Riley Mackenzie - Beautifully Done

Can’t. Make. This. Shit. Up.

Chase buried his head in his wife’s shoulder to hide his laughter, Lil bit her fingernail, and Dodd feigned a coughing fit.

In her oblivion, Sierra manually removed the redheaded beauty’s hand from her chest. “I’m good, no really. Besides, it’s all padding, babe. Breastfeeding sucks the life from the girls.” If Dodd shook his head one more time he was in serious jeopardy of herniating a neck disc.

“What part don’t you get?” Sierra focused back on me. “Your eyes resemble those crazy contacts models wear and you’re a freaking giant.” Her contorted facial expression screamed, ‘Duh.’

“Um, Sier, we’re about the same height, sweetheart.” I thumbed toward the two six feet plus men standing on either side of me.

“Yeah, but he’s a quarterback.” She pointed to Chase. “He’s a linebacker.” She air kissed Dodd. “And you’re the sick ass wide receiver. You just look taller. Just cause.”

Since when did she follow football? My cell started ringing and luckily I didn’t have to find out. “On that note, excuse me.” I fished it out of my black suit pants and turned my back on the crew. TP CELL. My balls did a happy dance. I was so screwed.

“Hey, you.”

“You are something else, know that?”

The bar hum was louder than I thought, so I finger closed my other ear and made my way toward the lounge to sit in one of their high-back cushioned chairs. “If you say so, not gonna argue.” Three-hour time difference, she obviously got my delivery.

“I’ll have you know, I was fully prepared to cook.” She tried to be snarky.

“I don’t doubt your abilities, Teeps.” Hell no. “But now, you don’t have to. Happy Thanksgiving.” I had the best restaurant in Coronado cater a turkey spread for twenty. Leftovers never hurt.

“What am I going to do with you, Ace?”

Hated that damn nickname, except when it rolled off her lips. “You’re going to spend New Year’s with me, that’s what.” I expected a pause.

Nope. “You skipped a holiday, you know?”

Sassy, I loved it.

“I’ll be in France for Christmas, business.” If the trip weren’t KimCore related, the next phone call I would have made would have been to Suzie, telling her to cancel. All of December. As if nineteen years wasn’t enough of a bitch to swallow, now I had my insane work and travel schedule to thank for another five weeks.

She didn’t question it. “What did you have in mind?”

“You’re coming to Boston.”

“Are you asking?”

“No.” Because I wasn’t. “You objecting?”

Even with the background noise, I heard her exhale, and then she whispered, “Nah.”

“Sweet dreams, Teeps.” I ended the call and walked back to where my friends were, no doubt sporting a lotto winning grin of my own.

Dodd was explaining the difference between Cessnas and Mavericks to the ladies, but single turbine engines were the last thing on my mind. I was counting the sips until Sam finished her anti-freeze looking drink, so we could call it a night. Ironic how I spent most of my adult life trying to make every day longer, every second count, and this blonde beauty walks back in and I was praying for a damn fast forward button. Five fucking weeks.

“Holy shit, you pulled it off.” Not that I doubted her for a second.

“Get out, get out!” Lili backhanded the air and then focused back on fluffing the flowers. “Ash, you’re ruining the surprise. Why. Are. You. Here?” No joke, she growled.

Last month after another taste of life’s fucking unfair, Chase swept her away for a last minute weekend in Sin City where Lili found all the inspiration she needed to recreate The Chandelier for tonight’s New Year’s Eve party. I hoped for her sake her newfound obsession for detail was a form of self-preservation or distraction and not the ball-busting surgeon rubbing off on her. Either way, the Cosmopolitan Hotel had nothing on KimCore’s two thousand square foot marble lobby. It looked spectacular, and sexy as shit. There had to be hundreds, maybe even thousands of ten foot shimmering strands of beaded crystals.

“Shouldn’t you be covering that up? It’s freezing outside and you’re walking around half naked.” She was cute when she was pissy.

I smirked and looked down at my sweat drenched t-shirt and running pants. I squeezed in a quick round with the bags, attempting to shed some pent-up energy. I’d been doing a lot of that lately. This was the longest I had gone since I was twenty. I tried a couple of times. I just couldn’t seem to get past the cheating on my friend part. Because that was what we were, that was all we were.

“More importantly, shouldn’t you be going to pick up Talia soon?” Her deep growl scaled up five octaves and she actually jumped a little, clapping her hands together. Hormone withdrawal was a scary beast. I felt bad for Chase. Lili’s moods were all over the place since she stopped pumping herself with all that shit. But I felt a thousand times worse for her. She wasn’t going to be getting pregnant any time soon, if ever, according to Chase. He called me in Europe, after the latest negative pregnancy test prompted yet another exam, and explained some rare fucked up uterine scar situation that sounded like it was named after me. It was a fine print risk of the surgical procedure she needed after all of her miscarriages. And because Lil’s had that kind of luck, she got her heart broken a week before Christmas. To say they both had a lot on their plate was an understatement. If executing our event gave her a bit of reprieve, so be it.

“Someone’s excited,” I winked. Screw it. I was just as excited. She was here, in a hotel a few blocks away. “Just making sure all the liquor we ordered came in.”

“Seriously if I didn’t know better I’d think you were the same person. Chase already called twice and stopped in just to be sure I didn’t miss a case of … whatever.”

We paid event planners handsomely for handling this stuff; we weren’t concerned about running out of booze. But we obviously both sucked at making excuses. Sierra had bailed on hanging with Lil today. Supposedly, Layla was teething and needed a ‘Mommy day.’ Unintentional but salt, open wound, ouch. So instead of going straight home to shower before I knocked on the Oriental Suite door in T-minus fifty-four minutes, I made time to “check” in. And since I was here, I snuck a peek behind the bar to secure a visual on the case of Prosecco I had shipped from Italy. Just where I left it. Good.

Lili whipped her hands in the air and scooted down the bar to rearrange the accent pieces that had been set down not two seconds ago. Dark blue and purple roses were draped by the millions on top of every reflective surface. Flowers were never my thing, but hell, they looked pretty good in this setting.

“You trying to kill my boy tonight? You look gorgeous.” I was a schmuck for just noticing that she was already glammed up, wearing a killer one shoulder blue satin dress that matched the flowers. It wasn’t my fault. I was a little distracted ... T-minus fifty-two minutes.

“Asher,” she snapped. “Get out! Go get dressed and pick up your girl.”

“Bossy and persistent, he’s wearing off on you.” But I liked her choice of words. Hell, I loved them. She eye daggered me and I held up my hands in surrender. “I’m going, I’m going.”

Lil was fine, holding it together, so I was sure as shit going, finally.

I valeted my nine-eleven Carrera in front of the Mandarin Oriental on Boylston.

“I’m only gonna be a couple minutes, can you keep the car running?” Sliding out of the driver seat, the wind cut through my white tuxedo shirt. It was freezing out. Even though KimCore was only a couple of blocks away I was glad I decided to drive. I opened the back door and closed it and then opened it again, finally grabbing my tux jacket. The valet attendant stood patiently waiting for me to make up my mind. “Thanks,” I mumbled in his direction.

I pushed through the revolving doors and opened her text for the tenth time. Ready when u are. Dangerous last words. I wanted to pick her up earlier but she made a last minute engagement with a friend. She didn’t offer; I didn’t ask. It seemed irrelevant, or so I hoped. I slipped on the formal black jacket and punched at the elevator button several times hoping to make the damn thing move faster. I wasn’t sure if I had ever felt like this. Lili’s last comment was stuck on repeat in my head.

I thought back to how Tal agreed to hang with me for New Year’s without questioning our destination. Even during subsequent conversations, she skirted the topic until she finally admitted she enjoyed the mystery, because no one—which I could only assume was a boyfriend—had surprised her in decades. That tidbit pissed me off. I was tempted to jump on the next transcontinental flight to surprise her with a fucking French croissant. If she knew me at all, she had twenty plus years of missed surprises coming her way. But a gala event at KimCore wasn’t one of them. I would’ve never done that to her. I only wished I could’ve told her face to face because the minutes of silence before I heard her resolve crumble sliced deep. I started from the beginning and talked until all her questions were answered. And by the end of the call she knew everything. Kim’s suffering, Chase’s development of the device, the struggles getting KimCore off the ground, even Lili’s accident. My chest constricted when she audibly sobbed.

The magnitude of walking through KimCore’s doors for the first time, on New Year’s no less, was not lost on me. No doubt this was going to be difficult for her. But her strength leveled me and her poignant words when we ended that call were still permanently ingrained in my mind. ‘Chase gave Kimi a beautiful life, Asher. Both of you have. You’ve poured your hearts and souls into a project that’s not only dedicated to our truly selfless best friend, but has given hundreds after her a second chance on life.’ I fell back on my hotel room bed that December night and squeezed my eyes shut. The last twenty years of my life flashed under my lids, a newly familiar sick feeling bubbled up from my gut. It finally dawned on me. Yeah, I lived in the moment. Yeah, I liked teetering on the outer edge of all boundaries. And yeah, I felt selfish half the time knowing I was given a second chance at life. But Talia’s perspective made me realize it wasn’t about being selfish. It was about being selfless. I had never given myself a chance to think about a future. I had barely given myself a chance to think about the next day, let alone the next year.