Bayside's Most Unexpected Bride. Kerri Carpenter

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ in the Big Apple. It was easier to pretend her life was closer to Friends than Two Broke Girls.

      When she’d returned to Bayside for holidays, she’d never been able to let the truth slip, which was that pretending to be a sophisticated young twentysomething in Manhattan was exhausting. And frustrating. And expensive. And...disappointing.

      She’d wanted to live in Manhattan forever. She’d had a whole picture of what her life would be like, but the reality never matched up to it.

      She was supposed to have an amazing job, a large apartment with tall windows that overlooked Central Park, a group of friends to rival Monica, Rachel and Phoebe. And, of course, her cool boyfriend would be the icing on the cupcake.

      But that’s not how Connor McKenzie turned out to be.

      She frowned. She’d seen no harm in dating her coworker. After all, their company hadn’t had a policy against it. At least, that’s what he’d told her. Why wouldn’t little old naive twenty-two-year-old Riley believe the dazzling, successful thirty-year-old Connor?

      So, all had been well...until it wasn’t. She’d moved back home.

      Well, more like run back with her tail between her legs. Now she never talked about her time in Manhattan if she could help it. Or she’d tell people the version she knew they expected to hear. At twenty-nine, Riley had definitely learned her lesson.

      Claudia’s face fell and Riley relented. She hated letting anyone down. “I mean, I guess I could put a list together. Remind me.”

      This seemed to appease Claudia. “Great. And don’t forget, editorial meeting this afternoon.”

      “Wouldn’t miss it.”

      Riley watched her editor walk to her office before returning to her screen and studying Sawyer’s name embedded in the Bayside Blogger’s column. Maybe Claudia was wrong. Maybe he wouldn’t get too mad about it.

      “Hudson.” Sawyer’s voice boomed out from his office. “Get in here.”

      As she got up and adjusted her dress, more than one head turned in her direction with sympathetic eyes. Never a good thing when Sawyer used his outdoor voice. Or called her by her last name.

      “What’s with him?” Dennis, her next-door cubicle mate, asked quietly.

      “Dunno. Probably pissed about that restaurant review I did. They were an advertiser.”

      “Hold strong.” He touched his stomach. “I ate there, too. It wasn’t good.”

      Riley grabbed her notebook and pen. “Will do.” Then she headed toward Sawyer with the sinking feeling she already knew what this was about.

      When she reached his office, she stayed where she was in the doorway. She crossed her legs, accentuating the fabulous brown suede knee-high boots she’d bought in DC last weekend when she and her best friend, Elle, had driven to the city for a girls’ weekend.

      “Hey, boss. What’s up?”

      He steepled his hands on his desk and peered at her with his dreamy hazel eyes.

      Damn. Dreamy? She meant irritating. Beady even.

      The weather was unseasonably cold already and he was sporting a pair of corduroy pants and a somewhat ugly argyle sweater that she knew had been a Christmas gift from his mother last year. Not the most stylish of outfits and yet somehow he looked like he’d walked out of the pages of an L.L.Bean catalog. Just because he was tall with broad shoulders and had really cute sandy-brown hair that flopped on his head because he needed a haircut. And today he was wearing his glasses. What was it about a large lumberjack-looking man who wore glasses? Why did that make her stomach twist up into knots? And then there was his lopsided smile...

      What in the heck was she doing? This was Sawyer Wallace, lifelong friend and, more importantly, boss. She couldn’t size him up like a piece of meat. Especially because they worked together. Especially because of what had happened to her in New York.

      “Riley,” he began.

      “Sawyer,” she countered, and bit her lip in anticipation.

      He reached into his top desk drawer and pulled out a colorful silk scarf. “Before I forget, Tony found this at The Brewside. Said you left it there a couple of weeks ago and he kept forgetting to give it to you.”

      She reached for the bright yellow scarf with lime-green polka dots. One of her favorites.

      “Thanks,” she mumbled. “Tony must have given this to you while you were on your date.” She used air quotes for the word date and wiggled her eyebrows.

      Sawyer exhaled a long breath.

      “What?” she asked, feigning innocence.

      “‘Bayside’s forever bachelor’?” he quoted. “Really?”

      She shrugged.

      “I thought I told you to keep me out of the Bayside Blogger’s column.”

      * * *

      Riley stepped into his office and closed the door. She didn’t sit in either of the chairs in front of the ancient oak desk in his office. The desk that had belonged to his great-great-grandfather. Instead, she remained standing in front of him, wearing a sexy little dress that looked like something he’d once seen on a rerun of The Mary Tyler Moore Show. Not to mention those boots that showcased her shapely legs.

      She was wringing her hands, he noticed. That meant she’d already realized he wasn’t going to like being an item in her gossip column.

      “You wrote about me? Seriously?”

      Riley scrunched up her nose in a way he found distracting. And...cute. “I’ve written about you before. Besides, it wouldn’t be fair to exclude you just because you work at the Bugle.”

      He arched a brow. “Because I own the Bugle, you mean?”

      “Well, no one’s off-limits. That was the deal we made when I started doing this.”

      “I know. Believe me, I know.” Did he ever. When Riley had originally pitched him the idea of a gossip column he’d had no idea what the Bayside Blogger would become. He’d only said yes because she’d been so excited about it.

      After she’d returned from New York City, the usually bubbly girl he’d known forever had been different. Somber, quiet, less bubbly. Not for the first time, Sawyer wondered what exactly had happened to her in Manhattan. But she never talked about it and changed the subject if New York was even brought up.

      His phone chirped and he saw a text message from his mother. He gestured to his phone. “Do you see this? You have my mom reading your column.”

      “I love your mom. Tell her I said hi.”

      Sawyer gritted his teeth. “My mom follows the Bayside Blogger. My mom mentioned the article and I told her it wasn’t true. She just asked me via text if I was planning to propose to Holly and when I said no, she asked if I was gay.”

      “Fair СКАЧАТЬ