Page 112 of The Backup Bride Proposal

“I love you, too.”

“I’m going to go to my trailer, call Ethan and then face-plant on my bed. We have five thirty makeup tomorrow.”

He grimaced. “Yeah, yeah. Good night.”

As soon as he got back to his trailer, he took out his phone and called Mae. She didn’t answer, which made him frown, so he sent a text.

Are you busy? I tried calling you.

He waited, watching his phone for a reply, then got tired of waiting, so he opened his game console to play somegames. About thirty minutes later his phone pinged. He grabbed it to see Mae had replied.

Sorry. Was taking a bath and reading a book. What’s up?

At the moment, he was thinking about her naked in the tub, bubbles up to her neck while she relaxed and read. But that wasn’t supposed to be his focus, so he typed a reply.

Sorry about tonight. Everly knows about us.

She replied with a?

He wasn’t going to do this with a text, so he FaceTimed her. She answered right away this time.

“Hey,” she said, looking beautiful with her hair in a bun, sitting on her bed wearing a tank top.

“Hey. Everly said I made tonight weird when it didn’t have to be because I didn’t tell her about us. I was trying to be sensitive.”

“Because…”

He dragged his fingers through his hair. “I don’t know. I didn’t want you to feel weird. I didn’t want her to feel weird.”

“So instead you made us all feel weird.”

“That’s exactly what she said.”

Mae smiled. “I knew I liked her. Look, it’s fine. I understand why. She’s your friend and you wanted her to be comfortable with us. Next time, just make her feel comfortable—like your friend. Because I really like her, Kane.”

“I like her, too. She’s been like a sister to me ever since we first met as teens. And, trust me, that’s all we are to each other.”

“I believe you.”

Now that he’d gotten things straightened out with Mae, he felt the fatigue overwhelm him. “I’ve got to be in makeup at five thirty tomorrow.”

“Ugh. Go to bed.”

“Yeah, I will. I’ll see you sometime tomorrow, okay?”

“It’s Friday and we have a wedding, so I’ll be busy most of the day—and night. And we have two weddings on Saturday.”

“Hey, we’ll figure something out.”

“Yeah, we will.”

“Don’t work too hard, Kane.”

“You, either.”

They clicked off. Kane turned his game off and went into the bedroom. By the time he climbed into bed he was more than ready to sleep.

He couldn’t wait to see Mae again. Hopefully sooner rather than later.

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