rings at the wedding.”
The more Aiden talked about how great everything was at an event that Holly wasn’t invited to, the more Holly’s expression became closed off and sour. She crossed her arms and looked at the ground, but also looked like she really would’ve just preferred kicking Aiden in the shins.
“Aiden,” Rachel said, putting her hands on his shoulders and turning him toward the activities going on in the park, “maybe we should focus on everything here instead.”
“Oh, hey,” Noelle said, seeming to have a gift of understanding what was going on between the kids, “you two should come to the wedding!”
Rachel shot her almost sister-in-law a look. She and Nick weren’t even dating. This tonight wasn’t even a date. Inviting him to a wedding where she and Aiden were the only people he would know meant that Noelle was basically setting the two of them up on a date. Asking while they were both present made it extra awkward to say no. But she was pretty sure Noelle didn’t even feel bad about that.
No, it wasn’t a date. Jack and Noelle were just inviting them to an event that was also going to be attended by a lot of family and friends.
“You should,” Jack said. “We had a couple of people cancel because they are nervous about the weather, so we’ve got the space.”
“No, we couldn’t,” Nick said. “This is your wedding, and you don’t know us—”
“—Yet,” Jack said.
Noelle nodded. “And that’s why you should come. You’re new in town, right? It’d be a good way to get to know people.” She smiled at Holly. “And I bet Holly will love it.”
Nick looked at Rachel like he was trying to see what she thought about it all. What was she even feeling? Nerves? Awkwardness? A thrill at having a reason to see him again in just three days? Anticipation? Excitement? Worry that she was putting herself in a position to become even more attracted to a guy she shouldn’t be attracted to? She was pretty sure she was feeling it all.
And, of course, she was right in the middle of her Season of Yes. That meant shehadto say yes, right? She smiled at Nick. “Yes, you should come. It’ll be fun.”
Hopefully, it would turn out better than her purchase of the atrocious sweater they’d come across that Aiden thought she should buy because it “looked so cute.”
eight
NICK
Nick stoodin front of the closet doors that were made of mirrors in the guest room where he was staying at his in-laws’ house. The mirrors were dated monstrosities that had startled him more than once when he walked past them at night when the lights were off, but they were sure helpful while he was getting ready.
His fingers kept fumbling as he was tying his tie, making him restart. What was he doing, going to the wedding of a couple he’d barely met, just because the groom’s sister was the mom of one of the kids in his daughter’s first grade class?
That wasn’t why he was nervous, and he knew it. He was nervous because that mom was someone who made his heart beat faster every time he saw her. His breath catch. His chest floated like everything that had been weighing him down was suddenly lighter. As he was sitting at the desk in this cramped room, writing code or working through lines of code, trying to find exactly where an issue was, Rachel’s smile started popping into his head. But not just every smile—the smiles she gave him, specifically. He was starting to crave those.
He glanced over to the wooden chair at the edge of the closet where Holly was sitting as she waited for him to get his suit coat and tie on. “Do I look okay?”
Holly stood up on her chair and motioned him over, so he walked up to her. She reached out and straightened his tie and then brushed her hands over his shoulders. “You look beautiful, Dad. Oh, wait. For boys, it’shandsome, right? Rachel is going to see you and her eyes are going to bug out because you look so handsome.”
He looked back at the mirror. Was that why he was so nervous? Was that what he wanted— for Rachel to see him and like what she saw? Yes, it was, he realized. So why did he feel so very not ready? Maybe because it had been so long since he’d been in the dating pool that he’d forgotten how to swim. He felt like he was in the shallow end, thinking someone really should put arm floaties on him before he waded out any further.
“Now this is the part where you tell me that I look like a beautiful princess.”
He smiled at his daughter as she twisted from side to side on the chair, her poofy ankle-length dress swishing out as she did. “You look like a beautiful princess, Hollybear.”
