Page 4 of The Bachelor Auction

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“Actually, it’s Emily Harding,”Brenda says. There’s no nervousness at all, no shock, no regret in the fact that she’s just put the last nail in our financial coffin.

“Thank you, Ms. Harding, then,” the announcer says and moves on to the next auction.

The spotlight shifts to someone else. Brenda sits down and peers at me, literally glowing, high on her little triumph.

I narrow my eyes at her, unsure whether I should murder her on the spot or wait for later when we’re back in our beat-up Ford, praying that we’ll make it to my matchbox apartment without the engine breaking down.

Obviously, she’ll have to cancel the bid, but first she’ll get a piece of my mind.

“Did you—” I almost choke on my words and need to clear my throat as white-hot waves of anger surge through me. “Did you just waste thousands of dollars—ten of them, to be exact—on…”

Nodding slowly, she takes a sip of her champagne. “You’ll be having dinner with Tyler Becks, yes. It’s going to be so worth it.”

I stare at her, at a loss for words. Several times, I open my mouth to say something, then end up closing it again. I probably look like a fish out of water, gasping for air, but who the hell cares?

She looks so smug, I want to shake some sense into her. But I can’t because Brenda’s such a sweet person, and she has our best interests at heart.

It’s not her fault she’s a little impulsive, right? Everyone has that one weakness that makes them both irritating and endearing.

I should have known better than to let her drag me along to this. But the thing is, I didn’t think she would go through with it.

I honestly didn’t believe she would.

Besides, I didn’t expect the bids to take four- to five-figure proportions.

I mean, you could buy a small family car, maybe even a small boat, for crying out loud.

Which leads me to—

“Go over there and say you made a mistake,” I urge Brenda, my voice hushed. “If you explain that we can’t afford this, they’ll understand. This is a charity event, after all, and people are bound to have sympathy for the less fortunate.”

“Hell, no.”

I stare at her for a good two seconds, my mind refusing to let the meaning of her two words sink in. “Brenda! We’re talking about ten-thousand bucks. We don’t have that kind of money.”

“We do.”

“We do?” I cock my head to the side, my eyes narrowed on her. “Since when?”

She nods. “I should have said, we do…once we borrow it.”

My shoulders drop. I should have seen that answer coming. “We? What do you mean by ‘we’?” I laugh because the whole situation is ridiculous. “I’m not borrowing any money. Besides, are you kidding me? Who would lend us so much money?”

“You’ll be surprised.” She shoots me a confident look.

For a few seconds, I look at her, aghast. I’ve no idea where she gets her confidence from. It must be coming from her brand of granola she eats or something. “Care to explain?”

She leans forward, conspiratorially. “Leave it to me, okay? I know what I’m doing.”

I groan. “You need to get this sorted out this instant or—”

“Trust me. This is fate. A once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.” Her eyes shimmer, and I know she’s about to sink into yet another one of her monologues about fate and everything happening for a reason, and all the other stuff that comes with being a hopeless optimist.

Basically, she’s a lost cause. Whatever I say or do isn’t going to make an ounce of difference.

I slump into my chair as my mind begins to go into overdrive, thinking of possible ways to get us out of this debacle—like it always does when I’m forced to deal with whatever unnecessary dilemma Brenda’s gotten us into.

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