“I was just kidding,” Daisy said, calling me back. For a moment she sounded like a little girl again. The way she’d sounded at the funeral.
We’d both grown up so fast, sometimes it was hard to remember that she was just a kid still. A kid who needed me. She had a few friends who still visited, but it was hard to be alone all day with just the nurses for company.
“Did you hear from Josh this week?” I asked.
Daisy shrugged, eyeing her phone. “He DM’d me a few times.”
“Yeah?”
“Just funny videos and memes,” she said, giving me a thin smile. “Lung transplant humor.”
“Well, there you go,” I said, reaching out to touch her on the shoulder. “Send him some back.”
“I am,” Daisy said and sighed, settling back against the pillows. “But it’s too slow. How am I meant to tell him to stop messing around and just ask me out if he’s really flirting? It’s not like we have a lot of time to spare.”
My heart stung at the casual mention of her life expectancy. It was reality for her, and it had been a reality for me for a long time, but it was still so hard to accept. Daisy was full of life – when she wasn’t stuck in a hospital bed, anyway. The thought of her being gone was too much to bear.
“You know, you’re not helpless,” I said, raising my eyebrow and powering through what I felt inside, as I always did.
“What does that mean?”
“It means ask him out yourself,” I told her with a gesture, throwing my arms wide. “This isn’t the 1950s anymore. You can take the lead.”
A faint but pleased flush started on her cheeks. “You think so? But he’s not due back in for weeks, and I might be checked out by then.”
“Ask him over text,” I shrugged. “Hell, give him a call, if you kids still do that.”
“Well, go away already so I can send it, grandad,” she said, the blush getting deeper. “I don’t want my big brother looking over my shoulder while I ask a guy out.”
“I’ve got to go, anyway,” I said reluctantly. “I love you, sis. I’ll see you Monday morning. And I promise I’ll make next Sunday Funday even better to make up for it.”
“Okay,” Daisy said. She sounded feeble, her voice weak from the excitement, but when she saw I was really going, she rallied. “Find someone delicious to bring home as a souvenir!”
I turned, hiding a smirk as I shook my head and left the room. Better not encourage her, or she’d only become more incorrigible.
I squared my shoulders and lifted my head as I left the hospital, walking back to my car. One day of work to get through trying not to be awkward around Xavi, one evening shift, and then a mad rush to the hotel – and I’d start to earn my pay.
If I was going to be able to get Daisy out of that hospital ever, we were going to need it – and even if I was nervous about playing the part, I was determined now more than ever to give Xavi whatever he needed.
And I prayed in the back of my mind that my coworker wouldn’t need something I couldn’t give.
Xavi
We stood in a loose semi-circle in the lobby, caught between the entrance doors and the restaurant. I kept glancing at the door nervously, even though I didn’t want to. I was trying to force myself to play it cool, but somehow my stupid eyes just weren’t getting the memo.
“Worried you’ve been stood up?” Ace asked with a smirk.
I glared at him. Stupid beautiful half-Korean asshole. I took a second to glare at the man next to him for good measure. Brody. Stupid leather-jacket-wearing good-for-nothing asshole who scooped Ace up and took away our friends-with-benefits arrangement. If I’d still had the option to chase Ace into one of these hotel rooms and have my way with him in secret, I wouldn’t have felt so much pressure to come here with someone.
And now all that pressure was leading to the biggest letdown of all time, because I was about to get stood up.
Of course, I was.
Who in their right mind would even want topretendto be dating Xavi Mendez?
“Don’t worry, darling,” I said with a smirk back, rearranging my face to look confident,, trying not to let anything that I was really thinking show. “If you’re so jealous, you can always sneak away from Brody tonight and come visit me. I still remember what you like.”
Brody looked appalled, and Ace snorted, folding his arms over his chest. “You never knew what I liked in the first place.”
