Page 7 of False Confidence

Maggie waved her away. “We’ve never claimed to be traditional. Why are you telling me now?”

“Liam asked me to. He felt weird about taking you up on your suggestion to ask me as a date to the wedding without you knowing everything.”

Maggie grabbed her coffee cup again and took a long draw, mulling it over before speaking. “I don’t really know what to do here. Am I supposed to ask you about it? I know we always talk about this kind of stuff, so I can pretend it’s not weird if you want to talk about it.”

Jazz shrugged. “There’s not much to say. We were drunk. Neither of us remember much of it.”

Maggie narrowed her eyes suspiciously. “Since when do you not remember a million details, even when you’re drunk?”

Shit. Maggie had her there. Thanks to her inability to come, Jazz had gotten good at embellishing when talking about sex. “I mean…” she searched around, trying to find an excuse and coming up blank. Peach, Maggie and Cal’s cat, jumped up on the table and nestled into her, and Jazz bought a little extra time kissing her face and sneezing when her orange and black fur tickled her nose.

“We were both wasted and tired after such a long day, but what I remember was good,” she said, finally. Adding, “I was sore the next day, if that tells you anything,” just as Cal walked into the kitchen. Let the ground swallow her the fuck up.

“Hi, love,” Cal said, stooping to kiss Maggie. Jazz ignored the tightness in her chest the sight of her best friend and her husband. They looked at each other like nothing else in the world existed and she couldn’t be happier for them. She couldn’t explain the little twinges of anxiety seeing them together gave her, and she didn’t need to explain them if she pretended they weren’t there. When they broke apart, Cal plucked Peach from the table and kissed her nose. “Hey, Jazz.”

“Hey.” She exchanged an awkward look with Maggie as they both sat in silence.

“Don’t stop on my account,” Cal said, grabbing a cup from the cabinet. “I’m just getting coffee, then I’m heading upstairs to catch up on my YouTube.”

Maggie’s lip twitched, fighting a smile. Her TikTok had been a gateway to Cal, and he now not only scrolled the app mindlessly for hours, but watched YouTube religiously, sending any video he found mildly interesting to Maggie. She watched every single one. They were disgusting.

Cal turned around and frowned while he waited for his coffee. “Why are you being weird?”

“We’re not being weird.”

“You never stop talking because I’m here. What am I missing?”

“You don’t want to know. Trust me,” Maggie said, and Cal shrugged, but took her at face value.

“Cool, I’m going to head out so you can stop being weird.” He lifted his cup in goodbye before leaving the room.

“Are you going to tell him?” Jazz asked Maggie when the coast was clear. She didn’t know why, but the thought of Cal knowing was infinitely worse than Maggie. It was just sex—it wasn’t a big deal. So why was she making it one?

“We generally don’t go out of our way to talk about Liam’s sex life,” Maggie replied with a snort. “But if he asks… I mean, shit, you’re my best friend and obviously I’m not going to tell him if you don’t want me to, but he’s my husband and?—”

“It’s okay.” Jazz cut her off before she could spiral. It was one of Maggie’s greatest skills. “I’d never ask you to lie to him. But also, it was one time. That doesn’t make it Liam’s sex life. He’s a single man in his thirties who looks like that. I bet I was barely a blip on his radar.”

Maggie said nothing, narrowing her eyes as she sipped her coffee.

“What?”

“You’re going to do it again, aren’t you?” Maggie asked.

“Of course not. I’m not interested in him like that.”

Would she like to do it again? Of course she would. She was only human, after all, and Liam had gotten her closer to finishing than anyone else had. But that didn’t mean she was going to. Besides, there was nothing to imply that Liam was even interested in her. She was tagging along to the wedding to support him as a friend, that was all.

“Sure,” Maggie replied sarcastically and, for a moment, Jazz hated how well Maggie knew her.

“It was one night. It’s not going to happen again.” There was more bite to Jazz’s words than she intended, and Maggie held her hands up in surrender.

“Okay, okay. It’s not going to happen again. But you’re going to the wedding with him, right?”

Jazz leaned back in her chair with a sigh, running her hands through her unruly hair. She knew she’d regret letting it air dry the night before, but she’d done it anyway. A trip to the salon would be essential before the wedding; she wasn’t going to make Liam’s ex jealous with three inches of root growth and uneven bangs that she’d cut herself, because she couldn’t see anymore but didn’t want to deal with a salon appointment.

“Yeah. As long as you’re okay with it.”

“Why wouldn’t I be okay with it?”

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