It was absurd to him now that he’d never imagined what it would be like to kiss her. At least not before this week. It was absurd to him now that he’d been walking beside her, eating beside her, offering a shoulder to her, laughing with her, living life with her for . . . what? Twenty-seven years since he’d really started caring about girls as a separate exciting entity? And never once had he imagined this.
Of course if he had imagined it, he was doubtful he would have imagined it quite like this.
Shouldn’t it have been awkward? He and Laila were quickly approaching four decades of friendship, and the bond they’d developed in that time should have made him so tentative to skim her swollen bottom lip with his teeth as he was doing now. He should have wanted to dart his eyes away rather than study every tiny golden speck hiding in hers. He shouldn’t have felt comfortable enough to make jokes, and yet the first words out of his mouth were, “You were asking as my best friend, weren’t you? Because I’m really not the type of guy who makes a move on the first date.”
She laughed, gently at first, and then they got lost in a fit of hilarity together. She lowered her forehead onto his shoulder, and he removed his hands from her waist, adjusted the jacket to make sure she was still benefiting from its warmth, and then wrapped his arms around her back.
No, he wasn’t the type of guy to make a move like this on the first date, and until the thoughts and feelings for her began invading his brain against his will this week, he would have sworn he also wasn’t the type of guy to make a move like this after nearly forty years. But maybe it was all about the glorious law of averages.
Not that the word average had any place in a conversation about what was happening between them.
Cole sighed. “As much as I hate the thought of talking about . . . well, anything, really, I suppose we should . . .” Laila raised her head and met his eyes, and he didn’t have any difficulty recognizing the dread—fear, maybe?—in them. He really should have started that sentence better. “Eat. Food. Talk about dinner. That’s all I meant. I suppose we should eat something.”
She exhaled as relief flooded her eyes. “Oh. Yeah. Food would be good.”
They were going to have to talk about other things. Eventually. Soon. And he didn’t feel much hesitation about that. It was more that he genuinely had no idea where they would go from here. They couldn’t go back as if it had never happened. At least he couldn’t. He would never want to. But nothing else had changed. She needed to stay in Adelaide Springs. He needed to leave. She had contentment there. And family. He didn’t. She saw home and happy memories everywhere she looked, and he was afraid he’d never again see anything but rejection and pain. Yeah, nothing had changed. Nothing . . .
Except for everything.
But for right now, he was still on a rather spectacular date with the most beautiful woman he had ever seen in his life. And he had promised her dinner.
* * *
“So here’s a question for you,” Laila began just after she swallowed her final bite of rib eye and washed it down with a sip of Pinot Noir Cole had grabbed from the Sudworths’ wine refrigerator. He’d hesitated briefly, hoping it wasn’t some vintage bottle that cost as much as his Jeep Wrangler, but he’d taken a gamble on how well he thought he knew his friends. Sure, he’d learned all sorts of things this week—Ryan Reynolds and maid’s quarters and chauffeurs named Malik sorts of things—but he’d be less surprised to wave up to Ryan Reynolds and Blake Lively as they flew with capes overhead, checking in on their old stomping grounds, than he would be to discover that Brynn and Sebastian were wine-investment people. And of course he could have texted one of them and asked, but that would have required inviting other people into the world he and Laila had created, and there was no chance of that happening.
“Fire away.”
“Were you attempting to murder me with the deliciousness of that dinner? I mean, you can be honest. Did you think that if you made it good enough, I would just keep eating until I exploded? Because if so, clearly your only miscalculation was in how much meat you needed to have on hand.”
It was true that she’d eaten a lot. More than he had, truth be told. But that had come as absolutely no surprise to him. For one thing, walking around Manhattan all day, those spectacular legs of hers had taken double the steps to keep up with his longer stride. She had probably burned enough calories that the entire grilled cow wouldn’t have replenished her. For another, Laila Olivet was the number one fan of his cooking and always had been. It would be impossible to calculate how much food he had prepared for her through the years and how much her input and approval had influenced his confidence, his cooking style, and even his menu at Cassidy’s.
And on top of all of that, he had spent an inordinate amount of time this evening forgetting to eat because he was so busy watching her, delighting in how satisfied she was with every bite of steak and grilled asparagus and the antipasto salad he’d thrown together and stored in the fridge before she woke up that morning. Not typically one to daydream, on more than one occasion during their meal he had gotten so distracted by watching her lips from across the table that he’d had to hurry around and quickly merge the images in his head with reality.
“No murderous intent, I promise. I’m just really happy that you enjoyed it.”
“Well, food is love, right?”
He smiled at her and nodded. “Yeah. Food is love.”
She stood from the bench on her side of the table and began gathering dishes. Cole placed his palm on the top of her hand to stop her. To stop her and because he hadn’t touched her in about three hundred seconds, and he was about to go crazy.
“What do you think you’re doing?”
“Tidying up.”
“Um . . . no.”
“No?”
Cole shook his head. “No. It’s your birthday. Besides . . .” He stood and leaned across the table until their noses were inches apart. “Don’t you want dessert?”
He’d never seen her face turn so red so quickly, and it didn’t take him long to realize what he had said to cause the reaction.
“I keep doing that, don’t I?” He chuckled softly, though as she batted her eyelids in what he figured was a moment of self-awareness that he rarely witnessed her experiencing in his presence, and as she manipulated her bottom lip between her teeth, he found it all less and less funny. “I meant cake. I made you a birthday cake. But if there’s some other sort of after-dinner delicacy you have in mind—”
Nope. He’d lost her to cake.
“When in the world did you have time to make me a birthday cake? Never mind. That doesn’t matter. What kind is it?” The self-awareness was gone, replaced by the complete lack thereof that he treasured. How had he never noticed how sexy it was that she was comfortable enough with him to be completely herself ?
“Red velvet. And, just FYI, I was up until about 1:00 a.m., thank you very much. Because I knew if I did it this morning, the smell of cake in the air would wake you up—”
“Yeah, don’t care. Cream cheese icing?”
Cole laughed and collapsed back onto his bench, releasing her hand as he did. He gave up. “Obviously.” But then his eyes flew open and he groaned as his head fell into his hands.
“What’s wrong?”
“The frosting.” He looked up at her through squinted eyes. “I forgot to make it. I’m sorry. I got tired and went to bed, and was going to do it this morning, but . . .”
She set down the silverware she had gathered in her other hand and walked around behind him. Soon her arms were around his shoulders and her lips were beside his ear. “That’s okay. I’m sure it will be great without it.”
He leaned against her arm and then tilted his head down and kissed her hand. Laila kissed his cheek, and then stretched over his shoulder more so she could reach his lips. Not that Cole made her work too hard, of course. He threw one leg over the bench and pulled her down onto his knee.
“Thank you for doing all of this today,” she whispered as she leaned back across his lap, into the security of his arms, and her lips made a trail along his jawline.
Cole looked down at the bruises on her right knee, fading but still evident three full weeks after she’d crawled through gravel to reach Cocaine Bear, hiding under her car in her driveway, and circled them with his fingertips.
“You’re welcome. Sorry again about the frosting.”
“Are you kidding?” She planted a soft kiss on his lips, then pulled back to look at him. When she spoke again, her voice was as low as she could make it. “Don’t you worry about it, sweet thing.”
Cole’s Barry White impression that morning had not been good, but Laila’s was just pathetic. Made even more so by the fact that she couldn’t get through a single word without having to choke down a laugh. And each time she laughed, her voice cracked, making her voice squeak between attempted bass tones, which of course made Cole completely lose it.
“Your sweet lovin’ is all the icing on the cake I need,” she squeaked out breathlessly, trying so hard to attain macho sleaziness and pulling off a lifelike impression of a soulful chipmunk instead.
“Alright. That’s it.” Cole scooped her up into his arms as he stood, then set her down, grabbed her hand, and began pulling her inside. “Let’s go.”
“Where are we going?” She kept laughing as she hurried to match his stride and wrapped her arms around his waist.
He threw his arm around her shoulders and kissed the top of her head. “I’ll show you icing on the cake.”
* * *
Earlier, he’d lost her to dessert, and now she’d lost him to his incessant need to convince Laila Olivet she could learn to cook.
“No, that’s good, but you’ve got to make sure to get it from the sides of the bowl too.”
“I am,” she insisted, pulling the hand mixer up in the bowl—again—and flinging still-thickening frosting onto his arms, her apron, and the Sudworths’ marble countertop. Again. “Sorry.” She pushed the spinning whisks back into the depths of the bowl and grinned sheepishly.
“It’s fine.” Cole smiled and swiped some from his forearm before tasting it off his finger.
“How is it?”
“Really good, actually.”
Laila chuckled. “You sound surprised.”
He scoffed. “Of course I’m not surprised.” For one thing, he’d taken advantage of the wine refrigerator to keep the cream cheese and butter perfectly softened (even if he had kept them in there a bit longer than he’d originally intended). He’d also discovered, unsurprisingly, that good-quality vanilla paste was easier to come by in Tribeca than it was in Adelaide Springs. But more than anything, he would never be surprised by her successes.
“Alright, give us a taste, then.” She parted her lips and jutted the bottom one toward him.
Cole had spent the better part of twenty years trying to teach her to cook. It had begun as reciprocity, more than anything. Well, reciprocity and fear that if he ever moved away, she would sustain herself on a diet of chocolate chips, marshmallows, and coffee until he came home for Christmas. But mostly reciprocity.
She’d taught him to sew buttons back onto his shirts; he’d taught her to boil an egg. She’d taught him how to stitch up the pillows his grandmother had always kept on the couch, to keep the stuffing from oozing out, and he’d reminded her how to boil an egg. It was around the time he was hemming his own dress slacks and she claimed to have forgotten the hacks he had taught her to help the water boil faster at high altitude that he finally got her to confess she had no desire to learn how to cook. And from that point on, he didn’t worry at all about her not knowing how. But he never stopped longing to share with her the joy he felt every time he stepped into the kitchen.
Cole swept his finger around the side of the bowl where she wasn’t currently obsessing over one stubborn clump of cream cheese with the hand mixer—she was good at everything she set her mind to, but he still wasn’t convinced she wouldn’t accidentally chop his finger off—and scooped up a dollop. He brushed icing onto her pouty bottom lip and watched as she tasted and reacted. Yes, he couldn’t deny he enjoyed watching her mouth as it manipulated the creamy mixture, but more than anything he was delighted by the unexpected pleasure of her own creation shining in her eyes.
“That’s really good!”
He grinned and nodded as he licked his own finger clean once again and then instructed her to turn off the mixer. “Before you pull it out,” he hastily added, and she complied.
“How did you know how to make this?” Laila asked, sneaking her finger in for another taste. “You didn’t have a recipe or anything.”
“I did originally.” He grabbed her cake from the microwave, where it had been hiding all day, and dug through drawers until he found an icing spatula. Drea had gotten all the wedding gifts put away, and the kitchen now resembled a Williams-Sonoma showroom.
“And you memorized it?”
He shrugged. “Sort of, I guess. I don’t know. I don’t really think about the simple things like cream cheese frosting anymore.”
Or any of it. Though it wasn’t that he didn’t think about it, exactly, so much as he got to focus on the extra step or the surprising ingredient that would alter the recipe and make it his own. He knew what tasted good. He knew what worked well together and what didn’t. He was skilled and devoted to his craft, and he loved the freedom that came from there not really being any wrong answer.
He’d miss that, he figured. The freedom. The ability to add something to the menu last minute or suddenly decide that tonight’s chile rellenos would be stuffed with picadillo instead of chicken. He hadn’t been a guest in another chef’s kitchen since culinary school. It was going to take some adjustment.
“Simple?!” She looked around the mess that had been created with only a handful of ingredients. “This was simple?”
He set down the cake and chuckled as he ran both of his thumbs along her cheekbones, causing thin, dried layers of frosting mess to crumble and fall. “No. Of course not. Forgive me. Not even Julia Child could have done what you just did.” He pulled her to him again and kissed her, something he’d only had the freedom to do for a couple hours, but the loss of which he knew he was going to mourn every bit as much as a lifetime in Adelaide Springs and an entire adulthood in the kitchen at Cassidy’s.
Eventually, though, cake won the day, and after Laila spread the icing and Cole applied the candles, she carried the plates, utensils, and matches back up the stairs to the roof while he balanced the cake in one hand and her gift in the other.
“You shouldn’t have gotten me anything,” she complained. “This day was amazing and the food was amazing and—”
“You’re amazing,” he whispered to her as they set everything down on the table. “Now . . .” He struck a match and lit the candles. “Make a wish.”
She smirked at him, and he knew they were thinking the same thoughts. Never in a million years, when they were joking in the kitchen that morning about how he’d unintentionally made things awkward when he wished her happy birthday just before not kissing her after all, had he envisioned they would be here, wherever “here” was, just fourteen or fifteen hours later.
Then she blew out the candles and he served the cake, and she made all sorts of low, satisfied, guttural noises that he’d heard countless times through the years and which he knew meant she was enjoying her food. But they were having a different effect on him this time than they ever had before.
He cleared his throat and pushed the wrapped package over to her. “Here. Open your gift.” Otherwise, I might actually lose the ability to function like a respectable human being.
He didn’t have to tell her twice. Her eyes twinkled as she tore into the pink wrapping and the pink bow. That was something he’d always appreciated about Laila—she knew that wrapping paper was meant to be ripped. Her grin of giddy anticipation remained as she opened the white box beneath the paper, but her jaw dropped instantly once she saw what was inside.
It hadn’t cost him all that much. In fact, he’d picked it up on after-Christmas clearance when he and Seb ran to Colorado Springs for January’s Costco run on behalf of all the business owners in town. Not that he’d found the little pink handbag at Costco. It had cost him a bit more than that. They’d stopped at Macy’s because Seb needed to exchange a gift his mother had gotten him for Christmas, and Cole had wandered rather than wait in the vehicle. When he saw it, there was zero question as to whether to buy it, of course. It was a perfect match to her Cinderella shoes, down to the translucent quality and the hues of glitter, or whatever it was that caused the sparkly effect she said made her feel like a princess. The only challenge had been holding on to it in secret for eight months so he could give it to her on her birthday. (That and carefully packing his clothes in a way that would protect the box in his suitcase.)
“I love it.” She mouthed the words to him, but no sound came out.
“I’m glad,” he responded softly with a smile.
She stared at it and rubbed it and inspected every crevice and strap, and Cole couldn’t help but think again of how unassuming she was. How easy it was to make her happy. But for the first time he wondered if Laila was truly that easy to please or if it just seemed so easy to him because he knew her so well. He suspected that was it, and he was suddenly filled with gratitude that he’d never taken that for granted. That he’d never rested on his laurels when it came to blowing her away. It would have been so easy to do.
He stood from his seat and offered her his hand. “Dance with me?”
She beamed up at him and set her handbag carefully back into its box. “It’s really hard to imagine I’ll ever say no to that.”
The song playing somewhere in the distance transitioned from Lewis Capaldi to “Lover” by Taylor Swift just as Cole twirled her away from the table and into an open space beneath the Edison bulbs. Laila had left her shoes and socks inside when they came back out with the cake, and he relished the way he had to lean over to wrap his arms around her waist, and the way she leaned into him and stood on her toes as her arms encircled his neck. The way they fit so well together. The way each of their heads went to the right as they faced each other, just as they always did when they hugged or danced or whispered secret jokes to each other at inappropriate moments. The way she trusted her bare toes to his two left feet.
They’d danced together before, of course. Weddings, parties, school dances, random moments when great songs came on the jukebox at Cassidy’s. He’d held her and swayed with her and dipped her and twirled her. But he hadn’t felt anything he was feeling now. He hadn’t ever been obsessed with the way her hair smelled like oranges. He’d never known her lips tasted like pomegranate. What a fool he’d been not to give any thought to the clues presented to him by the countless tubes of Burt’s Bees lip balm he was always finding on the floorboard of his Wrangler or between the cushions of his couch or under the bar at Cassidy’s. For years he’d held her and thought nothing of it, and now all he wanted was to find an excuse to hold her forever.
“I love this song,” Laila sighed against his shoulder.
“I know you do.” Then a thought occurred. “You don’t think the music’s coming from Taylor’s roof, do you?”
She pulled back to look at him, her eyes frenzied. “I don’t know. Do you think Tay Tay plays her own music at her parties?”
Cole shrugged. “Wouldn’t you if you were her?”
She nodded in earnest. “I absolutely would.” And then they were running over to the south edge of the roof, pushing each other out of the way and laughing as they squeezed between plants and shrubs to try to see the Franklin Street roof.
“I found them!” a voice called out behind them a few seconds later. Cole and Laila both startled and turned around. Sebastian stood smirking at them by the glass entry door and called down in response to whatever Brynn had said from inside the penthouse. “No, they’re fine. Just stalking Taylor Swift.”
Brynn stepped up the final stairs and out to the roof and Cole took a quick inventory of the situation and determined there was nothing there to raise suspicion about the day the two of them had had. It was a pretty romantic setting, sure, but that was Drea’s doing, based on Brynn’s suggestions, he assumed. So that was on her.
Satisfied that as long as they acted normal they’d be fine, he passed Laila a furtive glance and then stepped away from her and crossed over to them. “Hey there. We didn’t expect to see you guys until tomorrow.”
Brynn ran across the roof to Laila and threw her arms around her. “We took an earlier flight so we could make it back on Lai’s birthday. We made it! With . . .” She raised her wrist behind Laila’s back and looked at her watch. “Seven minutes to spare!”
“I tried to tell her that since she was born in mountain time we had an extra couple hours, but she wouldn’t listen to me.” Sebastian eyed the cake on the table. “Okay, not to be rude, but I haven’t eaten since Munich—”
“We ate on the plane,” Brynn interjected.
“Okay, I haven’t eaten good food since Munich. Is there birthday cake to share?”
“Oh, of course!” Laila hurried over to the table. “Let me run in and get you a fork. Cole, why don’t you help me. Brynn, you want some?”
“I don’t mind using my hands,” Sebastian insisted, cutting a piece and setting it on a napkin before lifting it to his mouth.
Brynn rolled her eyes and laughed at him. “My husband is not a fan of airline food, as you may have gathered. But I’m fine. Thanks. Now, birthday girl . . .” She sat down next to Seb and motioned for Laila to sit across from her. “Tell us everything. Cole wouldn’t tell us anything he had planned. Sit, sit!” She motioned for Cole too. “Seriously, I want to know everything.”
“He probably didn’t trust you not to tell her,” Sebastian mumbled with a mouthful of cake. “And I’m okay not knowing things. This is delicious, by the way.”
Cole slid in next to Laila and noticed immediately how awkward it was to sit so close to her with Brynn and Seb right there. Although didn’t they always sit that close? Why did it feel borderline salacious? And how was it possible that it was simultaneously awkward to be close to her and painful to be far away?
“Laila made the frosting.”
Brynn and Sebastian looked in surprise to Cole, then to Laila.
“It’s great,” Seb praised before feeding a bite to Brynn, who concurred.
“Thanks. Cole’s a great teacher.” Laila became very interested in studying her fingernails all of a sudden. “It was a really great day.”
It wasn’t that Cole had been ignorant about how short lived the perfect little bubble they’d been living in all day would be—although, yeah, he’d expected to at least have the opportunity to kiss her good night. Not that he’d actually thought ahead to any of it. And then tomorrow? They’d figure that out tomorrow. But today, they’d been on a blind date. Though, come to think of it, that aspect of it all hadn’t come into play very much since . . . hmm . . . When had they dropped the pretense? They’d eaten her birthday cake. She’d opened her present. They’d talked about that morning and the years before that morning. It had all been so seamless.
“Cole? Will that work for you?”
He’d been staring . . . well, at nothing, really. And he had no idea what he’d missed. Was that a second piece of cake Seb was almost done with? “I’m sorry, what? I must have zoned out there.”
Brynn shook it off. “Oh, I know. It’s super late. No, I was just saying we’re going to need to do birthday brunch tomorrow instead of dinner. Milo has to fly back to LA for some press stuff, but we’re going to meet at Bubby’s—”
“Bubby’s?” Laila asked.
“Yeah. It’s the best. And it’s literally just down on the corner. Not John-John corner. The other way. Milo’s going to meet us there at ten thirty.”
“Great.” Laila turned her head toward Cole and then instantly back to Brynn after their eyes met briefly. “And what about . . . what’s her name? Greta? Is she going to be able to meet us? Or did you manage to find him someone on the Hot Celebrities Only dating app?”
Laila briefly squeezed his knee under the table as Brynn laughed, and it took all the willpower he possessed not to hold her hand or put his arm around her, or do any of the things that would have felt so natural to do.
How was he supposed to act about all of this being-fixed-up stuff ? All he knew was he had no interest in being set up on a blind date that would undoubtedly fall pitifully short of the one he’d already gone on today.
“Dude.” He put his hand out and stopped Sebastian from going in for a third piece of cake and then walked over to the refrigerator in the outdoor kitchen and grabbed the bowl of antipasto salad from the second shelf. He looked around for an extra plate and utensil, but when he came up short, he dropped the serving spoon back into the bowl and handed the entire thing to Seb.
“Bless you,” Seb muttered as he took his first bite.
“Greta can’t make it, unfortunately,” Brynn finally said, her smile becoming a grimace as she turned to Cole. “She has a family thing. And I didn’t have a chance to call anyone else. I’m sorry. But I think we’ll still have a blast.”
“Do you want me to go invite Taylor to be your date?” Sebastian was still stuffing his face. “That’s the least I can do for you now. This is so good. I can at least throw a rock with a note or something.”
Cole chuckled. “Nah, I’m good. Thanks. It’s Lai’s birthday thing anyway. I can be a fifth wheel for Lai’s birthday.” He looked around at the mess to clean up. “I do think I need to start heading toward bed, though, if I’m going to be at my fifth-wheel best by brunch time.” Thankfully he had long ago developed the habit of cleaning up as he went, so there wasn’t too much, but he began gathering what was there. “I’ll go get started on the kitchen.”
“Let me help you.” Laila stood and picked up the forks, and their eyes lingered for the first time since their hosts (whom they usually adored spending time with) had had the audacity to make themselves at home in their own home.
“That’d be great. Thanks.” Cole turned to Brynn and Sebastian, who had finally stopped eating. “You guys must be exhausted. Jet lag, all of that. Go to bed. We’ve got this.”
Laila inched just a little closer to Cole, and he hoped that meant she was as desperate to be alone again as he was. “Definitely. But can’t wait to catch up tomorrow!”
“Are you kidding?” Brynn jumped up and took the forks from Laila’s hands. “You’re not cleaning up on your birthday.”
“We’ve got this,” Sebastian concurred, standing and taking the forks from his wife. But, unfortunately, the two Sudworths were not the “we” he was referring to. “There’s no place for the two of you in the kitchen. Dishes are men’s work.” He smiled at Brynn and planted a loving kiss on her lips. “You two go. Happy birthday, Laila.” He wrapped his forkless arm around her and gave her a hug.
“Thanks.” She hugged him back and then stared at Cole and shrugged.
He shrugged back, trapped. “Um . . . yeah. Happy birthday, Lai.” Cole opened his arms to her and was so relieved when she ran into them as she had a million times before—while also, of course, as she never had. Not once. Not like this. He inhaled the scent of her hair and caressed her back as affectionately as he could while still appearing normal. He thought he appeared normal, anyway. Strange . . . it was difficult to remember how he’d always hugged her before.
“Thanks for everything.” She grabbed her gift from the table and then bounced up on her bare toes and kissed his cheek, and he wanted so badly to tilt his head and catch her lips as they passed. “You’re not a bad date, my friend.”
“You either.” He winked as she pulled away, and he stretched out his arm to grab her hand before she walked away. Her fingers and her eyes lingered a moment longer, and then his arm dropped to his side when she was out of reach and heading to the door with Brynn.
“You look super hot in this dress, by the way,” Brynn declared as they stepped away. “You should just keep it. Doesn’t it look great on her?” She turned back to the guys.
Sebastian, who was in the process of wiping down the table, kept his eyes down and said, “I was a supportive attendee at the fashion show this morning. Please don’t make me participate in the aftershow as well.” He lifted his head briefly. “But yeah. Of course. You look beautiful as ever, Laila.” Then he resumed his scrubbing.
Cole opened his mouth to jump at his opportunity to compliment her without raising suspicion, but Brynn spoke again before he had the chance.
“I’m surprised Cole managed to keep his hands off of you.”
Laila’s wide, frenzied eyes flashed back to him one more time, and they were filled with humor, causing Cole to cough out a laugh and then turn it into a full-out cough as subtly as he could. Then he watched her until she was out of sight—across the roof, through the glass door, down the stairs—and then cleared his throat before bracing himself and turning around to face his host. His trusted confidant. His dishes buddy, apparently. And, as he figured was probably most relevant in that moment, his astute, intuitive, Pulitzer-winning friend who never missed a beat.
“I didn’t even ask, because I was so famished, but what was in that salad thing? It was killer.”
Huh. Okay. Sure. Why not?
Of course this would be the one day that no one asked him if something had happened between him and Laila.