Page 58 of Truly, Madly, Deeply

“You, shut up,” she said to Colin before turning to Caitlin. “That’s sweet of you, but—”

“I am far from sweet. I want to.” Caitlin jutted out her bottom lip. “Please? You’ve been such a doll, putting up with me and Colin these last few weeks. Not to mention, I have you to thank for my frankly phenomenal new deal with Spotify. Colin and I already have plans to check out this new bar over on Lenora. Come with us. We’ll have so much fun.”

Lenora was only a street over from her apartment, but Truly had a long Sunday ahead of her. The drive to the lake house in Chelan was five hours and she still had to pack and she’d really love it if she could make a little headway on her revisions. Because as soon as she got to Chelan? Her number one priority was her parents. She had no clue when she’d have the time or energy to work on her book when she had a real-life happily ever after to help orchestrate. “I don’t know.”

“Pretty please?” Caitlin batted her lashes. “Come on! First round’s on Colin.”

He huffed. “Says the girl who just got paid an absurd amount of money to talk about how to get come out of cashmere.”

Caitlin punched him in the arm. “Don’t act like you aren’t proud of me.”

Colin wrinkled his nose, but dragged her in, kissing her forehead and no, Truly did not melt a little.

“I really wouldn’t want to impose.”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Caitlin chastised. “Colin, tell Truly she wouldn’t be imposing.”

He smiled, a flash of white teeth against pink lips stretched wide. If her heart happened to skip a beat? No, it didn’t. “If anything, you’d be doing me a favor.”

Caitlin grumbled under her breath, too quiet to make out the words. Not that Truly was trying particularly hard, still snared by Colin’s stare and the brightness of his smile, the quirk of his lips and the lift of his brows all but screaming, what do you say, St. James? without him having to open his mouth.

And God, what a mouth it was. Lips like those should be illegal. In the right light, they didn’t even look pink, they looked red. A color she’d have to reach for a tube of lipstick to achieve. Kiss bitten. Wind chapped, probably, but the thought of someone else, someone who wasn’t her, scraping their teeth against the swell of Colin’s bottom lip until it plumped, until it turned tender and swollen, made her blood boil.

Just because she had no business kissing Colin didn’t mean she relished the thought of someone else kissing him instead.

Lips like those were practically begging to be kissed. Plenty of people would agree, people who would be out at a bar on a Saturday night, looking for someone like Colin to kiss.

What harm could come from one little drink? A chaperoned one at that. Baby steps.

“Text me the address,” she said. “As long as we’re not drinking tequila, I’m in.”

***

“Okay, picture like forty-some-odd McCrory relatives crammed into our parents’ house. Distant cousins and—hell, even our great-grandmother from County Sligo flew all the way across the pond. It’s a big thing.” Caitlin slammed back a shot of whiskey like a goddamn champ because she had no compunctions about indulging even if Truly did. “There’s, like, eggnog and cider and a dozen different kinds of cookies and Mariah Carey’s crooning about how all she wants for Christmas is you, ya know?”

Truly took a delicate sip of a Dirty Shirley, pacing herself. “I follow.”

“Perfect. So, now imagine—oh hell yes.” Caitlin wiggled excitedly on her barstool. “I’m starving.”

“Good. I think I ordered enough food for a small army,” Colin said, back from ordering at the bar. He placed a bowl of roasted brussels sprouts in front of Truly before setting a basket of parmesan truffle fries that smelled like salty deep-fried heaven in the center of the table, along with some sort of fancy beet salad, and a plate of wings smothered in buffalo sauce. “Dig in.”

“Don’t mind if I do,” Truly said, reaching past the bowl of brussels sprouts for a fry covered in cheesy, garlicky goodness.

With a put-upon sigh, Colin pointedly nudged the bowl of brussels sprouts closer. “Eat something green, please.”

“Let the woman eat her fries in peace, Dad.” Caitlin snorted.

“You know very well our father has never once willingly eaten a salad that didn’t have Caesar in the name. Or that wasn’t smothered in blue cheese dressing and bacon bits.”

“It was Dad energy,” Caitlin said.

It was, and Truly would be lying if she said it wasn’t kind of hot in a weird, let’s unpack that later during sex-positive therapy kind of way. Right now she just wanted to stuff her face and hear Caitlin finish her story.

“I’m not anti-vegetable. I understand the value of dietary fiber. I just happen to prefer my veggies covered in cheese and deep-fried. That’s my choice.” She popped another fry in her mouth and moaned at the flavor explosion. Those truffles were fucking magical.

“A perfectly valid choice at that.” Caitlin tapped her own fry against Truly’s.

Colin shook his head and speared a golden beet on his fork. “There’s goat cheese on these, if that persuades you to eat something not deep-fried.”

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