Noah took her hand and her cue, staying quiet. He sensed she needed him right now, and he’d be lying if he said it didn’t feel good. Having her move in yesterday had been the best and the worst thing that had happened to him in a long time. Last night had been amazing, the two of them staying up late and talking. He’d never done that with a woman. He’d never felt comfortable enough to open up. Lily was his safe place. Those two years of frustration over working together and not being able to touch her or kiss her or tell her everything going through his head had not been for nothing. It had built a solid friendship. It had established trust, and Noah understood just how important that was.
The elevator stopped on his floor, seventeen, and he and Lily ambled down to his end of the hall. As soon as he opened the door and they stepped into his foyer, she let loose. “That was a disaster.”
“That bad?”
“It’s a nightmare.” She marched right down the hall, past the kitchen and into the living room, and he had no choice but to follow. “There’s the cake that will never be baked and the dress I’ll never buy and the guests we’ll never invite.” She turned back to him, her face strained in a way he’d never seen before. “I can’t do it, Noah. I can’t. The lies, the standing there and chatting about place settings and DJs. It’s impossible. We have to say or do something to put her off.”
He went to her and held her hands, rubbing his thumbs over her fingers to reassure her that everything would be okay. She looked so stunning today in a simple black dress she’d worn to the office at least one hundred times. Her eyes were stormy and sad right now. He hated seeing her so upset. “Okay. We’ll come up with an excuse of some sort. I don’t know what. Come on and sit down with me and we’ll have a drink and we can brainstorm some reasons why people cancel weddings.”
Noah went to lead her to the couch, but Lily was frozen. “Lil. What’s wrong?”
“I…” A single tear rolled down her cheek. “I can’t.”
“Just tell me.” He wasn’t sure what the awful sensation in his chest was, but it felt like his heart was being torn in two.
“I’ll tell you why people cancel weddings. They do it when they decide they don’t love the bride. When they decide that she isn’t special enough or smart enough or kind enough or pretty enough to spend an entire lifetime with. That’s why people cancel weddings.”
Noah swallowed hard. The broken engagement. “Hold on a second. Are you talking about…”
Lily nodded frantically, her lips pressed tightly together, her eyes welling with tears. “He dumped me in the church, Noah. He didn’t want to marry me and it was the worst day of my life. And now I feel like I’m reliving every stupid minute I spent planning it. Only this time, the groom is you, which might be amazing if it were real, but it’s not. This wedding isn’t going to happen either.”
Noah struggled for breath as her words tumbled around in his head. Did Lily have feelings for him? It sounded like she did. If ever there was a time to come out with his own feelings for her, this was it.
“I have something I need to tell you.”
“I can’t take any more bad news.”
Just say it. “I’ve wanted you for a long time. A really long time, Lily. Probably since the moment you walked into our office that first day.” It was such a relief to finally come out with it. How foolish he’d been to keep it bottled up all this time. “So when I admitted at the wedding that I was frustrated, it was about far more than seeing you in a bathing suit or because we’d been holding hands and kissing. It was because I finally had a taste of what I’d wanted for so long, but I couldn’t have you for real. All because you were too good at your job to let me screw it up. I couldn’t let my brother down like that, but it’s been killing me. Slowly. Every day.”
She looked up at him, her eyes wide, traveling back and forth and searching his face. Her lower lip dropped. A puff of breath left her lips, but no words came out. It was torture to come out with his truth and have it met this way. Was she about to tell him once again that her job was too important?
“Talk to me, Lily. If you’re going to hurt me, it’s okay. I can take it. Nothing could be worse than the last two years. And if you need to forget that we ever had this conversation, we can do that, too. We can pretend like it never happened. By now, I think we both know we have a talent for putting on a show.”
“Will you just shut up and kiss me? For real. No more pretending.”