Wooing Cadie McCaffrey

by Bethany Turner

  Several minutes later, I had finished explaining how Will’s really good day at work, his really nice suit, and my mental twisting of every single word he said into confirmation that he was finally ready to commit to spending the rest of his life with me had mingled to result in the biggest mistake of my life.

  “So, what are you going to do?” Darby asked me.

  “What am I going to do about what? I don’t suppose there’s much to be done. It’s not like I can press Command-Z on this one.” I sighed as I stared blankly at the trusty iMac on my desk. How much easier life would be if it were like a spreadsheet—no mistake would be permanent, and you could sort and filter until things made sense.

  She nodded. “That’s true. You can’t undo it. But life will carry on in spite of that.”

  I crossed my arms as I leaned back in my chair. I wasn’t entirely convinced she was right about that. At the very least, life as I had known it had come to an end.

  “Look, Cadie,” she continued. “I know how important it was to you to wait until marriage. I get it. But guess what? You messed up.”

  “Wow. Thanks, Darb.”

  She shrugged. “You messed up like we all mess up—in different ways. And yeah, sometimes we even do things we told God—and ourselves—we wouldn’t. Now you need to figure out how to move forward. I think after you talk to Will—”

  My eyes flew open wide. “Talk to Will? How can I talk to him?”

  “You go down the hall, turn right, walk about fifty yards, and then take another right. It’s not that difficult.”

  I was not amused. “I’m serious, Darby.”

  “I know you are, Cadie. So am I.”

  She walked over to the window that looked out into the hallway and peeked through the blinds—presumably to try and figure out if Will was in the building. I hadn’t bothered to look for myself. He was there. I was sure of it. And it probably wasn’t going to be long until he knocked on my door and tried to get me to talk to him.

  “I’m not fooling myself that I can avoid him forever.” I sighed. “After he tried calling a couple times, I texted him and asked him to give me the weekend. And he did. I told him I’d talk to him soon, and I will. But right now, I don’t know what to say. I spent all weekend thinking, and I still really don’t know what to say.”

  Darby walked away from the window and returned to her seat across the desk from me. “What do you want to say?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean, what’s on your heart?”

  I scoffed. “I don’t think I can say what’s on my—”

  “But if you could,” she interjected, tenderly, “what would it be?”

  I sighed . . . again . . . as tears sprang to my eyes . . . again.

  “That I’m sorry.”

  “For the other night?”

  I shook my head. “No. I mean, yes. That too.” Definitely that too. “But really for everything leading up to the other night. The misunderstandings, I guess, if that’s what they were. The year of distance between us—”

  “But that wasn’t all your fault,” she insisted.

  I shrugged. “Wasn’t it? I really don’t know. Is it really his fault if I had us built up in my mind to something more than what we were?” I took a deep breath. “I guess, right now, I would really just want to ask him what the point was.”

  “The point?”

  “Of being together for so long and getting my heart to where it’s convinced that I could never love anyone else like I love him, only to realize we’re headed toward . . . nothing. What was the point of any of it?”

  It was my turn to walk to the window and look out, but I wasn’t looking for Will, or even thinking of him at all, really. Not right then. If anything, I was just searching for a way out.

  Once upon a time, my mother had said that when I found the right man, I’d know. She said that there were three characteristics that were nonnegotiable—he had to be a Christian, he had to earn a good living, and he had to be someone she and my father approved of. Of course, at the time I was thirteen and convinced that I was in love with Gabe Thorstun, who was known to his peers as Surge.

  I’m sure my mother thought that by laying out those three indisputable qualifications for a boyfriend, she was protecting me from Surge. “Trust me,” she said. “If the young man has those three things in his corner, the rest will be easy.” The rest will be easy.

  Will Whitaker had given his life to the Lord, worked hard to make a decent living, and my parents loved him, but for the first time I was realizing that my mom didn’t know what she was talking about. Nothing about any of it was turning out to be easy.

  “What’s been the point?” I repeated as I continued staring out the window. “I’d almost feel better if I could at least believe it was some sort of long con to get my money.”

  “You have money?” she asked with a smile.

  “No! See? I’m not even worth conning.”

  She was laughing as she joined me by the window. “If this was a long con, it was the worst long con in history. Let’s face it, Will is no Sawyer.”

  I faced her with a smirk. “Ah. So you’re on . . . what? Season two?”

  When all the world was obsessed with Lost, tuning in every week to see if polar bears or smoke monsters or Others would show up, Darby refused to jump on the bandwagon. It was only a couple of months prior, while recovering from pneumonia and out of things to watch, that she gave in and watched an episode. Now she was just like everyone else—obsessed, confused, and regularly alternating between Team Sawyer and Team Jack.

  Okay, so she was just like everyone else was . . . in 2005.

  “Sawyer just pulled that long con on that Cassidy woman—”

  “Oh, the one he had the baby with?” I asked, fully aware of what I was doing.

  The color drained from her face. “Spoilers!”

  “Nope.” I chuckled. “Sorry, but the spoiler statute of limitations has expired.”

  “Anyway . . .” she said, her tone long and drawn out—and annoyed. “Your four years with Will were not a long con.” She gave my hand a quick squeeze as she left me at the window and walked to the closed door, where she had apparently left her slipped-off shoes at some point. Sometimes I wondered why Darby even bothered to walk out of her apartment in shoes. They never stayed on.

  I faced her and then hoisted myself up onto the little ledge of the window. I crossed my arms and dangled my feet as I said, “I know. But if I could convince myself that he never loved me, at least I could stop trying to figure out why he doesn’t love me enough,” I muttered, accompanied by my closest companions, sigh and cry. “Why does it feel like that’s so much worse? What’s wrong with me, Darb?”

  “Nothing, apart from the fact that you have the musical tastes of a seventy-two-year-old woman.”

  I quickly decided that right then was not the moment to share with her that Barry Manilow had been my soundtrack of sorrow throughout the weekend. Not that she would be surprised. Barry had provided the soundtrack for most of the key moments in my life, from the time I was a little girl whose parents only allowed three pop music options in the house: Barry Manilow, Pat Boone, and Debby Boone. Compared to “Love Letters in the Sand” and “You Light Up My Life,” “Copacabana” seemed positively scandalous.

  “For what it’s worth, I don’t think my musical tastes are what’s keeping Will from wanting to spend his life with me. Too bad, really. If it were as simple as that, I could at least figure out how to proceed. What am I supposed to do when the only thing keeping the guy I love from wanting to marry me is, you know . . . the fact that I’m me?”

  Darby put her hand on the doorknob. “That’s absurd. You are quite the prize, you know. Well, maybe you don’t know, but I know. And Will definitely knows. I haven’t the slightest idea what’s keeping him from proposing to you, but whatever it is, it’s his problem. Not yours.”

  That was such a best friend thing to say, and I loved her for it. What’s more, I
knew she believed it was true. If only I could find a way to make myself believe it.

  “I mean, that’s weird, Cadie.”

  “What is?”

  “Four years, and you guys never talked about marriage? That’s not normal. I don’t care if people decide to get married or not, but at some point in a relationship that lasts that long, it’s going to come up.”

  “It’s not that it never came up.”

  “So it has come up? I don’t remember you ever telling me that.”

  I waved off her interest. “There’s no story there. Seriously. I don’t even remember what was said, really. It was about a million-and-a-half years ago.” I groaned as I looked at the clock and realized it was way past time to get to work. I descended from the window and walked to my desk to finally turn on my computer—thirty minutes after I arrived at the office. “I guess that’s not really the point, anyway. Even if he had proposed at the end of the night, we’d have already thrown a lot away. And here I’d thought the worst thing to come from our date would be me breaking up with him. If only.”

  She opened the door. “You going to be okay today? If you need to take another day off—”

  “I’ll be okay.” I did all I could to present a genuine smile for her. The appreciation I was feeling for her was most assuredly genuine—even if my face didn’t want to cooperate. “Thanks, Darb.”

  I figured I’d be okay, but that didn’t stop me from hurriedly moving to the door and closing it behind her as soon as she walked out. My hand hesitated as I tried to make up my mind—to lock or not to lock.

  Not to lock. I couldn’t stay hidden away forever. If Will showed up, I would just feign malaria.

  8

  A Million-and-a-Half Years Ago (Okay . . . More Like Three)

  Hey, where’s that research kid?”

  Will knew he should be satisfied—thrilled even—that Kevin Lamont was asking for him at all. He was working his dream job at his dream network, and one of the industry greats knew that he existed. Most days, that was enough. But every once in a while, he wondered if it would be too much to ask to be called by his name. Lorenzo Bateman in legal had finally begun calling him William, and despite the fact that his name was not William—even on his birth certificate, it was just Will—he liked to think that progress was being made.

  “I’m right here, Mr. Lamont.” He set down the cup of coffee he hadn’t finished filling and returned the coffeepot to the burner before turning. “What can I do for you, sir?”

  “Well, for one thing, you can stop calling me Mr. Lamont. You’ve been here, what, six months already?”

  “A little more than a year, actually.”

  “And you’re dating Cadie McCaffrey from accounting, right?”

  Will’s eyes flew open, not having expected his love life to come into the conversation. “Yes, I am.”

  “I like Cadie.” He paused before adding, “I like that my sports career means nothing to her.”

  “I wouldn’t say your career means nothing to her. No, she’s not much of a sports fan, but—”

  “That’s an understatement!” Kevin laughed boisterously. “But she’s unapologetic, she knows who she is, and just as importantly, she knows who she’s not. I get so tired of the suck-ups and the yes men. As far as I’m concerned, if someone is good at what they do, they should be confident enough to avoid all of that brownnosing stuff that so many people in this industry fall into.”

  “My name is Will,” he suddenly blurted out. “Not ‘research kid’ or ‘new guy’ or even William, or any of the other names I’ve been called in the past year.” His confidence dissipating quickly, he added, “Sir.”

  Kevin was silent for just a little bit too long, and Will couldn’t interpret the mood being communicated through the eyes that were boring holes into him. He quickly decided his safest move was to turn the topic of conversation back to Cadie.

  “Cadie does actually try to connect with the sports stuff, sometimes. She’ll use sports analogies to explain accounting to me.”

  “Hang on.” Kevin reached out with one of his legendary-wingspan arms and placed one of his grip-a-basketball-in-his-palm hands on Will’s shoulder, the tension seemingly defused. “McCaffrey uses sports analogies?”

  “Well, they’re awful, of course. Usually they just involve a ‘player guy’ running a ball down a ‘court thing.’” Despite his nerves, and the general uncertainty as to whether or not he had just thrown away his career in a fit of assertiveness, Will couldn’t help but smile. “I just like that she tries.”

  Kevin laughed. “Don’t you think for even a minute that she can’t keep up with your stuff. She’s attempting to dumb down for you. Not the other way around.”

  “Yes,” Will replied. “I am fully aware of that, sir.”

  “Good. Just so that’s clear. I for one am glad I’m married to a woman who’s smarter than I am, but the fact that she goes to a great deal of effort to make me feel like I can keep up with her, well . . . let’s just say I’ve got a good one. Sounds like you’ve got a good one too, Will.”

  “Thank you, Mr. Lamont,” Will said, quite impressed with how well he was hiding the elation he was feeling upon hearing Kevin Lamont finally say his name.

  “Seriously, man.” He pointed a finger toward Will’s face. “If you don’t start calling me Kevin, I’m going to go back to calling you ‘research boy.’”

  Um . . . that’s ‘research kid,’ Will thought and very nearly said before he thought better of it.

  “Okay. You got it.”

  “Good. So, look, we’re going to be pulling together an hour special on Jordan. I’m going to have them send you over some questions, and then I want you to meet up with him and prep him before the interview.”

  “Jordan? Michael Jordan?”

  “His people are expecting your call. You’re probably looking at coffee tomorrow or Friday. Let me know once it’s set up, and then you’re going to run point on B-roll.”

  Kevin spun on his heel and began walking away, but Will stopped him.

  “I am incredibly flattered. Of course. But I literally just got back from a trip interviewing the Zamboni driver for the Manitoba Junior Hockey League. Are you sure—”

  “I’m tired of the suck-ups and the yes men,” Kevin repeated. “And you’re good at what you do, Will.” Will stared at him in silence, afraid to move. “So go do it.”

  Two minutes later Will was briskly walking—and when no one was around, running—through The Bench’s hallways. He’d just been handed the biggest, most important assignment of his life, he was about to make a phone call to arrange a sit-down with one of the greatest, most legendary athletes of all time, and he was no longer “research kid.” Only one person could make the day even better.

  “Hey,” he said as he poked his head into Cadie’s office.

  “Hey there,” she responded in greeting, and the smile on her face—the one he knew was reserved for him—validated his belief that a few minutes with her was worth making Michael Jordan’s people wait. “This is a nice surprise.”

  “How’s your day?”

  “Not too bad. You?”

  “Good, actually.” He stepped farther in. “Kevin is putting me in charge of B-roll for a Michael Jordan special, and as if that weren’t enough, I get to sit down with Jordan and do some prep.” Even as he said it, the reality was still setting in.

  “Will!” Cadie squealed, jumped up from her chair, and ran into his waiting arms. “That’s huge!”

  He continued holding her but pulled back to look at her with a smirk. “Okay, I appreciate the enthusiasm, but do you know who that is?”

  “Of course! He’s the really good rugby guy!” She winked and then laughed as she removed herself from his arms—despite his resistance—and returned to her desk. “Just kidding. Even I know Michael Jordan. I mean, he was in Space Jam, so . . . total legend.”

  He watched her as they continued talking, and he was keenly aware that she wasn’t the direct
ion he had imagined his life going. Every woman he had dated before Cadie, on the other hand, had been exactly the type of woman he had thought he would spend his life with. The type who had their own season pass at Fenway and gave him a run for his money in Fantasy Football. Cadie McCaffrey was definitely not that type.

  “She’s unapologetic, she knows who she is, and just as importantly, she knows who she’s not.”

  “What?” she asked when she caught him looking at her so intently. When he said nothing, a slightly self-conscious grin spread across her face and she asked again, “What is it?”

  “Nothing,” he replied nonchalantly with a shrug. “Just thinking of something Kevin said today. He said he’s glad he’s married to a woman who’s smarter than he is, but he appreciates the fact that she goes to a lot of effort to make him feel like he can keep up with her. And I was just realizing how lucky I am to have you. You definitely go to that effort for me, and I guess I just wanted to let you know that I see that.” He sat on the edge of her desk beside her chair.

  She picked up a few papers, carefully placed them in a file folder, and then stood to take the folder to the tall, tan cabinet in the corner. Then she joined him at the edge of the desk and bumped him gently with her hip. He scooted over in response, and she sat beside him.

  “You’re a pretty sharp guy, Whitaker. I don’t think I have to work all that hard.” She leaned over and rested her head on his shoulder. “But that’s very sweet. Thank you.”

  Will kissed the top of her head. “I think we’ve got a good thing going, McCaffrey.”

  She turned to face him, and his face was still close. She leaned in just a touch farther and rested her forehead against his.

  Will adjusted his angle so that his torso was parallel with hers, and then he draped an arm across her and slid her toward him on the desk, closing the already minimal gap between them.

  “I love you,” he whispered against her lips.

  Cadie smiled and said, “I love you too,” as she raised her hands to his face and grazed his jawline with her fingertips. He tilted his head, leaning into one of her hands, as his free hand made its way to the back of her head. He began pulling her toward him, their lips already brushing against each other, but she resisted.