Page 73 of The Wisteria Tree Cottage

He seemed really happy though, walking into the office whistling to himself and sitting at the desk with a big grin on his face.

After he had done his daily checks on the website, he turned to Meadow. ‘So, last event tonight.’

Meadow forced a smile on her face. ‘Yes. Umm, two events actually. Kiss speed dating and dinner in the dark. I’m not really looking forward to the kissing one, but the dinner in the dark should be fun.’

‘Kiss speed dating?’ Indigo said.

‘We have twenty seconds to kiss someone in the dark to see if there is an intimate connection before we move on to the next person.’

Indigo wrinkled her nose. ‘Is it me or is that a bit gross?’

‘It’s not just you,’ Meadow said.

‘I’m quite looking forward to it,’ Bear said.

Meadow stared at him, feeling a little bit hurt by that after what they nearly shared this morning. He was looking forward to kissing thirty different women?

‘And how do you think Heather will feel about you kissing so many people?’ Meadow said.

‘I don’t think she’ll care, I told her this morning that it wasn’t going to work between us.’

Meadow’s eyes widened. ‘You did?’

‘Yes, it was not a great conversation to have, but we ended up having a chat about dating and relationships. She’s been in love with her neighbour for three years so her heart wasn’t really in it anyway. I talked to her about being brave and telling him how she feels. We actually left on good terms.’

‘What excellent advice,’ Indigo said.

Bear nodded. ‘Love is a risk, but the positives far outweigh the negatives.’

‘So how many people will you be kissing?’ Indigo said.

‘Around thirty,’ Meadow said.

Indigo’s look of disgust deepened. ‘You’re going to kiss thirty different people in one night?’

‘I know, I’m not looking forward to it at all. I was actually thinking of skipping that one and just turning up for the dinner.’

‘You have to go,’ Bear said, insistently. ‘How will you meet your soul mate if you don’t attend all the events?’

‘I’m not going to meet my soul mate by sharing my saliva with thirty different men.’

‘Look, you made me go to the pheromone event when the thought of sniffing all those t-shirts repulsed me, you have to do this one in return,’ Bear said.

He had a point but she couldn’t help being really hurt that he was so looking forward to kissing all these women.

‘The way I see it, if you find someone you really enjoy kissing, why not stick with them. Remove yourself from the dating event and just kiss the person you really want to be with,’ Bear said, his eyes locked on hers.

Her heart leapt. Was that why he was so looking forward to it because he would get the chance to kiss her?

‘I suppose the silver lining in this event is that at some point in the evening you two will get to kiss each other,’ Indigo said, voicing Meadow’s thoughts.

Meadow looked at Bear to see his reaction to that. He looked like he was trying to keep the smile off his face.

‘Oh yes, we will. I hadn’t really thought of that,’ Bear said, innocently, and looked back at his computer as if he was completely blasé about the idea. Although the tone of his voice belied that.

Meadow couldn’t help the smile from spreading across her face. She glanced across at Indigo, who had obviously picked up on Bear’s tone of voice, too, and was grinning at her.

Suddenly the kissing event was looking up.

---