Page 5 of Fools in Love

“April,” Sheila practically growled in warning.

I held up a hand. “I’m stopping. Promise.”

The auction was proving to actually be entertaining. Women got into bidding wars, screaming at one another as they fought over who could raise their paddle the quickest. Meredith kept hers firmly in her lap, the price growing way too steep, too fast. She had been right about her hundred-dollar bill getting her nowhere. At least in this crowd.

Before I knew it, the last bachelor was being announced.

“Ladies, this is the last bachelor of the evening. I hope you’re ready for him,” the emcee teased, playfully toying with the already-riled-up women.

I breathed out a quick sigh of relief that I’d managed to make it through the evening unscathed when the air suddenly caught in my throat at the sight of the guy now standing onstage. It wasn’t that he was good-looking because every single man on that stage tonight had been conventionally hot. Each one could have been on a magazine cover, but that was Manhattan for you. Gorgeous men lurked around every corner.

The chiseled, dark-haired guy up there now looked uncomfortable.

Agitated.

Angry even.

And for whatever reason, his ire drew my attention right to him.

He didn’t want to be here. At least we had one thing in common.

“That’s Robbie Mitchell. He’s a firefighter.” Sheila leaned toward me, and I nodded because the emcee had just informed the room of the same thing.

“I heard.”

“He works with Captain Alvarez,” she said, and all the pieces suddenly clicked together as the emcee started the bidding.

Sheila and Captain Alvarez had some sort of romantic history between them that neither one ever spoke of, but anyone with eyes could see it. Whenever they were in a room together, you could almost hear the air crackling with sparks.

“Why didn’t you ask him to be the bachelor instead of one of his younger guys?” I asked, knowing that the question would irritate her to no end.

She shot me a look that would have killed weaker people on the spot. “You know why,” she responded.

Before I could even savor in my win, Sheila was reaching for my arm and thrusting it into the air.

“Five hundred fifty dollars to number one-two-three,” the emcee shouted before pointing at another woman across the row from me, who was upping the ante.

“What the hell?” I yanked my arm out of Sheila’s grip, but she did it again without warning, and the announcer focused his attention back on me. “Stop making me bid!”

I made the mistake of looking toward the elderly woman on the other side of the room, who I was suddenly in battle with. She glared at me, pointing two of her fingers from her eyes to mine, and I turned toward Sheila, wondering what the hell she’d gotten me into and why.

“That old lady over there is plotting my death.”

“She’ll get over it,” she said before forcing my arm up again.

How the hell is she so strong?

“She’s going to poison my drink,” I whisper-shouted as I dropped the paddle, not wanting to die at the hand of some bitter grandma who had nothing left to lose.

I realized too late that letting it go was a stupid move instead of a smart one. Sheila picked it up and kept on bidding until my number was declared the winning bidder—at over three thousand dollars! I sure as heck wasn’t paying three grand to go on a date with Mr. Sourpuss up there.

Right when I was about to let Sheila know exactly that, she stood up from her seat and said, “I’m going to go write a check for your bachelor. I’ll be back to introduce you.”

“I don’t want him! You keep him! It was your bid!” I shouted at her, but she waved me off and continued walking away.

Meredith couldn’t stop laughing. Her arm was wrapped around her stomach as she bent in half.

“I will fire you,” I threatened, and that only made her amusement grow.

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