Page 67 of Best Man
Keeping his wish in mind, Niko put his arm around Paulina’s shoulder.
“Ready?” she called out. “One, two,three!”
The crowd let go, and eighty-three lanterns slowly began to rise. Niko focused on his and Paulina’s lantern for as long as he could, watching it climb higher and higher, until it got lost with the others. Together, all those lanterns formed a speckled mass of light, bobbing and weaving in the sky like a school of fish in the ocean.
The kids went,“Woooooooow!”
“That’s so awesome!”
Everyone milled around and watched the points of light get smaller and smaller—until they were so high, they didn’t appear to move anymore, as if they’d become stars themselves.
“They’re so high up!”
“Thanks, everybody! Let’s hopeallyour wishes come true!” Paulina said, and with that, she switched off the mic.
“Great idea,” Niko said quietly. “Everybody loved it.”
“Thanks for talking me into it, Sasha. I couldn’t have done it without you.”
“Yes, well, I know a great idea when I hear it,” he bragged.
She laughed. “Oh, is that right? You’re so modest.”
Piper raced over and threw her arms around Paulina. “That wassosweet, Paulie. Thank you somuch!”
The sisters squeezed each other tight. “Really? You liked it? I was afraid you’d hate it—like I was hijacking your wedding or something!”
“Hate it?! No way! That was so much fun! And what a great way to bring something from our childhood into the wedding!”
Niko, standing close by, sang to Paulina, “I told you.”
“I couldn’t have done it without Sasha, by the way,” Paulina said. “Not only was he a huge help last night, he talked me into it when I was having doubts. So thank him, too.”
Piper threw her arms around Niko’s neck. “Thank you, Niko! I loved it!”
“You’re welcome, Piper.”
After Jax thanked Paulina, he gave Niko a bro hug. “It all makes sense now,” Jax said with a smile—and Niko could see the relief that now filled his eyes. “I’ll admit, I kinda thought you were up to no good when you asked to borrow my truck.”
“Nahhh,” Niko said, waving his hand. “I told you, it was all for the wedding.”
“I thought the same!” Piper admitted with a laugh. “Paulie, when you presented that lantern to me at first, I was like—thisis what she was working on all night?! Don’t get me wrong, I was touched—but at the same time, I started thinking,‘Okay, wait. A single sky lantern? What were those two really up to last night?’ Because even when we were kids, we could make one of those in, what, a half-hour tops?”
“I know! I could see it in your eyes,” Paulina said with a laugh. “But yeah, Sasha and I wanted to make enough for everybody. We only had eighty-four total when we stopped making them at four in the morning, but we figured that’d be enough.”
“Wait, you were making these until four in the morning?” Jax asked.
“Yep!” Paulina said.
“Huh. That’s funny,” Jax said, and he slowly turned to face Niko. “I thought you said you were making them until the sun came up?”
Shit, Niko thought. They’d been caught giving different stories. “I, uhhhh,” he stammered. His mind raced as he tried to think up some excuse to explain the contradiction. Complicating everything was the fact that Hathaway had spotted him parking the truck at the hotel around seven in the morning, too.
Paulina pursed her lips. “Did I say four? I don’t remember what time it was—it might’ve been later. I wasn’t keeping track, but the sun definitely came up atsomepoint, didn’t it, Sasha?”
“It certainly did,” he said, his mind flashing back to seeing the sunrise through Paulina’s bedroom window.
“You know what?” Piper held up her palms to stop the discussion right where it was. “I’m not even going totryto figure out what’s going on right now. Tonight’s been so amazing, I don’t even care.”
