Page 124 of The Love Bandits

His eyes are shuttered as I approach him, and two things hit me—he’s grown a beard, which is surprising, and he’s wearing a long-sleeve T-shirt and jeans.

I slide in across from him, shrugging off my coat, and he silently passes a beer to me.

“I’m hoping you didn’t spit in it?” I ask.

He gives me a flat look. “Do I look like the kind of person who spits in drinks?”

Maybe. I’m not so sure that sort of personality has a look attached to it, but it would be the wrong thing to say, so I accept the beer with a nod and a thanks.

“My mother told me who you are,” he says.

“I know, she mentioned that the other week.” I let that linger for a moment and then add, “Mind telling me why you didn’t try harder to get her to turn me in?”

“The police probably wouldn’t have even arrested you,” he says with a sigh, leaning back in his seat. “But that’s not really why.” He turns his beer around, his expression distant. “My mother told me about that guy…Roark. How he was like a father to you, and he screwed you over. I know what that kind of thing can do to a person. I guess I figured you deserve a chance at a do-over as much as anyone.”

“I want more than a do-over,” I tell him, leaning forward a little. “Lainey and me…we’ve been helping people, and we’re scaling up.” I tell him a bit about the Love Fixers. How we’ve started running ads and are going to have to bring on extra staffsoon since Nicole and Damien are so often busy with their own agency.

“I sense you’re going somewhere with this,” Anthony says after a couple of minutes.

“You only have a few weeks left, man. Let me help you.”

He’s already shaking his head, and he looks like he’s ready to leave without even taking a sip of his beer.

“I need this,” I say, my voice shaking a little with the force of it. “Ineedto do this for you.”

“I forgive you,” he tells me. “I…” He swallows. “In a fucked up way, you helped me. So I forgive you. There’s no need for all of this.” He waves his hand around.

“There’s always a need for peanuts,” I joke. “Unless you're my brother, and then they’d kill you. Look, let me do this for you. If you make an ironclad prenup, there’s no reason why this will blow up in your face. It’s not really a marriage, it’s a…workaround.”

“And you’re in the business of workarounds, I take it,” Anthony says with a grunt that doesn’t sound particularly impressed.

“You might say it’s my specialty.”

He sighs and sags back again, plucking at the hem of his shirt as if he too is puzzled by why he’s wearing it. “I don’t know if I have it in me anymore. I…it was a lot, with Nina leaving. She…I might not have loved her anymore, but she was a big part of my life. Now, that’s just…gone.”

I pause, wondering if I should say this next bit, or if it will push him over the edge of his early mid-life crisis. Fuck it, I’ve never been the careful sort.

“Your mother hasn’t cancelled the arrangements for the wedding yet. It’s all prepared for someone else to step in. You can still inherit the money.”

His mouth drops open, then he swears liberally and takes a swig of beer. “But everyone knows. Fuck. Nina’s dating Wilson openly now.”

My mind automatically substitutes ‘blond dick’ for Wilson, but I don’t say so. I’m hanging by my fingernails here—if I push him in the wrong direction, I’m gone.

“So wouldn’t it be funny to get married to someone else using the wedding that was planned for her? Hell, you shouldinvite them. That’d be a trip.”

“She’ll know it’s fake,” he says, his mouth a flat line.

I shrug. “She’ll suspect. But she’ll still be jealous. Hell, she was jealous when Rosie touched your shoulder last month. There’s no one more jealous than a cheater.”

“Rosie,” he repeats, a spark in his eyes. “The woman who took the necklace.”

I nod. “But it was a misunderstanding.”

He’s quiet for a second, then he takes another gulp of his drink and nods. “Let’s do it.”

EPILOGUE

LAINEY

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