Jack, Dan, and Christopher sing along, just as loudly as her family, clapping and raising their empty wineglasses in a toast as the birthday song finishes. Jack pulls the waitress aside, whispering in her ear. She nods and heads back to the kitchen.
“I do hope he asked for the check,” Abby mutters. “Otherwise, we might be rolling these guys out of here.”
“It’s like you read my mind.”
Despite being the only two sober ones at the table, Abby and I haven’t been able to talk. The VCs asked her question after question, Dan pretending to understand Abby-speak, while Christopher just looked impressed. I filed away more vocab words I can whisper in her ear later, since she seemed to enjoy that so much yesterday. Throughout dinner, I've clutched her hand like it’s the only thing keeping me from tumbling over the edge of a cliff.
Except, I think as I squeeze her fingers, Abby is the cliff. And I’m falling, hard and fast.
I lean closer to her, smelling something minty as my lips graze her hair.
“Abs, I’m sorry again for asking you to put your hair up and wear other clothes. Jack gave me the idea, but I shouldn’t have gone along with it. You’re impressive on your own. Period.”
“Thank you,” she says. Tugging her hand out of mine, she grabs her napkin, balling it up in her hand before dabbing at her lips, which look plump and pink and far too tempting for our current location.
“I need to tell you something,” Abby says, leaning closer, still clutching her napkin.
“Anything.”
“When I was in high school—”
A shout at our table goes up, and suddenly the waitress is there with a half circle of other staff, singing and holding out a slice of cake with what looks like twenty sparklers toward Abby. Jack joins in the happy birthday song, but for some reason Dan and Christopher are belting out, “For He's a Jolly Good Fellow,” arms around each other, swaying back and forth. Any minute, one of them is going to go down.
“It’s not my birthday,” Abby says, holding out her hands as if to push the flaming cake back.
The waitress just shakes her head, pushing it toward Abby again, looking desperate, as though her life—and tips—depend on Abby taking this cake.
Three things happen almost at once. Abby jumps back into my lap, muttering something about being flammable. Dan loses his balance and topples in slow motion, grabbing onto the waitress like she’s a handrail, not a one-hundred-and-twenty-pound woman.
And the beaver pelt covering his head goes up in flames.
There are shouts, but all I can see are the flames shooting up from Dan’s toupee. Everyone’s frozen, staring like he’s the campfire we’ve gathered around and we’re just waiting for someone to pass out the marshmallows.
Until Abby jumps from my lap, grabs the pitcher of ice water, and dumps the whole thing over his head.
There’s a sizzle and loud hiss as steam rises from the scorched black remnants on his head. The whole restaurant has gone silent. While I’m still standing slack-jawed in shock, Abby gives him a hand up, as the serving staff rescues the waitress from where she was pinned underneath him.
Somehow, the cake ended up smashed into the side of Dan’s face. While he’s still staring in shock, Abby drags a finger through the thickest smear of icing, then pops her finger into her mouth.
“Mm,” she says. “Buttercream.” And then, with a pat on what’s left of his still steaming hairpiece, Abby says, “Thank goodness it’s just hair.”
Chapter Twenty-One
Abby
“And then Zane pops up and goes, ‘Check, please!’”
My roommates (minus Harper, who’s been MIA lately) are all dying laughing as I’ve got my head tipped under the bathroom sink so Delilah can wash all the product out of my hair. After that close call with the flaming cake, I’m not taking any chances.
“And the VCs?” Zoey asks.
“All in,” I say. “They made the commitment before they were so soaked in alcohol. And I did my part very well. Thank you.”
Zoey gives me a secret smile that I know means she’ll be seeing me later to ask more details, then exits the cramped bathroom.
“Done!” Delilah says, wrapping my hair up in a towel.
I give her a hug. “Thanks! And thank you for both my makeovers today. You should start a YouTube channel or something.”
Delilah wrinkles her nose. “Really? You think people would watch me put makeup on?”
“Are you kidding?” Sam asks. “You’d be an instant hit. Do it.”
“Think about it,” I tell her. “I can help with a website and whatever else you need.”
“Speaking of websites,” Sam asks as we exit the bathroom. “I suggested to my publishers that we hire you to help with mine. Before you say no, they’re footing the bill. Which means good money.”
“Maybe between that gig and the one with Zane, you can quit your day job finally and go out on your own,” Delilah says.
“We’ll see,” I tell them, not wanting to talk about the fact that my job with Zane is going to be over in a blink. Until I find a steady way to get freelance work or find a new job, I’m stuck with Micah in the fourth circle of IT purgatory.
I’m not surprised to see Zoey in my bed when I make it to my room. She pats the space in front of her. “I’ll French braid your hair?”
This is code for Girl Talk. Somewhere in the fall semester of sophomore year, Zoey cracked the code I didn’t even know existed to get me to spill all my secrets: French braiding. Something about the soothing feeling of her hands in my hair, coupled with the fact that I can talk without making eye contact creates the perfect environment to get me to spill.
“Did you talk to Zane?”
I close my eyes as her hands begin to work through the hair at my scalp, dividing it into sections. “No. But he did apologize.”
“I bet he did.”
“Zo, it wasn’t that big of a deal. I get it. These guys, alcohol aside, were pretty typical big oil men. Anyway, he said Jack suggested it.”
Zoey makes an irritated sound. “Not surprising. You’re going to talk to him though?”
“I hate talking about it.”
She’s silent for a moment, and I could almost fall asleep with her hands working their magic. Almost. Anytime I have to remember, I get anxious. I’d love to think that one day, I’ll look back on my high school days without feeling the sting. Or feeling anything. I’ve made progress, but I’m not there. Yet.
“I know. I think it would help Zane understand. If you’re really going to do this with him, you’ll need to open up. To trust.”
I know Zoey’s right. Zane couldn’t know why it bothered me so much that he asked me to change my look. Not without me telling him about the last thing that happened before I left public school to finish high school at home through online classes.
I just feel so stupid talking about it. Like, I should have known that when two popular girls suddenly started being nice to me and offered to give me a makeover, it was a trap. I guess I was thinking more about classic movies like She’s All That and not Mean Girls. They dangled the promise of Jacob Taylor in front of me.
“He thinks you’re really pretty,” Becky had said. “We’ll help you become irresistible.”
What idiot buys that line?
This one. The one right here.
Though I like to think of myself back then as almost a different Abby. The naïve one, who didn’t realize that you shouldn’t ever change yourself for a guy.
The humiliation coming home that day to explain to my parents what happened hurt worse than the chemical burns on my scalp from the bleach and whatever else they poured on me.
I didn’t even go back to school to clean out my locker. Mom and Dad refused to let me, going up instead to rail at the principal, who hadn’t done anything the months prior about the teasing and bullying, and refused to do anything then because it happened off school grounds. I didn’t want to go back, but I’m realizing now that a p
art of me always felt like a coward. I never faced down my bullies. I just … left.
Suddenly moved by the memory, I reach back and grab one of Zoey’s hands. She pauses mid-braid.
“Thank you,” I tell her.
“It’s nothing,” she says.
“No, I mean for helping me be brave tonight. I needed that. In a weird way, walking into that restaurant felt almost like facing down the people I couldn’t back in high school. I needed that, and I didn’t even know how much.”
“Psh. I barely did anything. You’re the brave one,” Zoey says.
I let go of her hand as she continues to braid, this time in a comfortable silence. She’s tying a ponytail holder around the end of my braid when an alarm broke up the quiet.
“Is that your phone?” Zoey asks. “I thought your ringtone was that dumb pop song.”
“Call Me Maybe. And it’s ironic, since people are definitely calling when it rings. Oh! That’s my alarm!”
I scramble off the bed and dig my phone out of the bag I borrowed from Delilah. I swipe it open. “I finally caught the rat,” I say.
“The what? We have rats?”
I wave off Zoey’s panic as I’m waiting for the app to load on my phone. “The person jacking up the code at Zane’s company. I set up a trap. I can track the full thing on my laptop, but this should be enough to show me … huh.”
I set the phone down and go for my laptop. The trap worked, but the data is confusing. Or, at least, it isn’t what I had expected.
“Is it Jack? Please say it’s Jack.”
“I don’t think so, but I can’t really tell until I get on the actual program and follow the digital trail.”
Zoey pats me on the head and then calls out from the doorway. “I’ll make a coffee and Twizzler delivery before I go to bed if the light’s still on, okay?”
“Yep.” I barely notice when the door closes behind her. I’m fully immersed in the information on my screen. Though I was expecting to be able to run a simple trace, ending in a user login or IP, I do love a challenge. This guy—or girl?—is good.
But not good enough. By morning, I’ll be able to walk into Zane’s office with a name.
From: [email protected]
To: [email protected]
Dear Dr. Love,
My ex-fiancé cheated on me, and now he wants me back. All my friends say once a cheater, always a cheater, but is that the case?
The problem is … I still love him. I don’t want to move on. I want to forgive and believe him. Am I being naïve to think we could work through this?
Sincerely,
Scorned
From: [email protected]
To: [email protected]
Dear Scorned,
I am so sorry for what you’ve been through. No one deserves to have their trust betrayed and their heart broken like this.
On the surface, I tend to agree with your friends. Cheating is a big red flag and an indicator of future behavior. But it’s not always that simple. My own parents worked through infidelity. I was old enough that I knew what was going on, and it was hard on the entire family, but I got a front-row seat to how wonderful reconciliation can be.
If it were me, I would want to see massive evidence of his remorse. I would want to see real changes. I would absolutely go to counseling, maybe even before you decide what to do.
Circumstances can also weigh in. Was he fully in a relationship with another person? Was it a one-time thing? Did he break it off? Did you catch him, or did he confess?
I’d prefer to think that you are hopeful, not naïve to want to work through it. But there are very few cases where I’d recommend doing so. Loving him isn’t enough reason to give him another chance. If you’re tempted to get back together, don’t compromise on the terms.
And then comes the hard part—if you say you forgive him, you have to mean it. No bringing this up every time you’re upset. No passive aggressive comments. Do you think YOU can ever forgive him? Can you trust him again?
Best of luck on this hard choice,
Dr. Love
Chapter Twenty-Two
Zane
When I answer Zoey’s call the morning after the flaming VC dinner (which is how I’m going to think of it from now on), I’m just walking into the office. Late for me, which means eight o’clock. Everything has felt a little off since last night. I had to stick around to get the investors rides home, which meant not getting any time alone with Abby. I didn’t hear from her last night or this morning.
“Hey, Zo.”
“Zane.”
She sounds ticked, and my alarms start going off. Her voice has this chill when she’s angry that’s positively arctic. I don’t think I’ve done anything, so I choose my default method when it comes to Zoey’s anger. Ignorance.
“What’s up?”
“Anything you want to share?”
It’s a trap. One I know well. Zoey invented this one. The one where you crack open a door and see what walks through. And no matter what you say, she’s waiting with a baseball bat.
“Anything you want to ask?” I’ve finally reached my office and close the door a little too hard, sinking into my chair.
“Oh, I’ve got a lot of questions,” Zoey says. “Starting with why you asked Abby to dress differently last night.”
I groan, running a hand through my hair before I catch myself and grab the edge of the desk instead. “That was stupid.”
“You have no idea. You really don’t.”
“Honestly, it was Jack’s suggestion, and I never should have listened to him. I apologized to her last night.”
“I heard.”
I frown, wondering why she still sounds so mad. “Okay, so what’s with the whole frosty interrogation?”
Zoey gives a heavy sigh. “Look, you need to talk to Abby. But you should know that she—”
Whatever she’s about to tell me is cut off when Jack storms into my office, looking as bad as I’ve ever seen him, which is saying something considering all the partying he did in college.
“We need to talk,” Jack says. He begins to pace.
“Zo, I’m going to have to call you back.”
“Zane, this is important.”
“I know. But there’s a situation here. I’ll call you as soon as I can.” I hang up even as she starts to say something else. I can’t worry about it now, though her words leave me with an uneasy feeling. I set my phone down, steepling my fingers on the desk. “Well?”
Jack flops down in the chair across from me and rubs a hand through his hair. “So,” he says with a deep sigh, “about last night.”
I wait, expecting him to say more. After all, there’s a lot of things to say about the previous night. The drunk investors, Abby completely blowing away my expectations in her natural Abby glory, the flaming toupee.
The corners of my lips twitch just thinking about Abby dumping water on the thing. I’m certain it looked better after the fire than before.
“It was pretty—”
“Terrible,” he says.
“Hilarious,” I finish. I blink at him. “What? How was it terrible? We got them to sign off before everything went down in flames. Literally.”
Jack leans forward, elbows on his knees, dropping his head into his hands. “I’m not so sure it’s a done deal.”
Panic is immediate, one of those emotions that railroads you. Zero to sixty in exactly no seconds. I wanted this. Not just for Eck0. “What do you mean?”
“Dan left me a message this morning. I have to call him back, but it didn’t sound good.”
My brain is already crunching the numbers, with and without Dan and Christopher’s backing. I don’t really like the options without. Not at all.
I tug at my collar, feeling a tightness that isn’t there. “Why? I mean, the part at the end with the fire wasn’t the best. But it also has nothing to do with us, and everything to do with the wine.”
Jack starts pacing
the room again. “I thought you were going to talk to Abby about a dress code.”
“Don't blame any of this on Abby. She did a great job last night—and probably saved Dan from getting second-degree burns.”
Jack looks like he’s about to argue, which means we’re really going to have words, when there’s a knock at my door.
“Come in,” Jack and I say at the same time.
Josh sticks his head in the door, looks between me and Jack, and tries to duck back out. Jack swings the door open and gestures for him to come in and sit down.
“It’s fine. Come on in.”
Josh perched on the edge of the chair. “Are you sure? I can come back.”
“Really, it’s okay,” I tell him. “What do you need?”
Josh is one of the few full-time tech people. Obviously, he’s not good enough to do what Abby has been doing, but he’s the most competent person we have. He and Jack don’t seem to get along, though Jack was the one who suggested we hire Josh.
Right now, Josh looks fidgety. And the unease that started with Zoey’s phone call is growing.
“Spit it out,” Jack snaps when Josh still hasn’t said anything.
“Right,” Josh says. “So, I didn’t want to say anything until I knew for sure. And I wasn’t sure. Not until last night.”
Jack motions for him to hurry it up. “Skip the saga. What is it?”
“Someone’s been intentionally messing with the program. Hacking in and planting bugs and traps. Things to shut us down completely.”
Jack narrows his eyes at me. “What has Abby said about this?”
I shrug. “She’s still working on it. I don’t get updates because I don’t know what she’s talking about most of the time.”
The look Jack’s giving me makes me feel like a rubber band stretched to the limit. “Shouldn’t you know something by now?” he asks. “Something more specific?”
Falling for Your Best Friend's Twin: a Sweet Romantic Comedy (Love Clichés Sweet RomCom Series Book 1) Page 16