Page 29 of Our Little Wedding

I walked up to the door and slid my key in the lock, opening the front door. Soft music filled the house. I smiled. Ainsley normally had music playing when she was working in the evening. I knew she hadn’t been in the office much while I’d been gone, so I figured she was probably playing catchup. I put my bags down and climbed the stairs and poked my head into the kitchen to find her standing at the counter plating food.

“Hey, sexy,” I whispered as I stepped up behind her and wrapped my arms around her.

She rested her head on my shoulder, a smile coming to her lips. “Well, this isn’t how you were supposed to find out about dinner. I must have timed your drive back wrong,” she said, placing the pot back on the stove before turning in my arms. “I missed you,” she said in a low voice as her arms rested on my shoulders and she met my lips, her body fitting perfectly against mine.

“I missed you too,” I whispered, pulling her tighter against me before kissing her again. “What’s all this?” I questioned, reaching over her shoulder and grabbing a carrot off one plate.

“This is dinner. I hope you’re hungry.”

“I’m starving, actually. They didn’t offer food on the flight back because of the weather. The turbulence was brutal. Can I help you with anything?”

“Nope. I have it all taken care of. Why don’t you take a minute, get comfortable and then go have a seat in the dining room and I will bring in dinner.”

“I can do that.” I placed a kiss on the side of her neck and listened as she giggled.

“Did you want me to make you a drink?” she questioned.

I shook my head. “No, I got it. I’ll just pour myself a scotch,” I said, pressing my lips to hers one more time.

I grabbed a rock glass from the cabinet and placed three cubes of ice into it and headed into the dining room, where I poured myself a glass and took a seat in my usual spot.

“Here we are,” she said, setting a plate in front of me.” I looked down at the carrots, asparagus, and chicken.

“This looks amazing.”

“Thanks. I wanted to make you something special for tonight,” she said, sitting down in her usual spot beside me.

I smiled. “Thank you. Everything go okay while I was gone?” I questioned. I’d been worried about leaving her to begin with, and once I knew she had run into Brittany, it had made it worse.It still bothered me that I hadn’t just taken them both with me instead. I also knew that Ainsley could lie to me over the phone, however face-to-face, I could read her like a book. I knew when she was sad, upset, worried, and frustrated, her eyes gave everything away.

“Yeah, everything went fine. Of course, Nikki tried to push boundaries, but then she always did when you’d leave me with her. This time though I feel it’s different.”

“Yeah, I am going to have to talk to her about that.”

“Ah, maybe she is just being a kid. It’s fine. She was a little tired today. She didn’t want to go to bed last night, and she was up later than she should have been tonight. So, when I put her down tonight, again, there was no bedtime story.”

“That’s okay. She will live without a story for a couple of nights. I know what she can be like when she gets cranky. I swear Brittany just lets her do whatever she wants when she is with her. I’ve also been noticing that every time she comes back from there, she never wants to sleep. She also gets demanding.”

“Yeah, I have a feeling it’s because she’s ignoring her. You should have seen how she acted, Nikki was trying to tell her something and she wouldn’t even look at her.”

“Well, I’ll address that when I have a chat with Brittany. I also need to mention it to my lawyer.”

“How did things go with Max?”

“Okay, nothing that we couldn’t correct. He also sends his apologies for not making it to our engagement party.”

Ainsley shrugged. “It doesn’t matter, but you can tell him thank you.”

I watched her drag her fork around her plate, moving pieces of carrots and asparagus around, not really eating. “Did you hear anything from the venues?”

Ainsley let out a deep sigh. “No, nothing. Nor from the caterers. Carly and I went to all of them today as well. I think I am just going to look up some different places.”

“Sure, never hurts to do that. We could always try contacting the one we used for the Christmas party. It’s always an option.”

“I’ll do that. Oh, you should have seen Nikki at the mall. We went into the bedding store, and she found the bedding she wanted immediately. That was until she spotted three others that she liked as well. I spent twenty-five minutes letting her try to decide on the one she wanted, only to end up deciding for her by bribing her with a set of purple sheets,” Ainsley said, hiding her face in her hands and laughing.

I let out a laugh. I knew how Nikki could be. “Well, I am glad you two figured it out and had a great time. I’m also glad that you decided for her, otherwise you might still be there.” I chuckled, setting my fork and knife down on my plate.

“We did. She’s been asking to use everything since we got it. So, I compromised. I feared if I didn’t, she’d never go to bed. I allowed her to use the heart-shaped pillow I got for her.”

---