Page 26 of Broken Deal

Damian fixes him with a glare sharp enough to cut. “You think you’re so hilarious, huh?”

Matteo points at Aria with the mouth of his beer bottle, raising an eyebrow. “Care to confirm?”

“I can confirm Damian is a very passionate and thoughtful lover,” Aria says in between fits of laughter, trying to catch her breath.

“Oh my God,Damie!” I chime in with a playful tone. “I’m so happy to hear my best friend is well taken care of.”

The whole table is laughing now, exceptfor Damian, who’s as red as a tomato, but still has that broody, grumpy aura of his.

“You promised you wouldn’t tell anyone about that nickname!” Damian exclaims, looking at Aria in disbelief.

Aria lifts her hands in surrender. “I’m sorry!” She grabs the black linen napkin from the table and throws it at me. “You are such a blabbermouth.”

A loud laugh escapes my lips as my eyes fill with tears from all the laughing. As I’m trying to calm myself down, a small snort slips out between laughs. I haven’t laughed like this in a while, and it’s a welcoming feeling with everything that has been going on lately.

“That’ll do, piggy. That’ll do,” Lorenzo says with a laugh.

I lock my eyes with him in shock as the rest of the group groans in unison.

“You have to stop it with the quotes that no one gets,” Matteo groans.

“I cannot believe we have another one in our group. Kill me now. Put me out of my misery,” Isabella complains.

“Did you just quoteBabeto me?” I ask.

Lorenzo frowns. “Yeah, why?” Then he looks at Isabella. “And what do you mean by that?”

“You’d be happy to know Sophia loves to quote famous movies and TV shows from the ’90s,” Aria chimes in. “It’s kind of her most annoying quirk.”

Her comment makes me falter for a moment, but I force a laugh instead. I know I have some annoying quirks, and my friends love me despite them, but the wound always opens the tiniest bit when someone points out things like that. And I know Aria doesn’t mean any harm, it’s not like I’ve spoken to her about it. This is how we work. I’m always the butt of the joke.

I look at her, faking disappointment. “You’re killing me, smalls.”

Lorenzo chuckles, nodding. “The Sandlot.Nice choice.”

“It’s like you guys are meant to be,” Damian chimes in, looking rather smugly at Lorenzo.

We both glare at him at the same time and say, “Please.”

The rest of the group starts laughing as our gazes lock and we study each other. I’ll be damned if what Aria said is true. Me being the female version of him? Not in a million years. This is a simple dumb coincidence.

“Okay, okay,” Aria says, standing with her glass of wine. “Enough with the jokes. I have something I want to say. I’m so glad you all could make it here today. Means the world to me, guys, really.” She lifts her glass. “To friendship.”

We all smile as we pick up our drinks and toast.

Damian clears his throat with a small, deliberate cough. “We also wanted to let you all know we’ve decided to have the bachelor and bachelorette parties together. So, we will be going to Las Vegas at the end of August as a group. We’re aware we don’t even have a wedding date yet, but our schedules will get busier during the fall, so it makes sense.” He shrugs.

Isabella chokes on her wine at the announcement, and Matteo’s back stiffens. He glances at Isabella for the briefest moment before dropping his eyes to his drink, suddenly becoming very interested in the beer he’s holding. I can feel Lorenzo’s eyes burning into me, but if there’s one thing I refuse to show, it’s weakness—or how much I enjoy him not being able to take his eyes off me more than I’d care to admit.

“Everybody’s cool with it,right?” Damian asks, his pointed look making it clear we don’t have any other option but to agree.

We all nod and smile, and Aria’s face lights up. I would do anything to make my best friend happy, even if it means spending more time than necessary with Lorenzo.

I tap Matteo’s shoulder, leaning forward with my elbows on the table and my chin resting on my thumbs. “So, I hear you have a cyber company?”

He smiles charmingly. “I do. Built it from the ground up when I graduated from MIT.”

“You and Isabella attended MIT at the same time, right?”

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