Page 56 of Sleeping with the Frenemy

Kamilah whacked her in the face with a pillow. “Cut it out, you homewrecker. Just keep it in your pants until one of my single and not jerky brothers comes back.”

Sofi chuckled, but she could hear how forced it sounded. “Don’t worry about me. I have no interest in any of your brothers and I don’t have to in order for us to be sisters.”

Kamilah flipped over onto her side and Sofi turned her head to look at her. “True,” Kamilah said with a blazing smile. “We’re already sisters.”

Sofi smiled back at her. She held out her pinky. “Ride or die.” It was something they’d said to each other since the day Kamilah had claimed Sofi as her best friend. It meant that they would be by each other’s side no matter what.

Kamilah wrapped her pinky around Sofi’s. “Ride or die,” she promised.

In her head, Sofi promised that she’d always put her friendship with Kamilah first. It wasn’t like her and Leo would work out anyway. They were already moving in different directions.

Sofi shook herself out of the past only to realize everyone was staring at her. “I’m sorry, what?” she asked.

Kamilah gave her a weird look. “I said, Rome has been talking about the bachelor party and I was telling him that Liam and I weren’t planning on having a bachelor or bachelorette party.”

“What?” Sofi screeched. “Of course you’re having a bachelorette party. I’ve already planned it and everything.”

“I told you,” Leo’s smug voice said right before a dark pink drink in a short tumbler appeared in front of Sofi’s face, cutting off her view of Kamilah.

Sofi blinked and grabbed the drink if only to get it out of her way. “You told me what?” she asked him.

He shook his head. “No. I told Kamilah that there was no way you were letting her get away with that and that you’d no doubt started planning it as soon as she asked you to be the maid of honor.”

Unwilling to say that he was right, Sofi sniffed and took a sip of her drink which tasted like a blackberry sweet tea with a tart kick of lime, spicy ginger, and the warmth of smooth whiskey. “This is good,” she told him. “A bit too boozy, but good.”

“I love boozy,” Alex said. “Boozy sounds perfect to us, right, Gabs?” She clicked her glass against her older sister’s. Alex and Gabi were the youngest daughters of Kamilah and Leo’s youngest aunt, but they were a lot closer to Kamilah than mere cousins. When their mom, Carmen, had left for New York with the oldest daughter, Eva, she’d left the younger two with their father, Luís. Kamilah’s parents, along with the rest of the family, had jumped right in to help Luís raise Gabi and Alex. In some ways it was like Gabi and Alex belonged more to the elder set of Vega siblings than they did to their own mother. It wasn’t surprising then that both were included in Kamilah’s wedding party, they were pretty much her little sisters.

“Leo, can I ask you something?” Ben asked from the bar where he was looking over the ingredients on the counter. “Are all the drinks you make today going to be pink? If so, why?”

“I was wondering that same thing,” Liam said.

“Yes,” Leo responded. “And I figured they should be pink so they can match with the pink wedding stuff.”

Liam blinked. “What pink wedding stuff?” His tone was dark and slightly threatening as if to say there had better not be any pink wedding stuff.

“Uh-oh,” Kamilah murmured, making it clear she hadn’t said anything about Sofi’s changes to the color palette.

Liam’s eyes locked on his fiancée. “I thought you said the colors were white, gold, and green like your ring.”

Kamilah squirmed. “They are, but then Sofi pointed out that we needed something bright to balance the deep emerald green.”

Sofi jumped in to defend her stance. “Exactly. Adding blush, berry, and fuchsia pink to the mix with little pops of orangy coral and sage green makes your wedding look like a summer wedding instead of a fall one.”

Saint shook his head as if something just wouldn’t compute. “Kamilah with a pink wedding? I just don’t see it.”

Sofi wasn’t surprised. According to the family, Kamilah had been the quintessential tomboy until she’d met Sofi. It made sense considering she had four older brothers who always teased her whenever she did anything they considered “girlie,” they still did.

Case in point Leo immediately saying, “I too was shocked when I walked into the dining room and saw a bunch of pictures of pink flowers all over the wall. Who would’ve thought that the same girl who wore my hand-me-down jeans and tennis shoes would want a Barbie wedding?” He turned to Liam. “You ready for all that Ken?”

Liam scowled. “I don’t think I want a pink wedding.”

“Well, who cares what you want,” Sofi said, sounding a bit bitchier than she intended. “Kamilah wants it and that’s what matters most.”

Leo laughed. “I don’t think it works that way. The groom is also an important part of the wedding process.”

Sofi waved him off. “Yeah, well, I’m on the case now. All this bride and groom need to do is show up.”

Kamilah walked up to Liam and plopped herself in his lap which seemed to lighten his mood considerably. “Besides, it’s not a lot of pink and it’s mostly just in the flowers.”

---