Page 21 of Three Grumpy Groomsmen

I look over. “Oh. Well…”

Ford sighs, but he’s smiling. “You want to see the armadillos?”

“It’s acircus, Ford,” I say.

Harrison laughs. “That’s my girl.”

Liam growls again, louder. Maybe about me and the armadillos. Maybe about Harrison speaking. Maybe both.

Ford just shakes his head. “You know it’s probably just two armadillos in some lady’s backyard.”

“But we kind of have to find out why she calls it a circus, right?” I ask, actually laughing now.

“Do we?” Liam asks. “Or are we just asking to be tied up in her basement with the other decaying remains of people who thought ‘armadillo circus sounds totally normal and interesting’.”

I laugh, and sip from my cup, and then, just to make Ford happy, I reach for the water bottle he’s holding and take a long gulp.

He gives me a smile and I feel lighter. Actually happy. Less than twenty-four hours after being left at the altar. That’s pretty amazing.

“And to think, you could have been on your way to your honeymoon right now,” Harrison stage-whispers to me.

Obviously Liam can hear him, but instead of growling, he meets my gaze in the rearview mirror. I know he’s checking on my reaction to the mention of the wedding that wasn’t. I owe him a huge thank you and a hug for carrying me out of the reception before my drunken speech went any further.

But I just nod and say, “I can honestly say that an armadillo circus with you guys sounds a thousand times better.”

And I really mean that. Even without knowing what exactly an armadillo circus entails.

CHAPTER 6

Ford

“No,”Harrison says, forcefully. “Absolutely not.”

Ivy and I exchange a look in the backseat. She looks exhausted and I don’t blame her. It’s been a long hot day in the cramped backseat of this car, with Harrison and Liam going at each other most of the time.

The armadillo circus was a bust.

Well, maybe it was amazing, but we never actually found it. If it did exist, it was more off the beaten path than we were willing to search. After several turns into random driveways and Harrison’s GPS glitching, Liam called it and got back on our route headed east.

Harrison can’t let it go and he’s not going to allow Liam to win this next round.

They’re locked in battle over which hotel to stay in and where. Liam wants to push on and drive for another hour or two so we can get to South Carolina as fast as possible, but Harrison is determined to set a leisurely pace with stops at luxury hotels.

“I’m not staying in that ‘motel.’” He even uses air quotes for the word motel as if Liam is suggesting we all sleep in a flop house for the night.

“Can you just compromise?” I demand. “We’re already stopping earlier than Liam wanted.”

“Yes, because we’re not going to just drive past an iconic town like Winslow, Arizona without stopping,” Harrison says, glaring at me from the passenger seat. “We’re going to stand on the corner like any true American.”

“What are you even talking about?” Ivy asks, leaning against the glass window as we’re idling in front of a budget motel Liam has picked for us to spend the night.

I feel really bad for Ivy. After the first few hours of driving, she stopped talking, mostly just fiddling with her phone and gazing out the window. I can’t tell if she’s just tired or if she’s devastated over her canceled wedding or something else entirely. Her mouth is pinched, and she’s kept her enormous sunglasses resolutely on her face.

At least she’s stopped drinking alcohol, and she did nap for a while but I’m still worried about her.

“It’s from a song,” Liam tells her. “It’s old, so you wouldn’t know it.”

It’s a reminder to me that Liam knows Ivy really well. I feel a pang of jealousy that is totally unjustified. He was her best man, or meant to be her best man. Of course they’re close.

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