Page 127 of A Lucky Shot

The gentle Chinook temperatures extended to the weekend, with their friends and family packing every square foot of their bungalow and spilling onto the back deck. Cass and Libby had sniffled happy tears under a blanket as the couple recited their vows and kissed under the January stars.

It helped her broken heart to know that two people could find happiness in each other.

Even if one half of the happy couple was currently pumping Cass for information.

“Wait. Wait, wait, wait.” Jill held up a hand. “You are going on a date with Dawson James? Dr. Rykoff in Sirius Darker, that Dawson James?”

“Yep.”

“Try and sound excited about it, why don’t you?” Omar said, dropping onto the couch beside her. “I’ll jump on that train if you aren’t interested.”

“He’s really nice. I’m sure it’ll be fun.” Cass shrugged and pulled up a genuine smile. “But seriously, how long have you planned this, Mrs. Campbell?”

Jill grinned back with the most relaxed expression Cass had seen on her face since the day she’d announced her engagement. “About a week.”

“You sneak,” Libby said, elbowing Jill in the ribs. “Wedding planning apps weren’t cutting it for you?”

“Couldn’t decide on the colour for the tablecloths,” Alex cut in, and reached his hand to Jill. “Pardon me, but I need to steal my wife.”

Jill glowed as he wrapped a protective arm around her, leading her to say goodbye to departing family, and Cass felt the longing for that easy comfort. Of knowing the person you loved, loved you back. Fiercely. With every fibre of their being.

“It’s really special, seeing them together, isn’t it?” Omar shifted into Jill’s vacated spot beside Cass, watching the newlyweds melt into each other’s arms as people congratulated them on their way out. The look of sublime bliss on Alex’s face was perfectly mirrored in Jill’s.

“It really is,” she whispered.

“It’s not every day people find love like that.”

She thought she had. Once. She didn’t know if she ever would again. Cass pressed her hand to the raw ache in her chest. “Have you, Omar?”

“Yes.”

“What happened?”

“I wasn’t ready for it, and I let it go.”

Cass followed his gaze to a skinny man in a cowboy hat she didn’t recognize, hugging Jill and shaking hands with Alex. Cass pulled her eyes away. “What did you do?”

“I’ve spent the last decade trying to find someone else to fill his space in my heart.”

“Did it work?”

“No,” he said. “None of them were him.”

“I’m taking a page from Brynne’s book and putting a no-topless clause in all my future contracts. I am never doing that to myself again.”

Powder-like snowflakes lazed down from the inky sky and melted on the pavement. All three locations Dawson had planned for them to tour at the annual hot chocolate festival were within walking distance, and a short drive from the wearable technology fashion event planned for after.

It couldn’t have fit her better if she’d planned it herself.

Dawson sipped his second hot chocolate, his jacket collar open to the early evening cold. He steered Cass around the open guitar case of a busker singing an old country song and dropped in a few bills as he passed.

Cass blew into her drink to make the honey flavoured marshmallows swirl in a tiny whirlpool and took a sip of her chili-spiced hot chocolate. The night she and Josh had met, cherry blossoms and rain flowed along the Vancouver streets. The city’s lights reflected off every surface. He’d dragged her under an awning to kiss her as they waited for the car to bring them back to his condo.

Thinking about him isn’t going to help.

Cass stared into her cup. “No shirtless scenes? You’ll disappoint a whole bunch of fans.”

“Some, maybe. But if I worried about trying to please everyone, I’d never get out of bed in the morning.”

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