Kitabı oku: «The Dating Arrangement»

Chapter One

“I’m getting married.”

Jack Wright nodded his head in response. Three things had brought him to this conclusion. Number one, she was carrying a stack of bridal magazines. Number two, she was wearing a rock on her ring finger that was so large, he had to wonder if it needed its own zip code.

But the truly telling sign was the fact that she had mentioned it no less than ten times in the five minutes she’d been talking to him in The Wright Drink, his dad’s bar.

My bar.

Jack silently admonished himself. He now owned the bar and had to start acting like an entrepreneur. First order of business—dealing with the bride-to-be.

“Ms. Mitchell,” he began.

“Soon to be Mrs. Cross,” she added brightly, clutching the magazines to her light pink dress. “But please call me Trina.”

“Right. Trina. I still don’t see how I can help you.”

“My fiancé, Nick, and I met here a little over a year ago. Right over there, at the jukebox.” She gestured in that direction, with a dreamy expression on her face.

“So you’d like to have your wedding here?”

The look of horror that flashed onto her face was so severe, you would have thought he’d suggested she get married in a maximum-security prison.

“I’d actually like to have my bachelorette party here. And Nick, my fiancé, wants to start his bachelor-party night here, as well.”

While he’d attended his fair share of bachelor shindigs, he knew next to nothing about bachelorette parties. Jack pushed a hand through his dark hair and glanced around the gloomy, dank, unappealing bar. The gloomy, dank, unappealing bar that he now owned.

As if reading his mind, Trina blushed. “Although, I hope you don’t mind me saying, this place seems a bit, um, different than when Nick and I met here.”

What a polite way of saying it was a dump.

He sighed. “Well, my dad recently passed away.”

“I’m so sorry,” Trina said with true sincerity.

“The bar was left to me and it’s hit a rough spot. I’m not sure that hosting a party—of any kind—is the best idea at the moment.”

Trina’s eyes widened. “Oh please don’t say that. How about this? Why don’t you think about it? I’ll leave my cell number and you can give me a call.” She grabbed a napkin from the bar, scribbled her number and handed it over.

Jack took the flimsy paper gingerly. He knew he needed to be frank with her.

“Trina, since you’ve mentioned it, I know how the bar looks now. I have to wonder why you’re still so interested in having these parties here when you could go to a much nicer place.”

“Because this place is special to us,” she said simply.

Something about the statement clenched at Jack’s heart and he had to take a deep, steadying breath. The place meant something to her. Shouldn’t he feel the same way?

He couldn’t reply, so he nodded his head again. A smile blossomed on Trina’s face. “Okay, just think about it. If I don’t hear from you in a week, I’ll follow up. Plenty of other wedding plans to keep me busy in the meantime.”

He’d have to take her word for it, since he was hardly any kind of wedding aficionado.

“Talk to you soon,” she said before flouncing out the front door.

Since the bar wasn’t open for business yet, Jack flipped the lock. Not that customers would be clambering to get in when he did open the doors for happy hour. Aside from the engaged Ms. Mitchell, soon to be Mrs. Cross, interest in The Wright Drink lay only with a handful of regulars who had been frequenting the place since Jack was a child.

Not for the first time today, his fingers twitched as he reached for the MIA pack of cigarettes he gave up six months ago.

He walked to the back of the room and glanced at the pile of bills spread across the long, wooden bar in front of him. Jack cracked his knuckles. He probably needed reading glasses. Just like his old man had worn.

His old man.

Jack still couldn’t believe he was gone. While he knew his dad loved him, they hadn’t been particularly close in years. No games of catch in the backyard, after dinner. After all, it was hard to do anything after dinner when you didn’t usually sit down for a traditional meal. But that’s what came of a dad who owned a bar. He’d spent all of his time at The Wright Drink when Jack was a kid. And the bar had thrived.

If he believed Trina’s account, and he had no reason not to, the bar had taken a turn for the worse within the last year. According to several of his dad’s friends, that’s when his father’s health had started to deteriorate. Not surprising for someone who had smoked for well over forty years. Still, no one could ever prepare for the call that their dad had passed away.

Those same friends had also informed Jack that even though his dad’s health had been declining, he refused to stop working at the bar. He came in rain or snow, good health or bad. Looking around now, he could see that The Wright Drink had suffered as much as his dad.

After high school graduation, Jack had gone off to college on a baseball scholarship and played in the minors for a couple of years, until a knee injury put an end to that. He’d decided to travel. Backpacked through Europe. Spent some time in both Brazil and Iceland—talk about polar opposites. Eventually he’d settled in Vegas. He’d begun dealing at the blackjack tables at a fancy casino, as a favor to a friend. He’d actually enjoyed interacting with different people every night. He had worked hard and moved up the ranks, until he was a supervisor, overseeing the whole casino floor.

Jack began to pace; his long legs were eating up the distance from behind the bar, through the area of high-top tables and past the cluster of wall-mounted television sets. Another trait he’d inherited from his father.

Still, no amount of walking was going to get him out of this jam. His father had died of a very sudden heart attack, and he’d left the bar and his house to Jack. The Wright Drink had seen better days. It needed a cosmetic overhaul. It also needed a financial miracle. The pile of bills wasn’t going to shrink itself.

In their weekly—okay, sometimes more like biweekly—phone calls, James Wright had never let on that he was in trouble. If he had...

Jack stopped pacing. He would have what? Dropped what he was doing and rushed back home to Virginia? Probably not. The painful grasp of guilt wrapped around his heart and squeezed.

His mother had died when he was a freshman in high school. Both he and his dad took her death hard. His dad retreated into himself. As the owner of a business, he’d already spent a ton of time at the bar, but after his mother’s death, his dad had managed to devote even more time and attention to work. He’d stopped asking how school was going or putting in appearances at Jack’s baseball games.

He’d stopped caring.

Jack and this bar were the only things his father had. Although, only one of them seemed to get any attention from the old man.

Jack tried—mostly unsuccessfully—to shake off the sullen mood. He started to make his way into the small room his dad used as an office, when someone rapped on the front door.

Jack really wanted to tell whoever it was that the bar was still closed, but he was in no position to turn away possible business. He made easy work of crossing the room and opened the door to find his father’s lawyer and good friend standing there, holding a large tote bag, a small dog and a big grin.

“Jack, my boy, how’s it going?”

Fred Koda had been calling almost every day. Sadly, Jack’s answer to his standard greeting never changed.

“Same.”

Jack eyed the dog in Fred’s arms. He judged him to be about twenty, maybe twenty-five, pounds. He was a very light beige color and had lots of fur; he definitely had to be part poodle. He had a light brown nose, which his little pink tongue darted out to lick. Jack peered closer. The dog had green eyes. Very human-looking green eyes.

“I didn’t know you had a dog,” Jack said.

“I don’t.” Fred held the dog out to Jack. “But you do.”

Jack froze. “Excuse me?”

Fred pushed the dog into Jack’s arms. The dog immediately licked Jack’s chin. Fred waltzed into the bar. “This was your dad’s dog.”

What the what? “My father never mentioned a dog, and I haven’t seen any dog-related stuff at my dad’s house.”

“When James had his heart attack, I went over to the house and collected all of the food, treats, toys and beds I could find. He’s been living with me since that day. With you inheriting the bar and losing your dad, I didn’t want to bombard you.” He scratched the dog’s head. “Meet your new roommate, Cosmo.”

“Cosmo? What kind of name is Cosmo?” The realization hit him fast and hard. His mother didn’t drink much, but when she did, she always had a cosmopolitan.

Jack followed Fred into the bar. “Listen, Fred, I appreciate you taking care of this little guy. He is a guy, right?” Jack held the dog up and looked to his nether regions. “But I can’t take a dog.”

Fred grinned wider. “He was left to you. You are Cosmo’s new owner. But I’m going to miss our man time,” he said to the dog. “Cosmo likes to snuggle and watch TV.”

Swell. “That’s cute and all. But seriously, I can’t take this dog.”

The ironic part was that Jack used to beg for hours on end to get a dog when he was a little kid. Now here he was, shunning that boyhood dream.

Cosmo squirmed in Jack’s arms until he got comfortable. Then he licked Jack right on the mouth.

“Yuck.”

Fred chuckled. “He likes to give kisses.” He held up the tote bag before placing it on a nearby table. “Everything you need is in here. Food, toys, files from the vet. Cosmo’s a rescue.”

“My dad rescued a dog?” It was so strange that he wouldn’t mention something like that to Jack.

“Just about a year ago,” Fred said. “I think he needed a friend.”

Jack let out a long exhale, which did nothing to alleviate the hurt and guilt Fred’s comment had lodged in his throat. Intuitively, Cosmo snuggled closer to Jack, wedging his little head under Jack’s chin.

“Some other tips,” Fred said. “Cosmo is part poodle, but I’m not sure what he’s mixed with. So he doesn’t shed. He’s housebroken. He’s also very playful, takes two long walks a day, likes squeaky toys, hates the vacuum. Oh and he’s kind of a Velcro dog.”

“Velcro dog? What does that mean?”

Fred actually appeared to be a little sheepish. “He’s clingy.”

Great. Jack sighed. “Fred, Cosmo is really cute.” And he was. He would have been exactly the kind of dog he’d wanted when he was little. “But I can’t take him. I don’t even know if I’m staying in town.”

“Why wouldn’t you stay here? You have a place to live and you’re the new owner of the bar.”

“A bar that never gets any customers.”

Fred hesitated, then waved his hand as if to dismiss the idea. “Well, I’m sure it will pick up soon.”

“I’m still trying to figure out what happened here, Fred. When I was growing up, the place was packed almost every night. Now there’s a handful of regulars and that’s about it.”

The strangest part about this was the fact that The Wright Drink was located on King Street. As one of the busiest streets in the popular Old Town area, King Street generated enough foot traffic to make attracting thirsty customers a breeze. Locals and tourists alike always seemed charmed by Old Town Alexandria, with its quaint cobblestone streets, red brick sidewalks, the history and culture, the close proximity to Washington, DC, the view of the Potomac, and the restaurants and shops.

“I’m not sure what to tell you, kid. I didn’t think much of it at the time, but looking back, your dad was acting a little weird for the last year or two.”

Jack shifted. “What do you mean?”

“Forgetful. Aloof. Not that he was ever Mr. Personality before.”

Maybe something besides the lifelong smoking had been going on with his dad. With his health. His grandfather had had dementia. Perhaps his dad started to get the same thing.

“Do you think that’s why most of the regulars haven’t paid their tabs? From the receipts and records I’ve gone through, it seems like my dad hadn’t asked them to settle for the last two years.”

Fred shrugged. “Could be.”

But would asking for money drive them away? Then the bar would truly be empty. Frustrated, Jack gritted his teeth. The only thing he knew about a bar was how to go to one and order a beer.

With a sigh, he said, “Maybe I’m not cut out for this, Fred. I can always try to sell it.”

“Nonsense,” Fred bellowed. “Your dad wanted you to have The Wright Drink. He told me many times.”

“Would have been nice for him to tell me too.” He hadn’t meant to utter that out loud, but he couldn’t take it back now. Fred paused. Finally, he put a hand on Jack’s shoulder and squeezed.

“I have to get going. I’m meeting a client near Mount Vernon and I heard the Parkway is backed up.”

Panic washed over Jack. “But Cosmo?” he asked helplessly.

Fred laughed as he quickly headed for the door. “You’ll be fine.”

“He shouldn’t even be in here. There are health-code violations. Right?” Were there? He had no idea.

“James had him in here all the time. Cosmo liked to sleep behind the bar.”

“Fred, wait...”

But Fred didn’t wait. Jack was alone with a little dog—and with his thoughts, which was even worse.

He was in no better place than he was before. He still needed to figure out how to turn the bar around. Or sell. Despite Fred’s protests, Jack was considering the idea to be a very viable option.

Ashamed of the thought, he walked to the middle of the bar. In the past, this would be the point where he stepped outside for a smoke. A little stress relief. Since that was no longer an option, Jack decided to have a much-needed tête-à-tête with Cosmo.

He placed the dog on the floor. Cosmo looked up at him with adoring eyes. “Listen, I like dogs. I do. But I’m not the most stable guy on the planet.”

Cosmo shifted and then lifted his leg and peed.

Jack sighed again. Loudly. “You really going to do that in public? In the middle of a bar where people eat and drink?”

Cosmo tilted his head, as if he were considering a reply. He just looked at Jack and walked to another corner of the bar and sat. And stared back at Jack.

“Damn it.” Jack ran his hands through his hair. He swore the dog had a look on his face akin to “na-na na-na boo-boo.”

Frustrated, he went to the supply closet and retrieved cleaning supplies. “Housebroken, my ass.”

He cleaned up the mess and shoved the soiled paper towels into a trash bag. Then he rummaged through Cosmo’s luggage and found a blanket and small bed. He stuck them under the bar, and the dog pranced over to them and made himself comfortable.

“Stay,” Jack said. “I’m going to throw out this little mess.”

He didn’t think dogs really smiled, but this one looked to be grinning ear to ear.

“I mean it, Prince Charming. Stay.”

He pushed through the back door that led to the alley behind the bar. He threw the black bag into the dumpster. Hard.

March was notorious for unpredictable weather, but today was beautiful. Mild temperature, with a nice breeze. Good day for a walk. Maybe a bit of exercise would help clear his mind. Bring a bit of clarity to his current situation.

He stepped away from the dumpster and glanced up and down the alley. He was unfamiliar with these businesses. He’d have to meander down Prince Street to familiarize himself. He did know there was a seafood restaurant, off to the right, and the door on the left led to...was it a wedding-dress shop? The windows were a little too high to see inside and protected by blinds, in any case.

Jack shook his head. So much had changed in this area of the city since he’d returned. He was actually rather proud to see Alexandria’s expansion.

Then suddenly a movement out of the corner of his eye caught his attention. He turned as a blur of white ruffles began to pour out of the window he’d just been gazing at.

What the hell?

The mass of material made a strangled sound as it continued to shimmy out of the window. A few more inches and a head of curly auburn hair topped with a veil surfaced.

He froze at the sight of a bride climbing out of the window. Either that or a life-size marshmallow had just exploded into the alley.

Yep, that door definitely led to a bridal shop.

“Gotta get out. Gotta get out,” the bride chanted breathlessly.

He’d heard of runaway brides, but this was something else. He would have chuckled, but the woman suddenly slipped, leaving her and that massive dress dangling from the windowsill. He assumed her feet were under there somewhere, but it seemed like all of that fluff had swallowed them.

She let out a squeak and Jack rushed over to help. “Hang on, I got you.”

Another little yelp sounded and her arms shook right before she fell... Right on top of Jack. He tried to catch her, but with all that dress, he wasn’t sure what body part he had managed to grab hold of. All he knew was that he was falling to the hard ground of the alley, with a pile of lace and satin and soft woman covering him.

A friend of his caught the bouquet at a wedding once. Apparently he’d taken it a step further and caught the bride.