“Rehearsal dinner.”
His forehead wrinkled in a frown. “Yours?”
“No,” I said. “Frances and Joey’s.”
“I guess you’ll be celebrating your own wedding soon. The engagement is still on, right? It survived the Thrifty decision?”
“It did.” Testosterone dripped from Charlie’s every word.
I could all but feel him bowing up beside me, regarding Ian like a dog that had stepped into his yard.
“Katie?” Ian left the question hanging.
I was running out of energy to lie about this anymore. Who cared? “Yes.” I stiffened as Charlie pulled me in closer. “Still so . . . so . . .” I sniffled and tried to think of the word.
“Happy,” Charlie finished. “Very happy.”
That wasn’t the word I’d been going for. “Right.”
Ian’s eyes searched mine. “I do hope you are happy. If you ever need anything—”
“She won’t.”
I mashed the spike of my heel onto Charlie’s toe. “Thank you, Ian. For all you did. And tried to do. For caring about the Valiant. For understanding what it’s worth and how much it meant to me.” Unlike some jerk I knew.
“We should go,” said the jerk. “Frances and Joey are probably ready to order.”
Ian looked so lonely standing there by himself. “You’re welcome to join—”
“The family is waiting for us,” Charlie interrupted. “Ian, good luck to you.”
“Thank you.”
I grabbed Ian’s hand and squeezed. “Goodbye.”
“You take care, Katie,” he said. “Oh, and Charlie”—Ian could sure do smug—“Might want to keep those steak knives from your happy fiancée.”
With Charlie’s palm pressed to the small of my back, we walked to our table.
“He’s charming,” Charlie muttered.
“At least he has a heart.”
“Which he freely shares. You should probably request a blood test before you touch it again.”
“He cheated on me with one girl.”
“One more than I ever did.”
I stopped right beside a table of an elderly couple. “Do you want to talk about what you did do? Because as long as we’re maligning Ian, we might as well discuss your grievances as well.”
His jaw tight, Charlie smiled at the couple now thoroughly absorbed in our conversation. “Sorry to interrupt your dinner.” Grabbing my hand, he pulled me toward a dark alcove away from the listening ears of any In Betweenites.
Between the isolated spot and his hands getting a little too free with my person, I had had enough. “Don’t even think of putting any moves on me, buster.”
“Would you just quit squirming and listen?” He waited ’til I stilled and managed to meet his angry stare. “This is Joey and Frances’s rehearsal dinner. It’s not going to be the Katie and Charlie show. I know you’re mad—”
“Furious.”
“I know you’re furious—”
“Like the fire-breathing, head spinning, hell summoning—”
“But no matter what you feel, we cannot ruin this for Frances and Joey. Or my mom.”
“Your mother?”
He raked his fingers through his hair, releasing a gusty sigh. “Joey and I live in different parts of the country. I don’t know when my family will be together again after this wedding, and I want it to go perfect for everyone involved. We’re not going to bring our differences into this weekend. We get through this wedding, and then we talk. Are we clear?”
“We have nothing left to say.”
“Katie, if we have anything in common right now, it’s that we both love at least one member of the wedding party. This is about them.” A pleading note entered his tone. “Save your anger for later. When we’re done, when Frances and Joey drive away tomorrow, you can yell and curse me all you want. But until then, we’re going to make sure that those two have a great wedding, and everyone’s happy.”
If he was trying to shame me into compliance, it was working.
Charlie stood there and waited for my response, the dim lights casting shadows on his chiseled face. A face I used to love tracing with my hands. Which usually led to my hands traveling to his hair. Which usually led to—”
“Katie,” said Charlie, jarring me from my thoughts, “your word on this.”
How could I be so angry at him and still find my skin tingling at his nearness, my eyes not missing a single detail of how handsome he was?
Because I was my mother’s daughter.
And a woman with a pulse.
“Fine.” I pushed off the wall and shoved past him. “But you’re giving me your dessert.”
Dinner was a loud, boisterous affair, as was any meal or gathering with the Vega family. While Frances’s mother’s family mostly lived in China, her father’s relatives never missed an event, no matter how far they had to travel. I sat next to Frances, pushing my Alfredo around on my plate and trying to pretend that Charlie Benson was somewhere in a Speedo on a glacier in Antarctica, instead of seated right across the table.
Joey hadn’t had much to say during dinner, and I worried that Frances’s chatty, vibrant personality was no match for his silent, introverted demeanor. What would they talk about at dinner? On road trips? When there was nothing left to binge watch on Netflix?
“So, Joey,” I began, taking a sip of tea. “Are you excited to move to Cambridge?”
“I am.” He smiled and glanced at Frances. “It will be very different from Texas, but I think the new venture will be fun.”
“Probably expensive too, right?” I flinched as Charlie delivered a light kick under the table.
“We’ll get by.” Joey winked at his soon-to-be bride. “I just got a job lined up at a body shop. Hopefully I can eventually get into paint detailing. It’s more my specialty.”
“I’ll probably work part-time at a coffee shop or something with late hours,” Frances said.
“You’re going to work and be in the PhD program? That’s quite a load.” I took a sip of iced tea. “And you guys have an apartment already?”
Frances dipped her bread in olive oil. “We just found a really cute studio near campus.”
“Cute?” Joey’s laugh was boyish and bashful. “It’s a pit. But we’ll make it our own. We can’t have a house like my parent’s right away.”
“It’ll be great,” Frances said.
Charlie smiled at his brother. “I’m sure it will.”
“You must come see me soon, Katie,” Frances said. “We’ll show you around Cambridge.”
“Maybe at Christmas?” Warm memories filled my mind. “Joey, Frances and I have these silly traditions. We drive around and look at the lights.”
“While singing carols at the top of our lungs,” Frances added.
“Frances hadn’t told me.” Joey rested his hand on Frances’s. “Sounds just like her.”
“I guess you’ll be taking her cat Mango,” I said. “How do you feel about temperamental cats?”
Joey frowned. “I’m allergic to them.”
“Mango’s staying with my parents.” Frances said.
“But he’s your baby. You bottle fed him since he was—”
“It’s okay,” Frances said. “He’ll be happy here.”
That cat was Frances’s pride and joy. I knew she had to be crushed.
“We are taking my dog Bruno,” Joey said. “He’s a Rottweiler. Huge guy.”
I assumed from Charlie’s narrow-eyed glare that he didn’t want me to comment on that.
“I can’t believe we’re going to be married tomorrow,” Frances said, pulling us away from my quicksand of conversational topics. “I can’t wait to walk down that aisle.”
“Do you have something borrowed?” I asked.
“My mom’s pearl earrings.”
“Something blue?” Charlie inquired.
Before Frances could answer, the waitress stopped by with dessert menus. The restaurant was known for their home
made pies.
“I’ll take peach cobbler,” Joey said.
“Would you like ice cream on that?”
“Nah, can’t have the stuff.”
The waitress scribbled down the rest of our orders and scurried away.
“You can’t have ice cream?” Frances asked. “I eat it almost daily.”
“Joey’s lactose intolerant,” Charlie said.
Frances picked up her water glass and drank deeply. She tossed her napkin on the table and rose to her feet. “I’m going to go to the ladies room. Katie, would you like to join me?”
“I don’t really have to go—”
“Yes, you do.” Frances excused us both without her usual graceful charm, then walked toward the bathrooms like her underwear had just caught fire.
She flew through the ladies’ room door, only to stop in front of a row of mirrors. She began to wash her hands, repeatedly soaping and rinsing as if she had something to scrub away.
“Are you all right?”
“Yes, I’m fine.” She worked a puffy lather onto her hands. “Perfectly fine. I mean, never mind that my fiancé doesn’t know some basic details about my life, and I had no idea he was lactose intolerant. I mean, I could’ve killed him. With dairy.”
“A little milk probably wouldn’t do that much damage.”
“He can’t live his entire married life with diarrhea!”
I bit my lip on a grin. “He probably has stuff he can take for it.”
“Does he have stuff to take when I starve him with my lack of cooking? Did you see how he was going to town on those potatoes? I’ve never even bought a potato.”
“He can learn to love rice.”
“Can he?”
Doubts.
They were running through Frances’s head so loud, I could almost hear them myself.
“Are you okay, Frances?”
“No.” She shut off the water and ran her hand over the sensor to get a paper towel. Then another. And five more. “I do love him.”
“Would you feel better if you moved the wedding date out a few months? Maybe next spring?”
“My whole family is out there. Even my stupid cousin Esther who just married a plastic surgeon. And my grandma who loves Esther best. You know, all my beloved kinsman.”
“They’d understand.” I pulled the wad of towels from Frances’s hands. “You need to do what’s best for you. And Joey.”
“He would never understand.”
“If Joey loves you he would.”
Frances turned back to the mirrors, leaned against the damp granite counter and looked at the girl staring back at her. My friend was exquisitely beautiful, brilliant, neurotic, and stressed out of her mind.
“It’s just nerves,” she finally said. “My mother said this could happen. I’m being silly.” She inhaled a cleansing breath once, twice. Then squared her shoulders and nodded to my reflection. “I can do this.” She watched herself in a mirror. “Tomorrow I marry Joey Benson.”
Chapter Twenty-Six
“So you two get married next, sí?” Grandma Vega took a bite of her tiramisu and leveled that eagle-eye gaze on Charlie and me.
“No. No, definitely not.” The woman had never liked me enough to speak to me, and now she wanted to chat? I needed to get out of this restaurant.
“Why not?” she demanded.
“Grandma Vega, Charlie and I are not a couple. We’re not . . .” Charlie of course was ignoring my glare and offering no assistance. He almost seemed to be enjoying this. “He and I. . .”
“Katie’s not speaking to me.” Charlie’s arm found its way to the back of my chair.
Grandma Vega shoved her dessert away and cackled. “You sound like a wife already.”
“I’m probably a long way from that,” I said. “I’m not very good at choosing the right guys.” Take that, Charlie.
Grandma Vega patted her lips with her napkin. “How you feel about arranged marriage?”
I reached for Charlie’s cheesecake and speared my fork into a large bite. “Not interested.” The cream cheese melted on my tongue, and I was grateful for the loose fit of tomorrow’s dress. “But Charlie’s very open to the idea. I’ll give you his address.”
Fifteen minutes later, as everyone sat finishing their dessert and drinking coffee, the focus and conversation was completely on Frances and Joey.
It was the perfect time to make my getaway.
“Excuse me.” I tossed my napkin on the table, grabbed my purse, and escaped to the lobby. I reached for my phone and pulled up my favorite numbers. Maxine and Sam could pick me up.
No signal.
I wound my way through the hungry, waiting crowd in the lobby and walked outside. “Come on.” I held my phone to the left. “Come on!” I extended it to the right. “Too many freaking trees!”
“I can’t do anything about the freaking trees,” said Ian standing by his car. “But I’d be glad to assist in any other capacity.”
I clutched the phone to my chest and stared at my salvation. “I need a ride to my grandma’s.”
He jangled his keys. “Now that I can fix.”
Minutes down the road, I let myself relax, my bones melting into his leather seat.
“I’m sorry how things turned out.” Ian turned down the nagging voice of his GPS. “You put up a good fight.”
“Thank you.”
“It has to be hard, with you being on one side and your fiancé being on the other.”
“He’s not my fiancé.” There. I’d said it, and relief poured over me like a waterfall. I had nothing to gain by pretending anymore, and I just didn’t care. “It was a stupid ruse. I had told Frances all about you, so when you showed up in town, she wanted to stick it to you.”
“And thus the engagement?”
“Yes.”
“Yesterday I was sitting downtown on a bench, and the Garden Club spent forty-five minutes showing me the flowers they had selected for your wedding.”
I couldn’t help but smile. “This is my hometown. They love me.”
“So this Charlie is a . . .?”
“Fool,” I supplied. “You’re a fool, he’s a fool, you’re all fools.”
“And what if this fool said he was sorry?” In the dark of the car, Ian watched me closely. “Truly sorry.”
“You all say that.”
“Fair point. But I truly am. I don’t expect you to understand this, but something happens for a man when you hit thirty. You panic. You realize it’s time to settle down, and your playing days are numbered.”
“Pretty sure you have the extended warranty on the playing days.”
“Then you came along. And you were different. I loved you.”
Empty words, especially after my row with Charlie, but for a girl who had been abandoned by her birth parents, it would never fail to send a momentary jolt of happiness. “Don’t fool yourself, Ian.”
“Would I have asked you to marry me if I hadn’t loved you?”
I closed my eyes and wished to be anywhere else. How had my life gotten so complicated in the last few months?
“Does your Charlie know that part of the story?” he quietly asked.
“No.” I hadn’t even told Frances or Maxine. I’d shared it with no one.
Ian turned in the seat and watched me in the dark of the car. “I might’ve been the player, but you were the one who strayed first.”
“I did not. I never so much as looked at another man the entire time we—”
“Your heart belonged to someone you’d met years before. And when I came to In Between it all made sense.”
“I told you the engagement was a total fabrication.”
“You never loved me. Not really.”
My lips opened to deny it. But I couldn’t.
He was right. Had I been crazy about Ian at one time? Yes. Wildly so. I’d delighted in the time spent with him, soaked up all I could learn about the theater from him, enjoyed the envious gazes of the girls wishing to be me. And I’
d luxuriated in those moments when he showered me with attention.
“All this time I didn’t know who I was jealous of,” Ian said. “But I knew this guy was out there, someone who held your heart in a way I couldn’t. Then I came to your little town, and there he was.”
“My relationship with Charlie is as dead as the Valiant.”
“You’re a hard person to love. Did you ever think about that? I don’t like your Charlie, but I can’t help but feel sorry for him.”
“He doesn’t love me.” I pushed a button and the window slid down. I needed air.
“I suppose it’s safer for you to tell yourself that,” Ian said. “You were always holding back, always ready to bolt, like I was someone to be afraid of. Or that love was.”
Did these men all read the same self-help books? “And what good would that have done? If I had totally fallen for you, you still would’ve cheated on me.”
“Would I?”
“Yes. Or you would’ve found some way to leave.”
He chuckled to himself. “So you went into our relationship expecting loneliness, and I was the one who got it.”
“And that’s why you messed around with Felicity. Because you were lonely.” He would have to have been deaf to miss the irony in my voice.
“I made a mistake. But maybe I just lived up to that low bar you always held over me.”
He was using me to excuse his gigolo behavior, and I wasn’t having it. No matter how low my self-esteem could drag lately, I knew I deserved better than some cheating rake.
“I miss you, Katie. I miss us.”
“You’re probably just saying that because Felicity broke up with you.”
“No,” he said. “She’s eagerly waiting for me back in New York. But she’s not you. I miss your smile, your laugh, your curiosity. How you adored London and made me see it with new eyes. Watching you try to find your way on stage.”
“You said I stunk.”
“You have a lot to learn,” Ian said. “But you don’t stink.”
“Did you give me the part because we were dating?”
“Yes.”
I expected the pain to barrel through me and sever me in two.
But it didn’t. More like a mallet to the kidney. It wasn’t anything I hadn’t known, yet hearing Ian confess it was hard.
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