Page 47 of Frisco

And fuck, Kali was here too.

I made another call.

Machete picked up, sounding out of breath. “Yeah?”

I did not want to know why he’d be out of breath answering the phone after one ring. “I need you to come back.”

“The sister’s gone already?”

“No. Marco Estrada is in town.”

15

KALI

I’d found Harper and Aly at a local bar that looked like a trendy eatery. The gravel parking lot was filled and there were tables in front, to the side, and behind. The gravel road kept going past to a cute older house behind.

That was nice. If the owners lived there, they could just run over to open up.

Getting in had been a different story.

There was a line out the front door.

I knew they were already inside the bar, so I’d tried a side door. No go. This place had bouncers, so I stepped back, made a call, and Harper came for me.

“We love this town,” he gushed as he guided me to a corner table. “Oh my God. It has everything. Famous people. I recognized two NFL players, and that was just driving around town. Luxury cars. The mansions. OMG! The mansions! They have gates. Have you seen the country club here? A real motherfucking country club, like from the OC.”

Harper rattled off everything they’d seen in the two hours since I’d dropped them at the hotel. Apparently, a power nap did wonders, along with the amount of caffeine and sugar both had inhaled. Also, they still thought I was staying with them. They didn’t know about the motel, but I was going to explain later, after I got Claudia to come back home with me. With us.

We sat down, and Aly joined us a second later, smoothing down her shirt and throwing some hair over her shoulder. She’d been in the bathroom.

She leaned forward, her palms flat on the table and fingers spread. “I’m in love. Love. I’m moving here. I wanted a millionaire farmer? Forget that. I want a millionaire! I’ve gotta meet one here, don’t you think?” A worker walked past, carrying a bin of dirty glasses. She stopped him. “Hey. Are you a millionaire? You single?”

He was tall, with dark hair, attractive. He blinked at her a few times before he grinned. “I’m Brandon, and holy shit do I wish I were a millionaire. Maybe for you, we can pretend I am.” He gave her a once-over with a slight leer that seemed more like a compliment than actually dirty.

Aly blushed. “Oh, wow. Did I make a fool of myself here?” She looked at us. “Did I just do a thing I shouldn’t have done?”

I glanced over her shoulder to Brandon, who was still waiting beside our table. When we made eye contact, he gave me a wink and a grin and disappeared into the kitchen.

Harper started laughing, pounding the table. “You just hit on the busboy, asking if he was a millionaire. He could be eighteen.”

Aly folded her arms and dropped her head to the table. “I’m an idiot. I’m the friend you can’t bring out in public. That’s who I am.”

I frowned. “I don’t think he was eighteen. He didn’t look eighteen.”

“None of them look eighteen here.” Harper grabbed his drink. “This is California. Eighteen is really code for forty-one. They look eighteen, but are forty-one inside. Which is golden for us.” He turned, raising his hand for a high five.

Aly slapped it with hers. “Hell yeah! Forty inside and eighteen outside!”

A few people around us turned to look, but neither of my friends noticed. That’s when I knew. They were well and truly blitzed. Good Lord. They’d driven over thirty hours on the road with me. They did it hoping to talk to me about my ex. We hadn’t actually talked about my ex, and now they were here, in some super cool bar/eatery, hitting on busboys that I wasn’t sure were even busboys, and they did it because they loved me.

Truly blessed. That was me.

I wanted to cry, just sitting here, when a beer landed in front of me. I hadn’t ordered it, but it was perfect. Corona.

When I looked up, Harper was smiling at me. One guess at who ordered it.

I took my beer and mouthed “Thank you” to Harper, who just smiled and waved.

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