When he held out his hand to me, I couldn’t resist saying, “I can see you’ve got the ‘being a gentleman’ part down already,” as I stepped up beside him on the sidewalk.
He sighed and buttoned his suit coat. “Is this your way of telling me that you are in fact going to comment on everything I do all night?”
“No.” I laughed, enjoying how light and playful I felt with him. I hadn’t felt this happy on a date in a really long time. “I just thought you should know that you’re doing great so far. But I will try to keep a log of everything else in my head until you ask for feedback.”
“Thank you.” He shut the passenger door. Then he held out his arm to escort me into the store. “And just remember, this is a practice date, so I’m planning to treat you like I would treat a prospective girlfriend, okay? That’s what this whole date is based on.”
“O-okay,” I said. A sudden surge of anxiety pricked at my insides as I realized just how much I wanted to experience once and for all what it would be like to be on an actual romantic date with Cole Kekoa.
24
Cole
So far, so good.
Arianna had agreed to go along with the plan for me to treat her like a potential girlfriend instead of the platonic best friend she’d seen me as for the past three years. Now all I needed was for everything to go perfectly and for the date to spark something in her brain that would allow her to actually look at me as she would a potential boyfriend.
Hopefully, the fact that I’d been stuck in the friend zone for so long wouldn’t overrule any possible advances I could make today, because this was kind of my one shot to go all out for her.
And I literally had gone all out—tried to think of all of Arianna’s favorite things and mash them all into one unforgettable night.
Because even if nothing came from all my efforts and I would have to move to San Francisco to put enough space between us so I could eventually get over her, at least she’d have one spectacular night that she would remember me by.
“Is it closed?” Arianna asked after glancing at the “Sorry, we’re closed” sign on the front door of the boutique. Then looking at the store hours, she said, “Ah, it closed at six. Dang.”
“It closes at six for regular customers,” I said. “But I may have made special arrangements with the owner to stay open just for us.”
Arianna’s eyes widened. “What?”
I loved the way her face lit up when she realized she was going to have the whole store to herself. That look in itself almost made everything I’d done for tonight worth it.
I knocked on the door to the boutique, and a moment later, a woman with shoulder-length blonde hair, wearing a black-and-white striped blouse, opened the door.
“Come on in, Mr. Kekoa,” she said with a huge smile on her face. She glanced at Arianna beside me. “And you must be Arianna.”
“Yes, that’s me,” Arianna said, dipping her head in a greeting. “Thanks for staying open for us. Cole told me he made special arrangements with you.”
The store owner, whose nametag read Hillary, glanced back at me, her eyes bright. “When a famous football star asks for a favor, you try to make it happen.”
“I bet.” Arianna linked her arm through mine. “And this one is especially hard to refuse.”
“I’ll bet he is.” Hillary looked me up and down in an appraising way, and I could only imagine what was going through her mind from the knowing look on her face.
I expected Arianna to tell Hillary that we were only friends, but instead of correcting the store owner, she eyed me with a flirtatious gaze and said. “You have no idea. He gets me to do all sorts of favors for him.”
And when she shot me a seductive look, I tugged on the collar of my shirt, my neck suddenly feeling hot. “Oh boy.”
Seeming to notice how awkward I suddenly felt, Arianna stood on her toes and whispered in a low voice next to my ear, “You wanted a practice date, right? Because I hope you’re ready for this woman to think that I’m really into you.”
Not just my neck felt hot now. My whole body suddenly decided to act like a furnace.
“How about we get started?” I cleared my throat. “Our