An Inconvenient Plan (Happy Endings Book Club, Book 10)

by Kylie Gilmore

  She crossed to the bar and squeezed herself through the crowd. “Josh, can you take a break?”

  Maybe she was finally ready to concede she belonged with him and no one else. “Gimme a few minutes.”

  She nodded solemnly, her brows drawn together. Shit. Maybe it was bad news. Maybe her aunt Jane had died.

  He pulled out his phone and called for someone to take his place for a half hour. Hailey might be upset enough to cry, and that could take a while. He braced himself for the excruciation of watching her suffer. He wanted to protect her at all costs, but sometimes death won. A few moments later, he gestured for her to follow him into his office. He pulled out the rope toy with beef scent he’d gotten Rose before and tossed it in the corner. Rose took off after it and chewed happily.

  Hailey stood stiffly in front of his desk, eyes shiny, lips pressed in a tight line like she was trying not to cry.

  His gut clenched. He walked around the desk and pulled her into his arms, hugging her. She gave him a small squeeze in return and stepped back. Her eyes watered as she looked up at him.

  “What happened?” he managed over the lump in his throat. If her aunt died, he’d go to the funeral with her, even though he hated funerals.

  “I just need to know where I stand…” Her voice choked and she cleared her throat. “Because Philip proposed and he wants me to help save an entire kingdom.”

  He went cold. “You told him no.”

  “He brought violinists, a photographer, all those security guards. I said I’d think about it. I couldn’t humiliate him like that.”

  “Fuck, Hailey! I can’t believe you. This is bullshit. You know what? Go to him. Have a great life.”

  “N-no.” Her voice quavered like she was definitely going to cry. His chest clutched. Shit. He’d been too harsh.

  He reached out to stroke her hair. She jerked away, her eyes flashing at him, giving him a visceral jolt of lust. He must be the crazy one, turned on by their battles. Deep down he knew the problem—their fighting was exactly what had hooked him in the first place. Here was his equal, battling with him. Who would win this war? And how could they establish peacetime?

  She glared at him. “I’m here with you, Josh. Why do you think that is?”

  “I don’t know. All I’m hearing is prince this, prince that.”

  “I’m trying to figure out whatever this tangled mess is between us.” She shook her head sadly, mumbling, “Maybe it’s just sex.”

  “Just sex,” he echoed.

  She threw her hands up. “I don’t know! With Phillip it’s roses and diamonds. With you it’s fights and sex!”

  “Fuck Phillip! I’m working! I’m trying to build something here, something lasting.”

  She held up a palm. “I can’t keep fighting with you. It hurts too much.” She frowned and that gave him hope because she never frowned. She was being real with him in a way she wasn’t with anyone else.

  He took her outstretched palm and entwined his fingers with hers. “Hailey.” He pulled her palm to his chest, drawing her close. She didn’t pull away, just stared at his chest.

  Her voice went soft. “And now this thing with my mom. I’m so worried.”

  He kissed her gently, trying to comfort her. She turned her head away. He cupped her cheek and turned her back, gazing into her eyes, a direct message that he cared about her.

  “I can’t keep doing this with you!” she cried and pulled away. She scooped up Rose.

  He jammed a hand in his hair. “We do have something more than just sex. If you could just open your eyes, drop this fantasy the prince is trying to pull over on you, you’d see that.”

  “Nobody is pulling anything over on me, Josh,” she snapped. Then she marched out the door.

  He swore under his breath and went back to work behind the bar. If he knew how to fix it, he would. All he knew was that he was not going to try to top roses, diamonds, mansions, castles, and whatever the hell else the prince threw at Hailey. She had to want him for who he was or not at all.

  He leaned against the bar, suddenly exhausted. Hailey was right. They had to stop battling, except he’d never known peacetime with her. How could he let his guard down when she was always ready with the next killer jab?

  ~ ~ ~

  Hailey organized a girls’ night at her place the next night. She was desperate for some perspective. She’d hardly slept at all last night, trying to figure out how to work this thing out with Josh or step away from him forever. Except their lives were way too tangled to ever completely separate. Their parents were getting married (maybe), they had a lot of the same friends, she was best friends with his sister, and they both lived in town and owned a local business. A breakup would be awkward at best, excruciatingly painful at worst.

  Everyone was here, even Claire with her bodyguard, Frank, posted at the door and her driver waiting out front. Hailey’s text to her friends must’ve sounded pathetic and desperate. Emergency meeting to figure out my life! had had a bigger impact than she’d realized.

  She set out the chocolate chip cookies she’d baked, along with fresh veggies and dip, and a chips and salsa platter. Everyone had already passed around the bottles of wine. Claire had sparkling water on account of her pregnancy.

  Hailey took the seat at the end of her floral sofa, and Sabrina promptly sat next to her, probably because she was a relationship counselor and planned to give her some advice. Clearly Hailey had relationship troubles. Mad was on Sabrina’s other side, probably ready to jump in and defend her big brother’s case. It occurred to her suddenly that she hadn’t heard a thing from Mad about her dad being upset that she and Josh had gotten involved. Was it possible Mad had kept it to herself? Maybe she’d been too busy with school to connect with her dad. Had everyone kept it quiet? She’d thought for sure after Josh had showed up at the club, the news would spread like wildfire. Was Joe still in the dark? Maybe he’d given Josh hell and just gave Hailey the cold shoulder. She hadn’t heard from Joe. And Josh might not have shared that bad stuff with her out of some protective instinct. Ugh. She much preferred to have all the facts.

  She stroked Rose’s little head, returning her focus to her friends. Most of them were sitting on the floor around the coffee table. “Should I bring in the two kitchen chairs?”

  Her friends declined.

  “Everyone have enough to drink?” she asked. “Or eat? Maybe I could make a cheese and crackers platter. I’m pretty sure I have crackers, or I could toast up some crostini?”

  “Quit stalling!” Mad barked.

  Hailey smoothed her hair and took a sip of wine. Mad always saw through when Hailey was fussing to avoid hard topics.

  “Is Josh being a dick?” Mad asked bluntly.

  The women all looked at her expectantly.

  How to answer? He wasn’t doing anything bad. He just wasn’t doing anything at all. Zero effort. The contrast to Phillip’s romantic efforts was stark indeed.

  “Men are stupid,” she finally said.

  Mad spoke around a cookie. “Let me just point out that all of my brothers are clueless in the romance department. They never read the manual.” She swept her finger through the women who knew her brothers best. “Right, Lauren? Charlotte? Sabrina? Claire? You know it’s true.” Lauren and Charlotte had married her brothers Alex and Ty respectively. Sabrina was engaged to her brother Logan, but Hailey didn’t think that should count since a relationship counselor was naturally good at relationships.

  Hailey looked across the coffee table to Claire. This was the woman who could explain it best. She should’ve gone straight to Claire in the first place with this untenable situation. Claire had married Josh’s identical twin, and the men were probably very similar relationship-wise, except she was sure Josh was a zillion times worse than Jake.

  Lauren demurred in her sweet way, tucking her long light brown hair behind her ears. “Alex was in mourning over his fiancée. He let me know he loved me once he was ready.”

  “Ty was clueless,”
Charlotte announced, her brown eyes bright. “No question.” She smiled. “But sometimes he just came out with the sweetest things that made me melt.”

  Josh had called Hailey a warrior once. That was almost sweet.

  “I have no complaints,” Sabrina said diplomatically.

  “Jake was not romantic,” Claire said. “He was hardheaded, arrogant, aggressive, and demanding.”

  Hailey sucked in air. That sounded just like Josh! Beast twins!

  Claire smiled at Hailey. “Sound familiar?”

  “Uh, yeah.”

  Claire winked. “I’m the same way.”

  Hailey got quiet. It seemed that wink was meant to imply Hailey might be that way too. Was she? Was that why they kept butting heads?

  Claire went on. “Things didn’t work so well in the beginning. It was kiss, fight, kiss, fight. Except substitute fuck for kiss.”

  Everyone laughed. Hailey just sat there on the edge of her seat, dying to know the answer to the impossible Josh question.

  Claire shook her head, smiling. “There was just a lot of energy sparking in all different directions.” She paused dramatically and the room went absolutely silent. Even Rose’s ears perked up from her perch on Hailey’s lap. “Until he made what we call in the movie business a grand romantic gesture.”

  “I thought Jake wasn’t romantic,” Mad said. “What’d he do?”

  Claire seemed lost in memory for a moment. “It might not have been romantic in the classic sense of the word, but what he did was something that meant a lot to me. He arranged to buy out Blake’s contract for the Fierce trilogy movies when Blake was giving me a hard time and, when I declined, he told me he’d invest in my movie’s marketing campaign. You have to understand I was so stressed at the time, all of my money was invested in production for the first Fierce trilogy movie, and I had little left for marketing. All I had was good buzz from the press and that was turning on me. He basically played my knight in shining armor.”

  “Josh doesn’t have that kind of money,” Mad pointed out.

  Claire tossed a chip at Mad. “You’re as unromantic as your brothers. It was the gesture, the sacrifice he was willing to make on my behalf, not the money. I didn’t accept either offer. Oh, wait! There was more. He offered to sell his company and travel to wherever I was filming just to be with me.”

  The women murmured in astonishment. This was news to them. Jake’s company was worth billions.

  “You didn’t accept that either,” Hailey said. “It was the gesture.”

  “Yup!” Claire took a sip of her sparkling water, her hazel eyes warm on Hailey’s. “Josh made a gesture for you.”

  “No, he didn’t.”

  “He showed up at book club.”

  That was true. It hadn’t felt like a romantic gesture. It had all been rather awkward, a little sweet too. He did give her that accidental pregnancy romance. The only gift he’d ever given her.

  “A-a-nd,” Claire dragged out the word for the next supposed gesture, “he took a night off work to go to a club with you.”

  Hailey huffed. “That was to show up Phillip. You can’t even believe what’s been going on with those two cocks.”

  Everyone laughed. Hailey laughed too and then she told them every last detail from Josh’s zero effort to their fights and hot sex. She finished with a report on Phillip’s princely behavior with all the roses, his interest in investing in her, and his dreamy proposal.

  “Holy shit!” Mad exclaimed.

  “They’re both acting like idiots,” Claire pronounced.

  “Maybe they’re both in love with her,” Sabrina suggested in her soothing counselor voice. Sabrina was very pro committed loving relationship.

  That was the weird thing. She didn’t think Phillip could possibly be in love with her that fast. But Josh. They’d known each other so long she supposed it was possible. But Josh hadn’t expressed that. He hadn’t expressed much of anything. Did she love him? She’d thought love would be this beautifully romantic thing, and that was definitely not what she had with Josh. He made her furious, made her come undone. The problem was this, no matter how mad she got, she couldn’t seem to stop thinking about him, couldn’t seem to keep away.

  “Phillip’s just using her to fix his rep,” Mad said with a scowl. She always took Josh’s side no matter what. Family first. Hailey hadn’t told her friends about her mom flaking on Joe for just this reason. She knew Mad would take her dad’s side and dump Hailey as a best friend. She needed Mad in her life. No one else cut through the BS and spoke her truth the way Mad did. It had always helped Hailey immensely, except where Josh was concerned. Her mom had better not screw this up for her. If her mom had just talked to Joe instead of running away to who-knew-where, Hailey was sure Joe would calm her down and assure her he loved her. He was just that kind of wonderful man.

  “Do you love Josh?” Claire asked.

  Hailey jolted. All eyes were on her. She let out a shaky breath. “I don’t know. I’m so confused. He promised me a courtship, but all I got was one dinner and a lot of nothing.”

  “Call him on it,” Claire said. “Say exactly what you want and why. Trust me, if you’re not direct, he’s not going to read between the lines. He might be smart, but he’s up on guy speak not the subtlety of woman speak. Jake’s the same way. Now me, I’ve learned to be direct working in the industry. You’re still fairly…”

  “Girly,” Mad finished for her.

  “Subtle.” Claire smiled. “I get it. Women are raised not to make a fuss, to smooth things over, to be polite and poised. Maybe your pageant training contributed to that, but life is not a pageant, and you don’t need to please him. What you need is to stand up for yourself and what you want.”

  Sabrina piped up. “I don’t know if that’s the right tactic in this particular case. It could easily escalate between her and Josh. I think she should withdraw from this weird dynamic. Let the men miss her and realize the depth of their feelings. Their actions after that will tell Hailey all she needs to know.”

  But what if Josh didn’t do anything? What if it was just Phillip urging her to save Villroy and his reputation and be a bona fide princess?

  “You ladies gave me a lot to think about,” Hailey said. “Thank you.”

  “We got your back, sister!” Mad said, offering her a fist bump. Hailey gave it to her. “We really will be sisters in two weeks. Awesome, right?”

  Hailey’s stomach rolled, nausea rising fast. She swore if she had to hunt down her mom and drag her back by the hair to marry Joe, she’d do it! Oh my! Maybe she was like Josh—aggressive and protective, not the hardheaded and arrogant part. She couldn’t remember feeling that way before. Maybe Josh was rubbing off on her, or maybe it was a hidden strength emerging in difficult circumstances.

  “Awesome,” she told Mad, quickly handing over Rose. “I’m going to get more wine.”

  Mad took the distraction, Rose, and cuddled her close.

  By the time her friends left around midnight, Hailey had a comfortable buzz from the wine and friendship. Her friends all thought she should step away from the crazy male situation. The theory being that the men would miss her and step up in their own way. Only Claire continued to urge her to be direct.

  And only Claire remained behind to try to convince Hailey to accept a ride over to Josh’s place. Claire’s driver and bodyguard were waiting.

  “Claire, really, it’s late; I’m buzzed. I think I’m just going to go to bed.”

  “Then tomorrow, okay? I’m telling you, I get Josh. I know he needs it spelled out. It might be hard, but you have to just put it all out there. Do or die.”

  “Okay, okay,” she said just to get Claire off her back.

  Claire hugged her. “Call me afterward and tell me how it went.”

  “I will.”

  Claire finally left.

  Hailey took out Rose for her nighttime bathroom break and then got ready for bed. By the time she finished in the bathroom, Rose was sound asleep curle
d up by Hailey’s pillow. Maybe Claire was right and she would feel better if she just put it all out there. She was so tired of not knowing where she stood with Josh. She changed into jeans and a sweatshirt, put a sleeping Rose in her dog purse, grabbed a flashlight, and left.

  Clover Park was safe for a midnight walk. The sidewalks were empty, houses dark, the only sounds the night bugs and birds. Maybe an owl? Doves? She had no clue. A rustle in the bushes had her picking up speed.

  By the time she reached the old Victorian where Josh lived, she was slightly out of breath, a little spooked to be out alone, and flushed with exertion. She pressed the intercom buzzer, hoping he was up. Nothing. She texted him. No reply. Buzzed again and again. Come on! Wake up! Damn you, Josh Campbell! I’m ready to speak my truth!

  “Hailey?”

  She yelped and whirled. Josh was standing right behind her. “You scared me.”

  “I just got back from work.”

  Of course, she should’ve known. It was Saturday night and he worked until closing. She hadn’t heard his car pull up. She’d been too busy buzzing the buzzer and silently yelling at him.

  Adrenaline fueling her, she blurted out everything right away. “I want the courtship you promised me. I only got one dinner twelve days ago and I want more. We’re way past slow burn, but I liked what you suggested. It felt romantic.”

  He stepped close, his voice a rumble in her ear. “Hailey, it’s past midnight. We both know why you’re here.” He took her hand and guided her into the foyer and then to his apartment.

  “I know, I just said why I was here,” she told him as he pulled her to his bedroom.

  He took her dog purse and deposited Rose outside the bedroom door, closing it quietly, and flicked on the light by the nightstand. Then he took her hand, guided her to his bed, and gave her a small shove. She landed, sitting on the mattress.

  She spoke her truth in the most direct way possible. “Claire explained Jake very well, and I finally understand…” She trailed off as he joined her, his lips meeting the side of her neck, kissing his way up to her jaw while his hand slid under her sweatshirt. “Josh.”