by Piper Lawson
Instead of complying, he steps into the bathroom, stopping when his hips brush mine. “Do something for me, darling.”
My breath sticks in my throat.
“Scope out the liquor. If I’m on the clock, I’m damn well enjoying it.”
“If you promise not to call me that.”
“What would you prefer? Sweet thing? Baby?"
They're both ridiculous, but the casual way he says them makes me wish he'd say nothing else all day.
I shove his shoulder before brushing past him to get back out into the suite.
“Enjoy the photo shoot, darling,” he calls after me.
“Don’t drink yourself into oblivion, sweet thing,” I toss over my shoulder.
I go down to the photo shoot area, a private stretch of beach within view of the hotel. The photographer shows up after I’ve spent a couple minutes scoping the sand for a good location.
"I want it to feel easy and natural," I tell the photographer, going over what we discussed already. "Get the property in the background if you can but make it effortless."
As planned, Aiden and Camila show up fifteen minutes later, looking flawless and elegant in a linen suit and a designer sundress.
As the photographer works with the couple, I cast a look back at the hotel. On the porch, Ben’s pacing and on his phone. I should’ve known Ben was joking about drinking in the middle of the day. He probably lied about having nothing to do this weekend too. The awards gala is coming up, and though he says it's a done deal, he must be feeling nerves.
Him coming here feels like a big deal. He prefers to take his weekends off, when he can get them. Pretending for my job doesn’t seem like much fun, and certainly not relaxing.
I’m still admiring him when Camila comes over on a break. “The handsome ones are the most dangerous. How long have you been together?”
“We’ve been friends since school.”
“That’s lovely. Don’t let him go.”
My chest tightens at her words. I’m not the kind of woman who gets swept off her feet by the gorgeous rich guy with the wicked smile.
But he’s not a type. He’s Ben.
He plays Fortnite.
Wears his hair “I’m in a band” long.
Worries about his mom.
Carries my dog in his pocket.
I have friends, but Ben's the closest person in the world to me—next to Lil, and even then, there are things I tell him that I won’t tell her. Professional fears, personal ambitions.
The other night, the admiration on his face seemed to blur with something intense, something that had me wishing he'd drag me into a dark corner and do dark things to me.
But we can’t have the kind of relationship I’ll admit to craving when it’s late and I’m alone.
He thinks he knows me, but if he knows everything, he’ll decide I’m not enough. He’ll take the hole Vi left in my chest, the one that’s mostly healed, and drive a truck through it.
The man occupying way too much of my brain hangs up and spots me watching, then he starts my way. By the time Ben comes up to me, we’re alone, Camila back with Aiden.
“How’s it going?” he asks.
“Good, I think."
The photographer comes over and shows me some of the shots.
Ben dutifully inspects the images. “I never understood why people get married."
“Having someone with you always, someone you let in and trust, doesn’t appeal to you in the slightest?” I ask.
“I trust you.”
My heart skips. “It’s not the same. When you want to spend your life with someone… they’re your other. Not only your default plans when you come home from a trip, they’re the one you race home to because you can’t wait to tell them about it. Because there’s no one else you want to be with.”
He grimaces. “Pretty words, and the dangerous thing is we want to believe them.” His voice is low, a whisper over the breeze. “Love only sticks around for the pictures. That's why people take them—because after that, all bets are off.”
The ache low in my stomach is for him—the boy he was, the man he is. I want to show him all kinds of love can be lasting, meaningful.
“Relationships start to feel heavy if you’re the only one carrying them,” I murmur, thinking of his family and what he did to hold them together. “I promise, I will always fight for you. And for us.”
He brushes hair out of my face, his gaze searching mine.
“Oooh, I love that.” The photographer’s voice cuts into my haze. The next second, the clicking of camera does too. “Let’s get some options we can show the bride and groom.”
“I’m not dressed for this side of the camera.” I force myself to relax as she moves around us.
"You look great." Ben's appreciative gaze runs down my body and back up.
My hands find his biceps. "You don't look so bad yourself."
“This is good," the photographer insists, humming her approval. "Can you kiss?”
I’m so caught off guard, I can’t look anywhere else, especially when his hands tighten around me. His mouth is right there…
Ben replies without breaking my gaze. "The last time I kissed her in public, she was pissed for days."
I don't know if it's the sun breaking through the clouds or the breeze in my hair or the fact that I'm so close to everything I want that I can taste it. But I take Ben's face in my hands, his clean-shaven jaw at odds with his wild eyes, and whisper, "You’re full of shit."
His smirk has me tingling—everywhere. "You love it."
“Gorgeous.”
I barely hear the photographer.
I want to tug him down to me. To brush my lips over his. To pretend this beautiful place is for us and us alone.
“Now that’s how you do a photo shoot.”
Richard's voice has Ben looking up. I reluctantly follow his gaze.
We exchange pleasantries before I watch the photographer show the couple some of our poses. I’m hyperaware of Ben's presence at my side the entire time as Ben addresses Richard. "I appreciate you extending the invitation."
"Not at all. It's a pleasure to have you here. Your reputation precedes you. You'll be running the East Coast venture scene in no time."
Ben pulls me closer. "It's her you're lucky to have. I’ve seen a lot of bootstrapped companies in Manhattan, more entrepreneurs than I can count.” His eyes shine with warmth, with pride. “She’s one in a million.”
If there’s a response to that other than melting, I have no idea what it is.
When Richard departs with the couple and the photographer, I turn back to Ben.
“How’d I do?” he murmurs.
Before he can react, I press up on my toes and slide my lips over his. He’s warm and firm, his mouth parting in surprise. He lets me in, from shock or something else. When I pull back, his eyes are darker than they were a moment ago.
“You’re wrong,” I murmur.
His voice is a rasp, his heart thudding beneath my hand. “About what?”
“Sometimes love sticks around after the pictures.”
13
“You look troubled.” One of the bride’s friends offers a smile as I look up from my seat on the front porch where I’m poring over market data and prospectuses.
Dinner was in an intimate private dining room of the hotel with the family and a dozen or so guests. Richard and Aiden drew me into talks about technology and the future of retail, but I kept looking at Daisy. Studying her profile across the table, wondering what she was talking about in her own quiet conversation while I was part of another.
After dinner, she begged off of drinks, citing the need to work. “Do you want to come up with me? My work won’t take that long, and I can set up the Xbox for after,” she asked.
The air outside in the hall had felt heavy, which made no sense given the cool summer evening.
“I’ll be up in a bit. I’ll have a scotch on the porch first.”
She looked d
isappointed, but it was replaced with a smile so fast I might have imagined it. “Sure.” Her voice lowered, her gaze flicking past me toward the other guests lingering and laughing. “We should decide what to do about sleeping arrangements.”
“You can have the bed.”
“The couch isn’t a pullout. Your feet will dangle off the end.”
“I’ve slept in worse places.”
“In college. You’re used to five star. You came all the way here for me. I’m not going to make you slum it. We can share the bed.”
Now, I’ve been on the porch for two hours and there’s no other answer but that I’m avoiding my best friend.
“Can I help you forget whatever’s on your mind?” the woman, whose name I’ve forgotten, presses.
“My girlfriend’s upstairs.”
“It could be our secret.”
Her meaning is clear, but I’m not tempted. There’s no woman in this hotel, in the entire Vineyard, or hell, in Manhattan, who could draw my attention right now.
None who could look like Daisy did today, her hair blowing in the breeze as she managed the photography shoot, out of her element yet so wholly committed it didn’t faze her. Or in the dining room, easily charming the Vanes and their friends on the far side of the table, catching my eye once in a while for a shared smile that made me want to meet her beneath the table and prompt her to tell me exactly what she’d been thinking.
“We don’t keep secrets from one another,” I say at last. “We never have and never will.”
The woman sighs, the intent behind her gaze softening a little. “That sounds nice.”
With a tight smile, I go back to my reading, and she departs.
There’s only one problem. I feel as though I’m keeping a secret right now.
I’ve always liked spending time with Daisy. She’s intelligent and interesting and challenging, but today felt different. This whole damn week has been different.
Feelings are a stupid thing. When you’re not twenty anymore, you’re not ruled by them, or you shouldn’t be.
But these past days have been changing how I look at her.
“It's better to be the one whose love is unreturned than the one who's indifferent.”
Since she said those words, they've lingered in my mind.
The possibility of love that doesn’t wound and scar is so tempting I can’t forget it.
She caught me off guard today, waiting until there was no audience to brush her lips over mine. I wanted to slip the black straps off her shoulders and lower my lips to the skin there, to see if she’d offer more sweet words I never asked for.
Knowing she’s upstairs, I want to join her.
It’s why I don’t.
If she sits next to me on that couch, our knees and shoulders brushing, there’s no way I won’t make a move.
I want her smart mouth, her soft curves, her incomparable attention.
Instead, I pore over more work, reviewing documents for the tech company I want to fund. They’d be perfect—high risk, high reward. It’s how I roll.
Remembering Daisy’s thoughtfulness, her willingness to do things for her business that aren’t directly linked to her immediate profits, I revisit Holt’s proposal, giving it more than my cursory scan from two weeks ago.
My read confirms my initial suspicion—it’s not in the same league. Healthcare services are a slow build, requiring significant infrastructure, tons of legal agreements, not to mention insurance.
It’s a good idea, but there are gaps that would take months if not years to address. More venture funding isn’t the right fit, at least not from us.
When I finally go upstairs, there’s a light on by the door. I shut the door quietly, drop my jacket on the chair. The Xbox is set out on the carpet, ready to use, and guilt washes over me.
Daisy’s asleep in the middle of the bed. Her makeup is gone, her face smooth and untouched. Dark lashes brush her cheeks. Her hair is a silky slide over one shoulder. She’s wearing a T-shirt and I-don’t-know-what beneath the sheet pulled up to her chest. Her lips part as if feeling my attention.
It’s less dangerous to study her when she’s asleep. There’s less chance she’ll read something on my face, or in my words, reflect it back in a way I can’t control or manage or anticipate. Less chance she'll see something I haven't let myself see, or acknowledge.
I don’t trust people easily, but I trust her. I’ve let her in—deeper than she knows.
My gaze doesn’t move from her as I strip off my clothes, laying each piece across the upholstered chair before reaching for pajama bottoms.
I crawl in next to her, my body barely fitting in the scant third of a bed remaining given her claim of the center.
What if she was mine? The thought slips into my brain.
Not only playing Fortnite once a week or when we make plans, but the days in between.
Weekends, like this one.
Mornings, when she’s rubbing sleep from her eyes and cursing about the demands from clients coming in the door later that day. Evenings, when we can meet up for takeout and talk.
Nights, when I could hold her until I convinced myself everything is right in the world. Kiss her until she’s breathless. Touch her until she’s blind with pleasure.
I love hearing her say my name in that teasing voice, or the chiding one, or the call-me-on-my-bullshit one.
How would she say it when I’m deep inside her?
I roll over and force my gaze to the wall, the art print outlined in the dark.
If she were my girl, it would complicate things. Be a distraction at best. When it ended, which it would eventually because they always do…
I’d lose my best friend. Part of myself along with her.
The possibility has my gut twisting. I’m not taking that chance with Daisy. She’s not some woman I can date until she decides I’m unyielding or I decide she’s demanding and we cut one another loose.
And then there’s the ghost between us. A memory that feels like more.
I chose her sister once, before I knew them well enough to realize all of the stunning subtleties Daisy alone possessed.
It was a cautionary tale, a lone regret in a sea of bad decisions I chalk up to experience.
I shift, trying to get comfortable on the mattress.
She finds me. Presses her soft, warm chest to my back.
Fuck.
She’s as persistent asleep as she is awake. I don’t know whether to curse or admire it.
Tonight, with no one to bear witness, I give in. My hand drifts back, curls over her hip, and like that, I fall asleep.
In the morning, I wake to find her already gone.
I go for a run then take a shower, and when I get out, she’s pacing the room on the phone, facing away, wearing a bright yellow sundress that makes my dick twitch.
When she hangs up, beaming, I say, "Good news, I take it.”
“The photographer will have proofs for me Tuesday,” she says, whirling to face me. Her smile falls away when she sees me dressed in just the towel.
“That’s great. How’d you sleep?” I ask as I rub a second towel through my hair.
She wets her lips. “Okay, I think."
The moment hangs between us, the realization we shared a bed.
“You talk in your sleep,” she says.
“I do not.” I blink. “What did I say?”
“Not telling.”
Somehow I had the upper hand and lost it, but she continues.
"So we have a free day. Reception tonight and bachelor and bachelorette parties. The girls invited me to tag along. I said no, but Camila insisted she’d rather have me there than take a couple of Aiden’s cousins she barely knows. I was thinking we could rent some bikes and go to Edgartown and enjoy the day? The lighthouses are beautiful.”
“Sure.”
So after breakfast, we set out together.
“Why don’t you do this more often?” she asks me as we pedal our pale blue and green b
ikes down the road. “You travel all the time, but you don’t enjoy the sights when you’re there.”
I shrug. “I send you pics of Jet.”
“But that’s for my benefit. What would you do for yourself if no one was watching?”
I turn over her question. “I’d pretend to be someone else.”
“Someone who rides a bike?” she teases.
I steer closer to her and swipe at her, but she ducks away, laughing.
We browse stores, and Daisy lingers on a rack of postcards.
“Never pegged you as the postcard type,” I comment.
“Vi sends them to me once in a while.”
Lily’s words come back to me, but I don’t let on. “You never said anything.”
She flips one over, studying the back. “She’s all over the place. I don’t even know what her life is like, but I miss her and envy her all at once.”
“Why do you envy her?”
Daisy sets the card back, sucking in a breath and avoiding my gaze. “Because she does what she wants when she wants. She always has.”
“You think you’d feel better if you did that too?”
Her gaze meets mine. “No, I don’t.”
Once we’re strolling back toward our bikes outside, I ask, “What do you want to do after you have Richard singing your praises?”
“Grow this business. Get Lil through school.”
“Date Wall Street.” My words have an edge that contrasts with the warm sunshine and colorful stores.
She cuts me a look. “He seems smart and reliable. He has sisters. Supports a number of charities.”
“Thank God. The tax deductions will keep you warm at night.”
Her eyes spark as she pulls up next to our bikes, holding down the edge of her sundress as it’s caught by a breeze. “I’m not Lily’s age, or holding out for something wild and reckless. I know that when I walk into a room, I’m clever, articulate, reasonably attractive. Not the most clever, or the most articulate, or the most attractive. That was always Vi, and she was the first to point it out.”
The hairs on my neck lift. “Vi gave you a hard time?”
I’d sensed there was shit between them, but didn’t hear about it outright. Daisy never talked about her sister with me, even after her twin left.