Page 12 of Faking It with my Small Town Billionaire

“I’m not sure they would all fit into this tiny bakery, Miss… Lily,” I say, correcting myself.

“We could hold it at the school,” she offers.

I draw a quick intake of breath, too slow to hide my reaction. Having to come back to this town is bad enough. Returning to Willow Creek High is an entirely different ball game.

“Oh, Lord. I’m so sorry,” she says hurriedly, placing a hand on my arm. “I didn’t mean—I mean, I didn’t think… It’s just… I don’t know. You know what? It doesn’t matter. We don’t need to have a meeting.”

I can’t help it. Her overreaction makes me chuckle. Maybe I need a release of tension, or maybe it’s just the rapid way that everything flew out of her mouth like gunfire, but the laughter bursts from my chest.

For a second, Lily looks surprised, then confused, and then her face settles and she laughs with me. But for some reason, I can’t stop. And nor, it seems, can she. Our nervous systems have taken over, and we laugh for so long that I begin to forget what we were laughing about to begin with.

“My stomach is killing me,” I moan through the laughter.

“So are my cheeks,” she cries, pressing her hands against them to alleviate the pain.

This makes us laugh even more, and with tears running down our faces, the two of us are hysterical.

“We need to stop,” Lily cries. “My sides. Oh, my sides.” Her hands move from her cheeks to her sides, and back again. This makes me laugh even more, and upon seeing me laughing, she bursts forth with fresh laughter of her own.

It goes on for a while, until, eventually, with sore stomachs, sore cheeks, and tears in our eyes, we begin taking big, panting breaths to calm ourselves down. Every few seconds, a little laughter escapes, and I try hard to suppress it. Lily does the same. It takes another five minutes until we fully regain our composure.

“Oh, my word,” I breathe, still struggling to fill my lungs properly.

“That was nuts,” Lily says plainly, but she’s grinning. “I haven’t laughed like that in years.”

And as she says those words, I realize I can’t remember the last time I really laughed at all. I mean properly laughed, with no holds barred.

“I am sorry,” Lily says, now that she’s calmed herself.

“Don’t start that again,” I quip.

She smiles, but then the smile fades. “I didn’t think it through, Mr. Donovan. It was stupid of me.”

Maybe it’s the laughter, maybe it’s Lily Harper being kind once more, but at this juncture, I look at her. “If I’m calling you Lily, then you must call me Orson. It’s what you used to call me,” I say gently.

“Yes. Yes, I did,” she replies.

“Good. Then that’s settled. Organize a meeting at the school, and I’ll speak to the town,” I say, standing from the table.

Lily stands with me, her face marred with uncertainty. “Are you sure?”

“You don’t need to worry about me anymore, Lily. I’m a grown man.”

But after the farewells, once I’m safely in my car, the smile falls from my face.

Darn you, Pops!

6

Lily

Even as I hurry around the school’s gym, making last-minute checks before Orson gets up to speak to everyone, I still feel like this is a bad idea. I should have kept my big mouth shut.

Orson had left his card with me after our meeting about the proposal for the bakery; as soon as I woke the next morning, feeling like all the fools of the world combined, I texted him telling him again that we didn’t need to organize a meeting at the school. I mean, after everything I had relayed to Jasmine, what the heck had I been thinking?

You worry too much, Lily, was his reply.

I worry just enough, I texted back.

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