Kayla shook her head. “No emails, no calls. I haven’t checked to see if anyone cancelled their dates. I should have thought about that already.” She grabbed her phone.
Evan reached out and put his hand on hers, stopping her from using the phone. “Don’t. Let’s see what Catherine says. Besides, one of those cancels was me.”
“Oh, Evan. I’m sorry.”
“It’s okay. This is more important right now.”
“Thank you.”
He took a seat in the chair across her desk to wait for Catherine. There was sure to be damage control needed, and he wanted to make sure they both knew he was all in on helping fix this. As a “silent partner” he should let her handle it, but it had never really been that way for him when it came to Kayla.
She’d quickly become his friend, and he had helped with this restaurant more than he had with any other business that he’d invested in. Sure, he helped everyone he worked with, but he was a lot less hands-on and involved in the day-to-day operations than he was here.
Kayla scrambled to stand up and her chair rolled backwards, bumping the wall, even as she rounded her desk. “Catherine!” She went to her friend and wrapped her in a hug. “I’m so sorry to have you do this again.”
ChapterTen
Evan
Friday morning, Evan was back at Blind Date, having barely been gone. There was a press conference scheduled for a few hours from now, and all his friends were on their way to the restaurant.
He grabbed an empty chair and took a seat as Catherine and Kayla talked. He knew what he needed to do today and wasn’t concerned about how to answer questions. Kayla was nervous as hell, but she was leaning on Catherine instead of him, which annoyed him more than he liked.
Another annoying thing was there had been no response from K in the app. He hadn’t written her again today, but was surprised that she hadn’t even acknowledged that he’d canceled the date.
Checking his phone again, he sighed and put it away.
“Evan.” Jake slapped him on the back and sat next to him. “Any word on what this is all about?”
“Nothing yet. Catherine’s team is on it, threatening to sue if they don’t reveal their anonymous source. She seems hopeful we will have an answer today.”
“Well, I’d trust her. She knows what she’s doing.”
Evan nodded. He knew they’d figure it out one way or another. They had grounds to sue as the information was false anyway, but he wanted to know who said it. Then he wanted a damn retraction printed and an apology.
Cade and Ryker joined them a moment later.
“Is Luke coming?” Jake asked.
Ryker nodded. “He’s on his way. So is Owen.”
It was amazing to have friends that would turn out for you at a moment’s notice and be back again in the morning. The plan from Catherine was to present a united front and talk about the dates they had and the ones they planned to go on.
Lauren had joined Catherine and Kayla. Evan watched as the trio chatted over notes, and Kayla took more each time she nodded. He hated that she was going through this.
“I have someone looking into Lauren’s mom’s whereabouts. I hate to think that this is my mess again, but I need to be sure.” Jake told them.
“Catherine is already confirming that it’s not the father, but last we spoke, she hadn’t been able to one way or the other yet.”
“Why would either of them want to start this over again? Jake and Lauren are living together and happy as hell.”
Evan shrugged. “We’ve got people going through recent disconnects too—people who weren’t happy about dates not wanting to meet them.”
Luke, Owen, and Jenna walked in before they could throw out any more ideas.
“Okay that’s everyone, I think.” Catherine stood, addressing the room. “Thank you all for showing up on this short notice and being willing to help.”
“We all know you.” Cade rolled his eyes as he spoke to his sister. “You can talk normal.”