Page 2 of Tips and Trysts

Like we’re in a choreographed dance, Tyler advances. “I thought you’d be happy to see me. You’re supposed to—”

“You know what? I’d love to stick around, but I have a private session, so I have to go fuck myself,” I interject, wishing I could tell him to do the same. I gesture to the bar’s exit. “I should head out.”

“But we just started talking,” he half-chuckles, half-protests. Another step forward.

I look him up and down, careful not to be too obvious. I’m no athlete, but he doesn’t look fast. Bet I could outrun him. And while I didn’t envision spending my Saturday night sprinting around Dupont Circle, I’d do it if the alternative were being shoved into the back of this deadbeat’s creeper van.

That is, assuming he has a van. They’re actually pretty expensive and the insurance is no joke. And now that I think about it, Tyler’s actually giving creepersedanvibes—not van.

“Stay and have a drink with me.”

“Hell no.”

Tyler’s eyebrows shoot up and he pulls his head back. “Wait, seriously?”

“Seriously,” I reply before I pull a twenty out of my purse and place it on the bar.

Next to me, Tyler has progressed to full-on sneering. “Do you know how much—”

“How much you’ve tipped me?” I interrupt, shrugging. “There are, like, nineteen guys named Tyler watching me stream on any given night because Tyler is quite possibly the most common and yetleastinteresting name on record. And in addition to having the most mind-numbingly generic name ever, you’re all horrendously bad tippers.”

Tyler’s glare darkens. He takes a step forward, hulking in a futile effort to seem bigger, but he ends up looking pillowy. “You b—”

“Bitch?” I question, eyebrow raised. “Even your insults are mind-numbingly generic. I’ve called myself a bitch three times today already.”

Furious, Tyler moves, ready to get in my face and—

“There you are,” a familiar voice cuts in—a grotesquely familiar voice.

Oh, I hate this voice.

I don’t just hate its pompous combination of a faint Mid-Atlantic accent and the clean enunciations of an Ivy League humanities major. I hate how easily I can pick it out of a crowd. I hate how it sparks something inside me—something hot and prickly that I can’t ignore.

My lip curls involuntarily as an arm winds around my waist. Alarmed, I look up—right into Everett Logan’s green eyes.

“You didn’t answer my text,” Everett comments before he tucks a lock of my hair behind my ear.

A few things about this turn of events strike me as odd.

The first: Everett Logan doesn’t look like himself tonight. In lieu of his usual button-down and business slacks, he’s wearing a black t-shirt, thick-rimmed glasses, and a baseball cap. In fact, if I didn’t know his voice—and those unmistakable green eyes—I wouldn’t have recognized him.

The second: Everett Logan didn’t text me. To be clear: Everett Logan doesn’t text me. Ever.

The third thing to strike me as odd: beyond a handshake, Everett Logan has never touched me before tonight.

My expression must match my confusion because Everett lets out a gentle laugh before glancing at Tyler. “Oh no,” he murmurs, sporting a cross between a smile and a smirk. “What trouble has my wife gotten herself into now?”

I freeze. It’s so loud in the bar that I assume I misheard him.

Equally perplexed, Tyler’s eyebrows ascend. “Your wife?”

“My wife,” Everett emphasizes, tightening his grip on my waist.

I didn’t mishear. He called me hiswife.

Everett Logan is many things. To name a few: He’s a lawyer at the Environmental Protection Agency, a policy analyst, an aspiring politician, and the lifelong best friend to Lander, my best friend Valeria’s fiancé. He’s also a little ratfucker.

And yes, our lives are forever intertwined because our best friends are in love,notbecause he’s my husband.

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