And I’d be there, right there, helping Hollis work through it all.
This thought makes me smile, tames the cobra rising in my chest. “No, it’s not you. It’s just been a tough day.” I bite my lip and will my eyes to glass over. “I didn’t want to bring it up, but apparently I can’t hide it.” I look down at my beer bottle, start to pick at the label. “Ford and I had a fight this morning. And we decided to take a break.”
Marla gasps, and I fight the urge to roll my eyes. “That explains so much.” She lays a hand over mine. “And there I was earlier, talking about marriage and kids and…shit. God, Becky. I’m so sorry.”
I shrug and slide my hand out from under from hers. “It’s okay. I didn’t want to bring it up. Honestly, I’d rather just forget about it. For tonight, at least.”
She juts her chin, determination etched in her features. “Then that’s what we’re going to do.” Trying but failing to catch our waitress’s attention, she hops up from her seat. “Screw it, I’ll just order straight from the bar. Wait here. I’m getting us some shots.”
I arch a brow. “Shots, huh? After what happened last time?”
She just smirks. “The things we do for friends, right?”
• • •
By the time Andy arrives, we’re lit.
I see him first, out of the corner of my eye. A grizzled blonde with broad shoulders and a thick, barrel chest. He’s wearing a denim shirt and black jeans and worn leather work boots that remind me an awful lot of Ford’s. He has more beard than he did in his Facebook profile pic, but it only does him justice. He’s hot, manly hot, the kind of hot that makes you wet just looking at him. He’s tall, too. Big and tall, and wearing enough muscle that he could easily pin a woman to a wall and hold her there with one quick thrust.
In fact, he almost looks like Nicholas – if Nicholas would ever let himself go wild.
The band hasn’t started yet, but they’ve taken the stage to warm up, and tables near the action are filling fast. I grab Marla’s arm and move us to one of the last spots near the makeshift platform, which also happens to be right next to Andy and his group of friends. There are about seven or eight of them, all men, and as we slip into our seats, I easily make eye contact with the one to Andy’s left.
Yeah, this is going to be a piece of cake.
The band works through its first five songs, a mix of country and rock covers, and by the time the sixth starts up, the dude I’ve been eye fucking for the last twenty minutes pushes back his chair and makes his way to our table. Marla’s back is to the group – something I made sure of when we sat down – so she doesn’t see him until he’s already seated. She blushes, her eyes darting my way, and I just shrug and smile, excited that the real show, the one I’m actually here for, is about to begin.
The guy is cute, in a blue collar, rugged kind of way, though he can’t hold a candle to Hollis. Or Ford, for that matter. But he’s perfect for what I need him for, and I flash him a coy smile over the rim of my bottle before taking a drink.
It’s only a matter of time before the rest follow.
Playing hard to get isn’t on the agenda. This guy needs to know he’s in like Flynn. That I’m up for grabs and ripe for the pickings. I need his ball attached to my chain in order to guarantee a merger of our two groups.
Between songs, I learn that his name is Landon, and by the time the band takes a break ten minutes later, Joseph and Rigley and Bryan have also joined us. Landon buys us all a round of drinks, and while we wait, he explains that they’re up here not only for the band, but to celebrate his thirty-fifth birthday. Tomorrow they plan to kayak through the sea caves on Lake Superior’s Wisconsin side, and I’m instantly jealous. We immediately launch into a discussion about the sport, and as new as I am to the hobby, I’m happy to be able to keep up. Landon has kayaked all over the world, even took a two-week trip touring the Broken Group Islands in British Colombia, and I’m so engrossed by his tales that I almost miss Marla and Andy’s emotional reunion.
Almost.
Fuuuuuck.
So this might not have been the best idea.
You. Bitch.
You bitch!
You bitch, you bitch, you lying bitch!
I can’t say this, though. But I want to. I want to wrap my hands around her neck and shout it in her face while choking the life out of her.
Because Marla is a fucking liar.
All this time I was working under false pretenses, with bogus information. Marla fed me one reality while the true story was a far, far different matter.
Marla and Andy didn’t just wake up one morning and decide they didn’t want to be married anymore. The culprit of their demise wasn’t youth and inexperience, as she claimed.
Nope.
Marla was the reason. Is the reason their marriage ended.
She cheated on her husband.
And I knew it. I knew it the minute Andy laid eyes her. He was the last of the crew to meander over to our table tonight, and when he pulled out a chair, when he was only half-seated in it and he saw his ex-wife, his eyes widened and his nostrils flared just enough that I knew – I fucking knew – there was more to their story than Marla told me.
Andy, for his part, didn’t cause a scene. Instead, he quietly set down his drink and, with measured movements, rose from the table and walked away.
Marla, of course, was more dramatic. She gave a little yelp of surprise when she saw him, slapping her hand over her mouth in a ridiculous effort to cover her surprise.
Yeah. It didn’t work.
The last we saw of them for a good half hour was Marla leaping up from the table and making a beeline for Andy’s large form as he shouldered his way through the crowd.
Apparently, the friends that Andy was with tonight were made after the demise of his marriage, because no one at the table knew who she was or why Andy had the reaction to her that he did. There was some uncomfortable joking about a bad one-night stand that garnered very few laughs, and when one of his friends went to check on them, he came back to the table with a somber face. “Dude,” he said, and then paused to chug some beer, as if what he’d seen was so traumatic that he needed to drown the image with booze. Everyone leaned forward with interest – including me – while waiting for him to finish. “That’s his fucking ex-wife.”
Quiet murmurs and foul expletives ricocheted around the table. Landon, who’d scooted his chair closer to mine, slid his eyes my way and shot me a look I couldn’t quite read.
Bryan (or Rigley or Joseph or John-Fucking-Doe for all it mattered) about choked on his beer and blurt out, “The one that—”
“Yeah. That one.”
Everyone at the table seemed to be in the know then. Everyone except me.
Which quickly pissed me the fuck off.
I don’t like being out of the loop. The only ignorant bastard in a sea of know-it-alls.
I turned to Landon, who just stared down into his drink, refusing to meet my eyes. “You might want to go get your friend,” was all he said.
So I did. I did, and now I’m sitting here with Marla, back at my place, on my couch, and watching her cry and snot bubble all over the place. I hand her another tissue and resist the urge to smother her with it.