But she didn’t seem to want anything to do with me, and to be honest, I couldn’t stop thinking about her. If I had said something wrong, I just wanted to know what, so that I could apologize to her. I had hoped that things would just blow over eventually. Bailey didn’t seem like the kind of person to hold a grudge. Clearly things weren’t blowing over, though, and finally, I knew that I had to talk to her about it.
I thought about asking Kayla first. Maybe Bailey had said something to her. The two of them had easily fallen back into being close friends now that Bailey was back. But it didn’t seem professional to talk to Kayla about this, and I was afraid that she would see right through me.
See through to the fact that I actually found myself liking Bailey. In a way that I had never expected to like anyone again, after Beth.
Oh, I wasn’t in love with Bailey. Nothing like that. But she was smart and cute and there was something about her that just drew me in. She was like a warm fire to my cold bones. All I knew was that I couldn’t keep obsessing over figuring out what I had done wrong. Better to just talk to her about it.
I caught up to her as she finished her conversation with Kayla and headed out towards the condos. “You’ve been avoiding me,” I said, walking up alongside her.
Bailey gave me a surprised look which quickly turned sheepish. Was it my imagination or had she picked up the pace a little, like she was hoping to get away from me? I grimaced. I didn’t think that it was my imagination, and it only made me more certain that I had done something wrong.
Instead of telling me what, though, Bailey sighed. “Things have just been busy,” she said. “I feel like I’m being pulled in every direction.” She gave a quick laugh. “I know you told me things were going to get crazy once people started arriving for the holidays, but I guess I didn’t expect anything like this.” She was smiling, though, as she looked down at the resort from up here on the raised part of the base area that held one of the restaurants as well as the condo buildings.
“It’s one of the busiest winters I’ve ever seen here,” I agreed, looking down at everything. I paused. “From what I hear, you’ve been doing a damned good job here. Everyone’s pretty impressed.”
I could see the faintest tinge of pink on Bailey’s cheeks. “Thank you,” she said quietly.
I shrugged easily. “Just calling it like it is,” I said. We were both silent for a moment. Suddenly, I found myself blurting out the words: “Let me take you to dinner tonight. To get your mind off work. And to celebrate a successful start to the season for you.”
Bailey gave me a surprised look. “Adam, I don’t know,” she said, and I could hear something in her voice. Like she wanted this but wasn’t sure if it was such a good idea.
“Just as coworkers. Or friends,” I quickly clarified. “I’m sure you don’t know the area very well, so let me show you some of the good places. It’s the least I can do. Plus, then you’ll have an idea of where to recommend to our guests if any of them ask you.”
Bailey stared at me for a moment longer. I was kicking myself. I knew that I didn’t want to go to dinner with her just as friends, and I definitely didn’t want her thinking that this was just some work thing. But the damage had already been done.
She smiled shyly at me. “That sounds nice,” she said quietly. “What time are you done today?”
“Should be around five,” I said.
“I’ll meet you in the lodge?”
“Perfect,” I said. I watched her walk away towards the condos. I wanted to follow after her, to stop her, to tell her that I hadn’t meant for this to be as friends or about work. I had told myself that I was never going to fall in love again, and I meant that. And what’s more, I wasn’t ready to start anything serious.
But I wanted this to be a date.
I didn’t know how to explain that to Bailey, though. And I knew all the reasons why it couldn’t be a date. They went beyond the fact that I had lost my first wife. Bailey was my boss, and she didn’t know about my history. She didn’t know about Beth, and she didn’t know about Ethan. If we started dating, I was sure to have more than a few moments where I panicked at the very thought of commitment.
Anyway, maybe this was a good thing. If we both approached this as friends, if we really got to know one another, maybe we could hang on to our friendship even if it never could evolve into anything more. I had promised Ian that I would look out for her.
God, Ian. He would probably kill me if he knew that I had a thing for his younger sister. Even if I never acted on it, I knew that he would never approve. Just another reason to let Bailey think I just wanted to go to dinner as friends and colleagues.
I couldn’t keep thinking about this now. I had work to do. Like Bailey had said, there were a lot of guests here this week, and that meant that there were a lot of hot tubs that needed fixing, basic lift maintenance to keep track of, lightbulbs to change, snowmobiles to work on, and everything else that went into running the resort. I had a full list of things planned for that afternoon.
But at the end of the day, even though I hadn’t finished quite as much as I had hoped to that day, even though normally I might have stayed longer and finished up a few more projects, I was only too happy to head to the lodge to meet Bailey.
She showed up just a couple minutes after I did, looking flushed and hurried. “Sorry, I’m late, aren’t I?” she asked, immediately checking her watch.
I laughed and shook my head. “Relax, I just got here a minute ago,” I told her. I eyed the soft green sweater that she had changed into. “You look nice.” I hadn’t realized that she would actually get ready for this dinner together. Especially not since I had very clearly told her that this wasn’t a date, that this was just about work and friendship.
She blushed deeper and shook her head. “One of the guests was having trouble with his car, so I helped him jump it. But anyway, when I was attaching the jumper cables, I leaned up against the car and got all covered in mud.” She met my eyes with a challenge in her own, like she was daring me to question her story.
I shook my head, grinning at her. “Now you know why mechanics are always in old flannels and jeans,” I joked, gesturing at my own outfit.
“You always look good,” Bailey blurted out, then looked mortified at having said that. I couldn’t help grinning, but I didn’t respond to that, just led her out to the parking lot.
“The place I want to take you to is a few miles away,” I told her, “but I was thinking that since your condo is here at the hill, we could take your car and then drive back here, and then I’ll pick my truck up then.”
“Sounds perfect,” Bailey said, leading me over to a nice new sedan. “Where exactly are we going?” she asked as we drove.
“It’s this great little Irish pub. Good live music most nights, a good beer list, and some of the best hearty, warm food that you can imagine. Perfect for after a day of skiing.”
“Sounds great,” Bailey said, nodding approvingly. Then, she gave me an appraising look. “You’re not going to make me dance, though, are you?”
I laughed and shrugged playfully. “We’ll see.”
“So how’s it feel, being the successful new owner of one of the best resorts in the west?” I asked Bailey when we had ordered dinner.
She snorted and shook her head. “I don’t know if you could really call me ‘successful’ just yet,” she protested. “I mean, sure, I haven’t made any huge mistakes, at least not that I know of, but the whole reason things are running as smoothly as they are is because you guys already have such a great system in place.”
I shrugged. “That’s partly because the previous owners didn’t want to be involved at all, with any of this,” I said.
“I still can’t imagine that,” Bailey said. “I mean, I know there are people like that. But if I’m going to own a business, I want to be right there on the ground level, involved with as much as I can. It’s fun to me.”
“It’s more about the money to some people
, though,” I reminded her.
“Yeah, I guess so,” Bailey said. She paused and then grinned at me. “But you said that this dinner was about getting my mind off work,” she reminded me cheekily.
I laughed. “That is what I promised,” I agreed. But at the moment, I couldn’t think of anything to say that wasn’t about work.
Or about Ethan, but I still wasn’t ready to tell Bailey about my son. I wasn’t sure why, exactly. Well, maybe because if I told her about Ethan, I would have to tell her about Beth, and I wasn’t ready for her to know about Beth just yet. I didn’t want to see her pity over the fact that I was thirty-two and already a widower.
But that wasn’t all of it. Maybe it was just that I was afraid if she knew about Ethan, she would be even more hesitant to call me into work on my days off. Or maybe it was the fact that she wouldn’t want to go to dinners like this with me if she knew that I had a son that I was responsible for as well. Never mind that Ethan was perfectly happy to spend the evening with his grandfather. Never mind that I had plenty of time to spend with my son even during these busy holiday weeks.
I wasn’t sure exactly what held me back, but with my whole life spent either at work or home with Ethan, I didn’t know what else to talk about.
Bailey came to my rescue, though. “So, do you have any plans for Christmas?”
I shrugged. “Not really,” I said. “I usually go skiing every year. It’s one of the best days of the season. Never too crowded, and everyone’s just out to have some fun.”
“I would have thought that Christmas would be one of the busiest days to be out there,” Bailey mused.
I shook my head. “Nah, most people are at home spending time with their families,” I reminded her. And of course, I would be spending time with my family as well. It was the one day of the year that I could count on Dad to get out there and ski with me and Ethan. But I didn’t explain all of that to Bailey.
“What about you?” I asked her instead. “Are you staying here or headed back to Vegas to spend time with Ian?”
“I’ll be here, but I’m still hoping that Ian will be able to get back here at some point during the season,” she said, shrugging her shoulders. “Can I admit something?”
“Sure,” I said, heart already hammering with ideas about what she might admit. Had she heard something about me from Kayla or one of the other workers? Or did she want this to be a date?
But her confession had nothing to do with me. “To be honest, it’s kind of nice doing something separate from Ian for once. Like, we grew up together and we’re always going to be close. But I feel like in the casino business, I was always in his shadow. Now, I have the chance to just be myself and do things my own way. It’s refreshing.”
“Who’s talking about work now?” I teased, trying to get my beating heart to calm down.
Bailey laughed. “Fair enough,” she said. “All right, how about this one; you always seemed like a family guy. Why are you still single?”
I stared at her for a moment, wondering if those words had really come out of her mouth. At first, given the way that she blushed, I expected her to try to take them back, too. But instead, she just gave me that look of challenge that she had perfected.
I knew that this was the point where I should tell her about Beth, but I couldn’t bring myself to do it. Not yet. I just wasn’t ready yet. And really, who could blame me for that?
“Why are you still single?” I countered instead. “Las Vegas must have ten times the eligible bachelors as Park City. You can’t tell me that not a single one of them has managed to ever catch your eye.”
I hoped I didn’t offend her by saying that. It just seemed like the easiest way to turn the attention away from myself. And I didn’t really want to talk about myself right now, partially because I found myself wanting to learn as much about Bailey as I could.
Bailey laughed and shrugged. “I’m too focused on work to be interested in having a relationship,” she said, and I tried not to wince.
There wasn’t a reason for me to wince, after all. This wasn’t a date, and I wasn’t trying to start a relationship with her. But there was something about the way that she said it that made me feel like even if I wanted to start a relationship with her, she wasn’t going to take the time for me. She was too focused on her career for that.
I wanted to say something about how sad that was. About how she shouldn’t spend her whole life trying to only find meaning in her career. But there was no way for me to explain what I knew about the joys of a relationship without mentioning Beth and Ethan.
So instead, I just smiled across the table at her. “There’s a great ice cream place up the road,” I told her.
Beth groaned. “You should have told me that before I ate my whole dinner,” she complained, but I could tell that she was amused. “Lead the way. But you’d better be the one driving on the way home!”
“Deal,” I said.
This wasn’t a date. And maybe I shouldn’t have suggested ice cream. The place up the road, The Dairy Cow, was a place that I used to go to with Beth and Ethan, back before Beth got sick. And even after she got sick, I used to stop in there and pick up pints to take home. Beth didn’t have much of an appetite with the medications that she was on, but she always used to smile at the gesture.
I pushed those thoughts out of my mind, though. Focus on the now. Focus on Bailey.
It was surprisingly easy to do that, I found.
18
Bailey
I was surprised when Adam suggested that we get dinner together on Tuesday. He was right, I had been mostly avoiding him ever since that day when I had shadowed him. I hadn’t been lying when I said that part of the reason was just that the resort had become every bit as busy as he had warned me it would.
But to be honest, there was more to it than that. I had seen him once, the morning after I had had that naughty dream about him, and I could immediately feel my body flush with heat. It took everything I had not to head over to him, grab his shirt, and pull him into a heated kiss.
I knew that I couldn’t do that, though. And especially not right here in the middle of the workplace. That wouldn’t be proper. So I had decided it would be safer just to steer clear of him, at least for now. I’d get over this silly little crush on him. Throwing myself into my work had always done the trick in the past.
I was actually really enjoying working at the resort. I had managed to carve out a niche for myself, to pick up slack in certain areas and just lend another pair of eyes in other areas. I was already starting to feel like they were my family, and I was surprised at how quick most of them had been to accept me. Not only that, but they accepted my ideas for the resort and responded enthusiastically with other things that we could try.
I liked the whole culture of working for a ski resort. It wasn’t like working in the casino business. It was a lot more relaxed and down to earth. Sure, we still had our higher-end clients, the ones who shelled out the big bucks to come here and bring their families here. But we weren’t like some of the other hoity toity ski resorts in the area. Brooks Mountain was a bit smaller and a lot friendlier. Everyone kind of knew everyone, and if you stayed for even a week, you started to feel like a local.
It was what I had instinctively loved about this place when I was younger. But I appreciated it even more now that I was trying to make a home here.
I was sure that that local hospitality was the only reason that Adam was taking the time to take me out to dinner. He had been very clear that this was just a friends thing. A coworker thing, moreover. But there was something about sitting across from him at the table in the little diner that felt like a date.
And what’s more, I could tell that he was nervous. I was nervous too. I wanted to break through that shell of his, but I just didn’t know how. I didn’t want to risk offending him or anything. The question about why he was still single was out of my mouth before I had fully considered what it would sound like, asking that.
; I wanted to take it back. But there was a part of me, deep down, that really wanted to know why he was still single. That needed to know why. Not that I was looking to start a relationship with him. I knew all the reasons why I couldn’t do that.
Then again, if this was a date, well. I kind of liked it. I would do this again.
It wasn’t a date, though. I had to keep reminding myself of that.
Gosh, it was so confusing.
What was even more confusing was the way that Adam refused to answer my question about why he was still single. I mean, sure, it was only fair that he turn the question back to me. But I didn’t miss the way that his eyes flicked off to the side, as though he was in pain. What had happened?
Maybe he had been in a serious relationship. Maybe whoever it was hadn’t appreciated him and had broken his heart. That could be why he was so gruff, why he didn’t let anyone get close to him. He wasn’t ready to try to commit to anyone again.
I wanted to ask more questions, but I wasn’t sure how. And the next thing I knew, we were headed down the street to get ice cream.
“Rainbow sprinkles? Really?” Adam asked, raising an eyebrow at me when he heard my order.
“Hey, don’t judge,” I said. “Vanilla ice cream and rainbow sprinkles is what I always used to get as a kid. At least, before…” I trailed off for a moment. But then, I realized it was something that I wanted to share with Adam. “When I was really young, and our parents were still together, sometimes Mom would take us down to the casino floor at the end of the day when Dad was finishing up work. And I didn’t really like it down there. It always smelled funny and there were so many old people. And I wasn’t allowed to just run around or anything.”
One Shot At Love: A Billionaire Single Father Romance Page 10