Page 308 of Coach
She beamed, running across the room andtumbling into him with open arms. “Hi, hi, hi! Aren’t you thrilled to see me?”
Mateo chuckled, glancing up at me, as though piecing a puzzle together.
“Always,” he said, “but why—”
“We’re here!” Mike and Elliot strode in, Matty and Jeremiah in tow. Each held one of those little bags people gave party gifts in. Matty’s looked like a glitter fairy had exploded and left her remains all over the paper.
“Dane, and Patrick send their love,” Matty said. “The two gorillas had to work, and Patrick wussed out. You know how he is without his man on his arm.”
Indeed, we did.
Mateo hugged each guy in turn before whirling and spearing a finger at me. “Shane Douglas, what have you done?”
I raised my hands in the international “don’t shoot” gesture. “We need wine. Sisi, can you—”
“On it,” Sisi snapped, a blur of motion toward the door where a staff member appeared.
Moments later, servers bearing trays of fruits, cheeses, and tiny triangles of buttery fried bread stepped through the doors. Two others followed, each carrying several bottles of wine or a handful of long-stemmed glasses. By the time they’d finishedsetting up their spread, it looked like a reception for twenty rather than the handful of us.
Sisi tore into the tiny rolls of prosciutto and mozzarella, while Matty grabbed a bottle and filled a wine glass to the rim.
“I don’t think that’s how you pour a tasting,” Sisi said.
Matty shrugged. “I want a good tasting. How can I do that if part of the glass isn’t filled?”
As usual, Matty made no sense—and all sorts of it.
Sisi nodded as though he’d just defined the Pythagorean theorem. “Try these. They’re heaven,” she said, shoving a roll into Matty’s mouth and earning an appreciative hum.
Silverware clinking against a glass drew everyone’s attention. Mateo turned, a wariness entering his gaze as he sipped wine.
“I don’t speak,” Shane said.
“No kidding!” Matty jabbed.
I glared until he slouched back into his glass and salted meat.
“I don’t do speeches, but I need to explain to Mateo why you’re all here.”
“He doesn’t know?” Jeremiah asked Omar a little too loudly. An anticipatory giggle threaded his words.
“He knows we needed a weekend away. Hell, we all knew that.”
A chorus of nods and grunts of agreement.
“He didn’t know you would be here. And, well, he didn’t know why I really wanted to come.”
“Because he stroked it right,” Matty chirped.
Sisi spit wine.
Omar elbowed him, his brow furrowing until it became one giant, fuzzy caterpillar.
I ignored them all, setting my glass down and turning to face Mateo, who stared at me through narrowed eyes.
“I’m not great with people. You know that. And still . . . for some reason I’ll never understand, you keep following me around.”
A few snickers from our friends.
