And over a decade later, here I was. Rich. Successful. Happy, more-or-less. I supposed that Charlie would be getting out of prison soon, if he hadn’t already. I wondered if he caught up with Freddy. I wondered if Freddy was even still alive.
And Sammy? Sammy had gotten three years after he beat wifey’s new boyfriend half to death with a tire iron. Afterward, he’d gone back to the old neighborhood, became another drunk useless adult until his liver gave out. My sister had told me he died right before asking for a new car. She’d gotten one in exchange for the rest of the information.
I’d thought a lot about Sammy since his death. Did he ever realize that he’d screwed us all over by leaving? That none of us had been prepared to face the world on our own? He had to have known I’d made it out. I supposed I should be thankful he never came calling for money like the rest of them. On the other hand, it would have been nice to talk to him one last time. Even if it was telling him to feck off.
I drank my scotch glumly. I’d grown a lot since those days. I was a successful man, confident and wealthy. Sam’s marriage wasn’t going to kill me. And I didn’t think any of the Knights were going to wind up with a bullet in the brain anytime soon. But they’d been what I’d been searching for ever since those late-night poker games and wild young-kid dreams faded to empty promises and lost causes.
Could I find something to replace them once they were gone? Could it be someone with auburn hair and sparkling brown eyes? Or would that just lead me back to the lonely road I walked from Dublin?
“If your face got any longer, it’d be sitting on the ground.”
I glanced to my left. It was Twain, of all people. He had a habit of appearing whenever and wherever you least expected him. I hadn’t seen him since yesterday at the pool and was surprised to see he looked almost civilized, wearing a gray sports coat and jeans.
“Shouldn’t you be getting fitted for something with the rest of them?” I asked. I wasn’t in the mood for teases and insanity.
Twain shrugged and waved for a drink. “Probably,” he said. “If I gave a shit.”
I raised an eyebrow at him.
“What? I didn’t gain any weight in the past two weeks since we got the damn things fitted in New York. All they’re doing is wasting time.”
“Cheers to that,” I said. He knocked his beer to my rocks glass.
He drank and I watched him from the corner of my eye. Once he put his glass down, he gave a long sigh. “Fuck you, Mac,” he said.
“What?”
“You heard me,” he said. “Fuck you. I’ve known you for, what, two years now? And don’t get me wrong, you’re a cool guy. A bit stuffy for my taste, but that’s to be expected at your age.”
“Wait a minute—”
“But,” he continued over me, “I never thought you hated me until now.”
I kept silent. It was better to just see where the hell he was going with this.
“Why is it that you have to plan the greatest night in the Knight’s history for the one time I’m not there?”
He rolled his eyes at my confusion. “Did you or did you not really have seven strippers in Beck’s suite? And the girls. Did they or did they not walk in on the party?”
I snorted at the memory. Not my proudest moment, but leave it to Twain to find that the best story ever. “Yeah, that’s about right.”
He groaned. “I was hoping Henry was exaggerating. Please tell me you at least got video?”
“Nope. It lived and died in the moment,” I said with a grin. “It was good too. Well, no it sucked. But I’ll never forget it.”
He shook his head. “Of course,” he said miserably. His eyes narrowed. “And I hear you and Alice are a thing.”
I sobered instantly. “That’s not true,” I said.
“Okay, let me clarify. I saw that you and Alice were a thing. Remember, I was there in Tuzas. I saw the two of you at that bar.” He leaned closer and whispered like it was a secret. “I saw the way she looked at you.”
I grunted. “Well, it’s her mistake then. She should know better. I’m completely unavailable.”
“Are you now?”
“Yes!” I said loudly. Why did he have to bring this up? Couldn’t we have just talked about the strippers?
He raised an eyebrow at my outburst.
I sighed and shook my head, looking down at my glass. “I won’t become one of those sad, divorced idiots at weddings who glower at their barstools the entire time.”
Twain looked at me carefully and then chugged the rest of his beer before standing up. He slapped my shoulder and pointed across from us, at the mirror behind the row of liquor bottles. “Like that guy?” he asked.
He disappeared a moment before I realized he was pointing at me.
20
Alice
I didn’t want to leave. I wanted to turn over and snuggle against that strong, broad chest and pretend that Mac was the man I dreamt about. That he was my future, my forever. The Sam to my Beck.
But the fantasy couldn’t go on much longer. I was an adult woman with a career and my own blender, not a little girl anymore, and I needed to face the facts. I needed to stop chasing the unobtainable.
The moment I closed the door softly on Mac’s sleeping form, I threw myself back into the wedding with unbridled fervor. It wasn’t hard. Though the resort was handling a lot of the larger details, there was still plenty to do — last minute alterations for the wedding dress, unloading to oversee, fires to put out, and, of course, so many guests to greet.
Before we’d started planning back in New York, I hadn’t known that Beck and Sam even knew so many people. That had prepared me somewhat for today, but no stack of wedding invitations could compare to the physical hoard of guests that came pouring into the resort this morning. Every time I went anywhere with Beck, people swarmed, offering congratulations to the point that I felt like a bodyguard to a celebrity, telling them that “the bride has places to be” as Beck tried to thank them while moving.
I finally had to confront Mariana — and by confront, I meant see her in person for the first time since that fateful initial day. Obviously there was absolutely no way I was going to bring it up, so after some initial awkwardness, we fell back into our previous roles and everything was more or less fine.
The morning was busy, and by noon everyone came to help out. Kylie, Sarah, even Jules, dragging Keegan behind her like she didn’t want to spend time alone with us. Mason and Henry helped too for a bit before going with Sam to get their tuxes fitted one last time. Even Twain hung out for a bit though he did much more talking than helping. Only Mac was absent.
At some point Margot Lorne appeared on the scene and chatted up Beck while I watched her with a side-eye. She was unbelievably polished. Young, blonde, attractive. It was obvious what Mac saw in her. She fit his lifestyle much better than I ever would.
Beck, Mariana, and I went to show her the wedding cake, and when we came out Mac was there. It was an awkward moment, him standing there in front of Mariana, Margot, and me. The tension was so thick I was almost relieved once we were alone in the hallway
And then that conversation.