Page 119 of The Love Haters

But the truth is, there was no question that Hutch was absolutely seething. About everything. And a little revenge sex might not be totally out of the question for him, either.

I guess The Gals felt the same way. I’m not sure any of them fully bought Cole’s story. And so—bless them, bless them—over the next three days, rather than letting Sullivan have free rein to stalk Hutch however she liked, The Gals befriended her.

Aggressively.

And it worked. Strength in numbers. The four of them surrounded her and pummeled her with gifts from Vitamin Sea, and signed her up for snorkeling lessons with theirsexy friend Mario, and drove her to Big Pine Key for shopping and lunch, and plied her with fruity drinks—and basically did everything they could to keep Sullivan far away from whatever nonsense was going down with Cole and Hutch and me.

None of them has ever admitted it to this day, but I’m convinced they were running interference for me. And it worked almost too well. Sullivan got so sunburned while snorkeling that she didn’t leave her cottagefor a full twenty-four hours. The Gals brought her sandwiches and ice cream, and then hung around in her cottage, keeping her company.

God bless The Gals, Sullivan even missed dinner by the pool the first two of the three nights she was in town.

Not thatmy boss not being theremade my situation better.

It just—maybe—kept it from being worse.

COLE DID NOTremember tonever touch me, by the way.

He went the other direction, in fact, finding all kinds of ways to break my rules, from touching my arm, to squeezing my shoulders, to patting my knee.

When I glared at him, he’d shrug like he was in character.

Which made for a special agony when Hutch came back the next night for dinner. And—after Rue implored him to come back again—the night after that, too.

At those dinners, Hutch sat stiff and tense, averting his eyes from everything, even while The Gals buzzed around in their caftans and teased me and Cole for being what Ginger kept callingan unlikely couple.

Meaning, of course, that we had absolutely no chemistry with each other whatsoever.

Props to Ginger. Spot-on.

“But sometimes unlikely couples are the best ones,” Benita said.

Nadine agreed: “And sometimes the couples that seem the happiest are secretly miserable.”

Hutch looked like he knew a little something about being secretly miserable.

“What do you think, Hutch?” Ginger asked.

Hutch was jaw-grinding his food with an expression like he was eating grass. “What do I think about what?” he asked.

“About Cole and Katie—as a couple?”

For the first time all night, Hutch lifted his eyes and looked at me.Then he shifted his gaze to Cole. “I hope he’s good to her,” Hutch said, at last.

I wanted to correct him so badly. But what would I even say? Of course he couldn’t stand the sight of me right now. He thought—and now this really hit me—that all this time I’d been both dating his brother and also throwing myself at him.

And I just had to let him think that.

Until Friday. Just until Friday. One more day.

“We don’t have to talk about this,” I said.

But the ladieswantedto talk about it. In fact, this was pretty much all they wanted to talk about. We were like their own personal reality show—right here at the Starlite. A lifetime of life and love and struggle had tuned their antennas so fine that they sensed all was not as it seemed. They were mystery readers, turning pages late into the night, desperate to figure out the answer. This was the topic for all of dinner—and well after.

“In the past, for example,” Ginger said then, “Cole has always dated Kewpie doll types of girls.”

I frowned at Cole, likeSeriously?

Cole shrugged.

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