Page 61 of Surprise Best Man

“Well,” said Theo. “This is it, boys—after tonight they’re going to have to rename the band Lover Boys and Devoted Husbands.”

Will and Noah laughed, but I was so up in my own head that the words barely processed. Hell, I’d been like that the whole night. I’d been trying to keep my shit on lockdown, not wanting to make the evening about me and my problems. But damned if I couldn’t stop thinking about Shania.

So far the guys hadn’t really noticed my kinda dour mood. But now their attention was on me, all of them noticing that I hadn’t cracked a smile or spoken more than a few words since we’d sat down.

“OK, dude,” said Noah. “You’re way too bummed out for someone who’s got a pint of beer in front of him and some nachos on the way.”

Of course he had to mention nachos. I winced internally at word, realizing that I’d brought Shania in on something that was mine—without thinking, I’d made it ours. Was I going to be able to even order my favorite food without thinking of her and the times it was the two of us, the city stretched out in front of us?

I felt so fucking stupid—both for falling for a woman without even realizing what was happening, and for not noticing what the hell she’d been doing behind my back. Double whammy of “dumbass.”

Then, of course, right at that moment the nachos arrived. I stared at them for a good few seconds, totally shocked that the sight of them was enough to put me in somewhat of a state.

“Now that’s not a normal reaction to seeing some damn nachos,” said Will.

“Yeah, bud,” said Noah. “Something’s up—let’s hear it.”

I shook my head. “Nah,” I said. “It’s nothing. You guys have enough shit going out without hearing about my crap.”

I sat up straight and squared my shoulders, as if the problem was literally right in front of me and I was getting ready to take it down with my own two hands.

“Nope,” said Noah. “None of that. Just because we’ve got a wedding tomorrow doesn’t mean whatever you’ve got going on doesn’t matter.”

Theo scooped up one of the nachos and popped it into his mouth, followed by Noah pushing the tray of nachos toward me which, admittedly, looked really fucking good. No Sambrosa nachos eaten with Shania at Griffith Observatory, but maybe in the same ballpark.

“Fuck,” I said. “Here it is—it’s about Shania.”

The guys looked confused.

“What about her?” asked Noah. “She having trouble with the maid of honor shit?”

“Nope,” I said. “It’s something else…”

And with one more deep breath, I went into it. I told them everything, starting from all the way back in college and ending up at yesterday, when I learned what she’d pulled and how I’d found out.

“Fuck,” said Will after I was done and the guys had a few seconds to process everything. “Shania really did you like that?”

“That’s rough as hell,” said Theo. “And what, you found out because he happened to tell you?”

“Maybe he knew about what was going on between us,” I said. “Not sure how he’d have found out, but maybe he was, I don’t know, trying to rub salt in the wound.”

“Why would he do something like that?” asked Noah. “You really think he’d fuck with you?”

“You never know with guys like him,” said Theo. “Not enough to get what they want, they have to rub it in the faces of those who didn’t.”

Will held up his hands, as if indicating the conversation needed to stop in its tracks.

“Then you broke it off with her in person, right man?” he asked. “I’m assuming that you didn’t send her a text from across the rehearsal dinner.”

“Nope,” I said. “I talked to her, told her that it was over.”

Noah narrowed his eyes, as if he’d noticed something that I hadn’t.

“And how’d the conversation go?” he asked. “Did you ask her about James, give her a chance to explain herself?”

I opened my mouth to speak, but stopped myself before I said a word. “I mean, kind of.”

“’Kind of’?” asked Will. “Did you straight-up say ‘I’m ending this thing because you got involved with someone else?’”

I didn’t, and I knew it. But I wasn’t ready to admit that I was wrong.

“No,” I said. “Why would I? She knows what she did. I didn’t think she needed to hear the exact words to make my point.”

“And how did she react?” asked Theo, wiping his hands on a bar napkin. “Was she like, ‘yeah, we’re together, sorry about it’?”

I glanced away for a moment, trying to remember her specific reaction.

“No,” I said. “She seemed…confused more than anything.”

Fuck.

The guys all regarded one another, as if they were in on something that I wasn’t. Then they turned their attention back to me.

“So,” said Noah. “Let me get this straight. You’ve had a…thing going on with Shania for the last few weeks.”

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