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The more people know, the harder it will be to play everything off, which will, in turn, make it more difficult for me to pretend I can move on from the moment we almost gave in.

Even that was just wishful thinking, though.

Rory and I have the same circle of friends. We see each other all the damn time.

Meaning I’m well and truly fucked.

six

Rory

Things may be normalbetween Cole and me now, but apparently, I can hardly look at Harlow without my cheeks flushing. But I guess almost giving your best friend’s brother a blow job less than a week ago will do that to a girl.

She hasn’t called me out on it, but she’s eyed me several times.

Lucia, though? Oh, she knows something is up. She’s laughing under her breath whenever I stumble over a word or get caught up in a daydream. I’m so fucking obvious it’s painful.

“Rory. Hello?” Harlow says, cutting me out of my daydream about fucking daydreaming. “You good, babe?”

“Yep!” I say with a bit too much enthusiasm. Lucia snickers again, and I lightly kick her under the table. “All good here. What do we have left to plan for Ella’s bachelorette party?”

“We need to finalize our itinerary,” Lucia replies. “Our flight is at ten on Black Friday. It should take roughly six hours, so with the time change, we’ll arrive around one.”

“And since we don’t fly back to New York until Monday morning,” Harlow adds, “we have two and a half days to fill.”

“Well, we already have tickets for Garth Brooks on Friday night,” I say. “I’m not sure Ella would forgive us if we miss that.”

“I vote we do Chippendales,” Lucia exclaims, slapping her hand on the table and almost knocking over our drinks.

Harlow looks at Lucia in exasperation. “Ella won’t want to do that, and the only dick I want to see is my boyfriend’s.”

“I bet Rory would enjoy it. A bunch of hot men dancing with their junk in our faces? Yes, please.”

“Fuck no,” I laugh. “I like sex and men as much as the next girl, but I don’t want dicks in my face unless I’m the one getting on my knees.”

Heat flares in my cheeks again as I recall that moment. I can’t forget it, no matter how hard I try.

“It sucks to be single when all your friends are in relationships,” Lucia sighs. “I’ll have to go back to Vegas and see sweaty men another time.”

“You arenotthe only single one,” I chide. “I’m as single as Pringle.”

“Which just means you and I will need to mingle.”

Harlow laughs across the table. “I take it your Tinder date last night didn’t pan out?”

“Ew, no. His profile said he was 6‘2″, but he couldn’t have been more than 5′11″. Of course, I don’t care about that, but the man had the fucking audacity to get annoyed with me for being taller than him in my heels.”

“How do you possibly always find the worst dates?” I ask.

“Because,” Lucia grumbles, “all the good men in NYC are in relationships with Harlow and Ella.”

“My brother’s a good guy,” Harlow adds.

“Lane, too,” I say.

“Fair.” Lucia takes a sip of her wine before continuing. “I love Lane. He’s funny and kind, but he’s not my type. I want someone who challenges me. Lane’s a golden retriever. Cole,too, honestly, and that’s most of the reason I’m not interested in him.”

Lucia smirks at me as I blush yet again, knowing exactly what she’s getting at. I never told Lucia, but I guess I was right—she figured it out.

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