Page 135 of The Love Haters

“Katie’s not an underling,” Cole said. “She’s a colleague.”

I was Team Hutch, but…point, Cole.

“A colleague,” Hutch countered, “is thelastthing she is.”

“Our boss, Sullivan, is laying off half the staff. I was trying to do something good for someone. Isn’t that your whole thing?”

But Hutch shook his head. “You just didn’t want me to get what I wanted.”

“What did you want?”

“To see you!”

“But I sent Katie instead.”

Hutch glanced over my way. “Yes, you did.”

Cole was nodding now. “And then you fell for her.”

I waited for the denial, but it didn’t come.

Instead, Hutch said, “You never told me she was your girlfriend. I didn’t know anything about that. You can’t just send a woman like that down here, and make her spend every single second following me around, and tell me to let hersleep over at my house—during a thunderstorm—and think I’m not going to react to that. That’s on you. You should’ve said she was yours from the start! But you didn’t. And before I knew it…” Hutch rubbed the back of his neck. “Before I knew it, it was too late.”

The Gals all turned to check each other’s wide-eyed reactions.

No one, of course, was more wide-eyed than me.

But that’s when Cole said, “It’s not too late.”

Hutch shook his head. “What does that mean?”

Hutch looked around. He saw us all by the pool. The Gals raised their glasses as if to sayCheers.

Cole looked at me. “Should I tell him what it means?”

But I wasn’t prepared. “What—right here?”

“Three days ago you wanted to tell him right here.”

“It’s been a long three days,” I said.

“I think it’s been long enough,” Cole said.

“But”—I glanced over—“what about Rue?”

“Don’t worry about Rue!” Rue called.

Then, without any further discussion, Cole just turned to Hutch and said, “Katie isn’t actually my girlfriend.”

Oh, god.

Hutch held very still. “She’s not—what?”

“Or even my friend, to be honest. We barely know each other. I just needed somebody to come down here and take this job.”

Hutch stared at Cole, trying to read his face. “You’re not together?”

Cole shrugged.

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