“I can’t believe I’m going to be in Ryan Shay’s wedding,” Rio sighs. “A dream come true for me, really.”
“You do know you’re standing on my side, right?”
Rio waves Indy off. “Semantics.”
Indy chuckles and brings her cocktail to her lips, clearly unaffected by her best guy friend wishing he was a groomsman instead of standing next to her as a bridesman.
Stevie, the only sober one of us, sits on the couch with Kennedy while Rio, Indy, and I take up the floor in Indy’s living room. Kennedy picked me up on her way, and an hour in, Rio busted through the door to join our girls’ night.
“Miller, when do you head out to LA for your next job?” Stevie asks.
If I wasn’t three sheets to the wind right now, that question would’ve sobered me up.
“Sunday.”
“Wow,” she exhales. “I didn’t realize it was so soon.”
I sense all pairs of eyes on me.
“How do you feel about that?” Kennedy asks as she takes another sip from her drink, clearly knowing better than anyone else here that I’m struggling with the idea.
I roll onto my back, eyes on the ceiling, holding my cocktail above my head because well . . . I’m drunk and I don’t know what I’m doing. “Do you want the sober answer or the drunk one?”
I tilt my head back to see Stevie’s brows furrow as she rubs her belly. “The drunk one, obviously.”
“There’s a part of me that doesn’t want to leave.”
“Then don’t.” Rio’s words seem so simple.
“It doesn’t exactly work that way,” Kennedy says. “The girl is a world-renowned pastry chef, who has a three-year-long waitlist of kitchens she’s going to be working for.”
“Four years now.” I point to Kennedy over my head. “But, yes, exactly.”
“What’s keeping you from wanting to go back?”
Whipping my head to the side, I immediately find Indy, who’s wearing the biggest shit-eating grin from her question that she seems to already know the answer to.
I narrow my eyes at her. “Okay, Miss Romantic. Why don’t you tell me, since you seem to already know.”
“Because you’re in love with Kai.”
“Wrong. I’m not.”
“Well, I know you’re in love with Max and you can’t even try to deny that one.”
Exhaling, I drop my head back to the floor, holding my drink on my stomach. “I am. God, I love that kid so much. Is that weird?”
Indy, sitting cross-legged, looks down at me. “No, Miller. That’s not weird. Sometimes we can’t explain how or why we love who we love. We just do. You don’t really get to tell your heart what to do.”
“Is that the alcohol speaking, or are you really that much of a romantic?”
Stevie laughs. “She’s love’s number-one advocate. Drunk or not.”
I sit up on the floor to face the group. “When I look at Max, I think about him going to his first day of school and how much I know Kai is going to cry over it. I think about the friends he’s going to make and I just hope that they’re good people. Those aren’t normal thoughts just a nanny should have, right?”
Looking up, I find everyone watching me, expressions ranging from knowing smiles to glossy eyes.
“Miller, I don’t think you’ve been just a nanny to anyone in that family,” Kennedy says.
“Fuck my life.” Rio pounds back his drink before going into the kitchen for another. “I’m going to be the only single one left, and that was so fucking adorable that I don’t even mind it.”
Indy squeezes my leg. “It’s okay for the important things in your life to change, you know?”
Stevie nods. “And it’s okay to change directions even when you’ve spent your entire life headed on a one-way street.”
“It’s not that simple. This is everything I’ve ever worked for. Everyone in my industry knows my name. I’ve won awards that people strive their entire lives to achieve, and I’m only twenty-five. People don’t just walk away from that kind of a career.”
“They do if they don’t love it anymore. If they love something or someone else more.” That’s Kennedy who speaks up, and to say I’m shocked that she’s suggesting I leave my job is an understatement. Kennedy is all about her career. She doesn’t even hang out with the team because she’s worried it’ll tarnish her reputation or that the boys won’t take her seriously.