“I love you, too, Daddy!” Dolly gave him a big hug. When he left, he didn’t look back.
Nikki and I didn’t move apart, but even if we had, it was too late. Tilly and Danielle had come over to the counter. Their team, The Kingpin Killers, had won sometime during Tristan’s visit.
“Finally!” Tilly cheered as she slapped a hand on the counter. Nikki and I jumped apart, and Tilly laughed. “Don’t get shy on us now, lovebirds!”
Danielle gave me a soft smile. “You cost me five dollars, but it’s worth it.”
“That’s right, pay up!” Tilly held her hand out to her wife.
Danielle ignored Tilly’s hand and kissed her. “Maybe I can pay you back some other way.”
Tilly hummed and waggled her eyebrows. “What can I say,” she said to Nikki, “She drives a hard bargain.”
“Wait,” I said, “what are you talking about?”
“We had a little bet,” Danielle said, “about you two getting together after community day.”
“Well, I thought you’d get together before pride, and Danielle said it would be after,” Tilly explained.
“I want to play, Mama,” Dolly said, tugging on my work shirt and pointing at the lanes that were starting to clear up as games were ending.
“We can take her,” Danielle said. “Want to use my bowling ball, baby? It’s got daisies painted on it,” she asked Dolly, who in return bounced up and down with excitement.
I grabbed Dolly a pair of shoes in her size, and she sat on the floor to put them on. “Thank you,” I told Tilly and Danielle. They waved me off and told me they were happy to do it. Ben was already showing Dolly how to put her name into the scoring system.
When they walked away, I could feel Nikki’s eyes on me. I hid from her gaze like a coward. She asked, “Why didn’t you tell Tilly and Danielle that we’re not together?”
“Well, I thought it would get Tristan off my back. And then, it was so fast.”
Nikki ran a hand through her waves. I wanted to reach out and touch the feathered ends. “This is so fucked up.”
“I’m sorry,” I said. “I’ll tell them the truth.” Of course, this was wrong on so many levels. Nikki and I had history, but that didn’t mean she owed me anything. When she had stood up for me, I was swept up in the moment. That didn’t equate to any underlining desire. There was a time when we might have been something more, but that was before I was a mom. That was a different version of me. That Maeda ran away and came back changed and with a kid. Nikki wouldn’t have been interested in me, not anymore. She was just a good person.
“Wait,” Nikki grabbed my hand, and my heart skipped a beat. “Maybe, we could pretend. For a little while.”
I waited for her to explain, her thumb grazing over my knuckles with a feather-light touch. Suddenly aware of what she was doing, she let go and shoved her hands in her pockets. “I want to own Lucky Lanes, but I need to prove that I’m settledhere AKA the old man wants me to be in a relationship. And, you need to get your ex off your dick, so maybe… this could be mutually beneficial?”
I stared at her. “I mean, that would be helpful, for sure.”
And, I was drawn into the fantasy. I could let myself pretend I had never left her in the first place, I could live thewhat ifthat played out in my mind over the years. But even if I had stuck around, it’s not like I could be with someone as wonderful as Nikki. She was caring and generous. Always helping others, and all I did was run.
She nodded once. “We can talk more about it later. I need to announce the next round of the tournament and the results before we close up.”
“Okay,” I looked over at Dolly. “We can talk at my place? Dolly will be asleep within an hour of getting home.”
Nikki agreed, and I was left standing there with my chest feeling like a helium balloon — stretched and light and about to pop.
Chapter Eight
Nikki
I finished locking up and sat in the gazebo in the town square for twenty minutes just drinking a soda and thinking about this scheme. Would this actually work? Mike already thought we were dating, and he would love to be right. It felt manipulative to pretend to be dating Maeda just to get through Mike’s ridiculous hoops, but it was also manipulative that these hurdles were in front of me at all. This was to benefit both of us, and since we are two consenting adults, no one would get hurt, right?
I took a deep breath as I walked up Maeda’s steps. “It’s nothing,” I said to myself. An old mantra. A reminder thatnothing was that big of a deal, a way to take something scary or overwhelming and reduce it to a manageable thing that you could hold in your hand. I texted Maeda that I was there, and she opened the door.
She was still in her work uniform. The Lucky Lanes shirt tucked into a pair of light wash denim shorts with a bisexual flag embroidered on one of the butt pockets. She had taken off her Converse and socks in favor of some house shoes.
“Come on in,” she said, unbraiding her hair and letting the soft waves hang down her back.
