MCKENNA
“You want the facts? Okay, well first off, I didn’t kiss him. How’s that for a fact? I’m not the type of girl who runs around kissing strange men. And he was strange. I want to be clear on that from the start. If he’d been a normal guy with normal social etiquette, then everything would have gone as planned, and we wouldn’t be in this mess. Butnooooo, he just had to be a bench-stealing, poet-pondering weirdo, didn’t he?
“Are you writing any of this down? I don’t see you writing any of this down. This is my official statement. This needs to go on public record. I don’t know what Nate’s telling your little partner in the other room right now, but let it be known that I, McKenna Boston, didnotkiss Nate Lambert the first time we met.”
NATE
“The woman’s a nut job. First time we met, she couldn’t keep her lips off me. And that’s a fact.”
FOUR DAYS EARLIER
Was there anything that ruined a perfect marriage proposal more than a snoozing, potentially dead body on a bench?
Probably.
But right now, McKenna Boston couldn’t think of what that might be.
She lowered her Nikon camera to her chest and stared at the distant figure sprawled across the wooden park bench like an uninvited, inebriated wedding guest. Or at least what she imagined an uninvited, inebriated wedding guest might look like.
Ever since her boss declared weddings too nerve-wracking for their little photography business to take on more than a decade ago, McKenna had trouble recalling what an invited sober guest looked like anymore.
But considering nobody in their right mind would choose a wedding venue along this lonely stretch of river outside her tiny Nebraska town, in addition to the fact she didn’t spy any empty bottles, she was sticking to the napping or death theory. Mostly because she didn’thave time for any other theories. Not when she needed her sister engaged by the end of the night.
“Sir,” she called out, startling several birds in the surrounding pine trees into flight. “Sorry,” she apologized to the birds before screaming even louder, “Sir,” as she hurried forward, trying not to lose her brown Birkenstock sandals in the process.
Side note—don’t wear sandals when you’re trying to hurry, because you will lose them in the process. Several times.
Side note to the side note—don’t have size twelve feet. Cute options for summer footwear may be limited to fifteen-year-old pairs of Birkenstock sandals.
McKenna patted her outer thigh, more concerned right now with the valuable ring in her pocket than the style of her shoes. Her fingers dug into the fabric of her dress until they gripped the round metal shape buried within the pocket.
Still there. Good.
Not having a box to secure the ring made her twitchy, which is why she’d made sure to wear her cream-colored dress with the pale teal stripes. Not only did the dress make her look cute and girly—a direct opposition to the towering Amazon vibes she usually exuded as a six-foot-one woman—this dress had the deepest pockets.
She gave her outer thigh one more reassuring pat, then flicked her wrist to glance at her watch. Six thirty. Good. Everything was good. Her smartwatch buzzed with a call. Everything but this.
“Mr. Sullivan?” she whispered, holding her wrist close to her lips. What could her boss possibly need on a Friday evening?
“McKenna?” His shaky voice whispered back. “Are you okay?”
“I think so. Are you okay?”
“Why are you whispering?”
“Because you’re whispering.”
“Becauseyou’rewhispering. Are you in danger?”
“No,” she whispered. “I mean, no,” she said louder. “I’m just getting things ready for the proposal.”
“What proposal?” She didn’t have to see her boss to know he was rushing into the kitchenette area of their photography studio to look at the wall next to their coffee station where the Cat-Astrophe calendar she’d given him last Christmas hung. “I don’t see anything about a proposal.”
“It’s a surprise, remember? For my sister?”
“I hate surprises.”
Right now, so did she. “Was there something you needed?”
