Page 58 of The Love Wager

Ipower on my laptop, back in the office for the first time in a week, bracing myself for the flood of work emails. What I’m not prepared for is the absolute avalanche of 127 unread messages from email addresses I don’t recognize. My stomach drops.

What the actual fuck.

I scroll through, deleting the endless marketing emails—delete, delete, delete. But even after clearing out the clogging junk, there’s still just under a hundred left. I roll my eyes and draw in a deep breath for the usual barrage of invoices from vendors that we’re struggling to pay every month, requests for free stuff from influencers, and possible complaints from thecouple of scheduled events we had while I was away. But then I click on the first email and freeze.

It's from a client praising us for the garden party my team put on last week. They absolutely loved it. The subject line on her email: Can we book in for our upcoming business dinner?

“Wait, what?” I ask my quiet office in disbelief.

I blink and keep going. Another email, same theme. Another glowing review, another inquiry for a new event. One after the other, it’s the same pattern. They saw a post on social media. A friend recommended us. They attended an event we planned and are now ready to book with us.

I’ve been gone for a week, and it’s like the business exploded in my absence. I’ve been busting my ass for over a year to build this company, and not once has anything like this ever happened.

I close my email, feeling overwhelmed by the potential scheduling crisis that’s bound to unfold. Then, as if on autopilot, I pull up our social media accounts. Our marketing manager, Madi, is the one I pay the big bucks to handle all of this. She’s in charge of our platforms and email lists and I trust her to manage everything. Leaving me free to focus on the design and outsourcing part of events.

I check our analytics—followers, views, engagement—everything is up. Not only up but skyrocketing to the moon up. People know what Indie’s Event Co. is now; even better, they want to work with us. These numbers aren’t just good. They’re life-changing.

I think I’m in shock as I sit and stare at the screen, trying to figure out how this even happened. I posted nothing special, and I don’t remember any plans to change up our marketing strategies.

I scroll through our tagged photos, half-expecting to see some high-profile influencer or celebrity endorsement I somehow missed. But then I see it and it all clicks into place.

Taylor.

I immediately reach for my phone, not even bothering to check the time to do the math for the time zone difference. Hitting Tay’s contact, I let the call ring. “Tay,” I say as soon as the beep sounds to leave a message, “I know you’re probably enjoying some delicious Grecian dinner right now, but I think we need to talk about some things. I love you. Call me back!” I hang up quickly, my mind racing, anxious to hear from her.

This changes everything.

I know what I need to do now, at least with my business side of things. That part of my life finally seems clear for the first time in months. But with the thought of Taylor comes memories of the wedding and an onslaught of suppressed feelings about Brooks. I haven’t let myself reflect on the mess we made during her wedding week.

We were like a black hole, pulling everything to focus on us with our one-track minds of each other. Dragging others into the vortex without realizing the destruction we would leave in our wake. And then everything we found together in that week vanished in the blink of an eye.

Now, it’s time to focus on what comes next, what I can control. Well, at least for Indie’s Event Co. But I also need to set things right—for them. They deserve it. It’s time to put my money where my mouth is.

My phone doesn’t make it through the entire first ring before I answer.

“Hey, girl. Spence just stepped away for a second. What’s going on?” Taylor’s voice is warm and relaxed. The clink of glasses in the background accompanies her question. She’sundoubtedly living her best life at some expensive restaurant in Santorini while I’m drowning in work chaos.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” I ask, my voice coming out a little more frantic than I intended.

“Uhm, do you want to be a little more specific and help a girl out? What are you talking about?” Tay sounds completely unphased, but I can tell she’s trying to hide something.

“The photos. The captions. Tay, I’ve got emails coming out of my ass with potential clients from all over the country.”

Her silence on the other end is almost too perfect. A beat passes before she finally responds, and I can practically see her smug grin through the phone. “Well, you wouldn’t let me help any other way and after you and Brooks blew up the wager nonsense, what…”

“Hold on, are you trying to tell me you orchestrated the whole bachelorette party bet to sway in my favor?” I cut her off, my brain trying to process that possibility.

“I’m not, not saying that,” she says casually.

“Taylor Paige Bell.”

“Caldwell now,” she corrects me in a singsong voice.

“Tomato,tomato. You went through all that trouble just to help me?” My tone drops slightly in disbelief.

“And then you derailed my perfectly laid-out plan by dragging Brooks into the mix,” she adds, sounding exasperated by my choices. “I know the business has been struggling, and you’ve been overworked and unhappy. I just wanted to help where I could. So, I got creative when you wouldn’t take the money.”

My jaw practically hits the floor. “You… you did this? You started this whole thing because you thought I was struggling that much?” My voice wavers between shock and gratitude. I wish we were on a video call so she could see how much that means to me.

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