The Best Man

by Renshaw, Winter

  Someday he’s going to set his sights on someone and never look back. She’ll get lost in the depth of his eyes, find herself intoxicated with the velvet in his tone and the way he smells like pure masculinity with a touch of sandalwood. He’ll woo her with his intelligence and charm her with his peaceful confidence.

  I don’t even know this woman, but I’d give anything to be her.

  26

  Cainan

  “What the hell happened with Grant and Brie? I just saw he changed his status from engaged to single? Did you know about this?” Claire greets me Saturday morning with a barrage of questions.

  “Hello to you too.” I shut her apartment door behind me.

  “Seriously, when did that happen?”

  “Over a week ago.”

  “When were you going to tell me?” She plops down on her mid-century modern sectional and hugs a pillow. “They were so cute together.”

  “Brie changed her mind. It happens.”

  She nibbles a painted thumbnail. “I guess …”

  “He’ll get over it. In fact, he’s already planning a guys’ weekend in Vegas.”

  “Of course he is.” Claire rolls her eyes. “Sounds like his comment at brunch that weekend had some truth behind it after all. Brie must’ve been having second thoughts, and Grant must’ve been aware of that.”

  My phone buzzes in my pocket with a text. The number on the screen is unfamiliar.

  602-555-9945: HI! IT’S BRIE. HOPE YOU DON’T MIND ME TEXTING YOU … GRANT GAVE ME YOUR NUMBER. ANYWAY, JUST WANTED TO SAY IT WAS NICE CHATTING WITH YOU THE OTHER DAY. LOVED THE COFFEE SHOP. WILL DEFINITELY BE BACK. ALSO, I GRABBED THIS BOOK WHILE I WAS THERE. SO GOOD! IF YOU EVER WANT TO BORROW IT, LMK!

  A photo comes through of a book with a bright orange cover.

  The Alchemist.

  I’ve seen it before, but I’ve never read it.

  “What’re you grinning about over there?” Claire interrupts my moment.

  I wipe the expression clean off my face. “I wasn’t grinning.”

  “Like hell you weren’t. Who texted you?”

  “Does it ever get exhausting for you? Being all up in everyone else’s business?”

  She leans off the sofa, swiping at my phone. “Tell me or I’m going to have to see for myself.”

  “Brie moved here this week. I ran into her a couple of days ago and we had coffee. She was texting me a book recommendation.”

  I’m met with crickets.

  “It’s completely innocent,” I add before she has a chance to insert her opinion.

  “Brie as in … Grant’s Brie?”

  I nod.

  “Jesus, Cainan. What the hell is wrong with you?” She rises from the sofa and strides the length of her living room. “Is there something you’re not telling me?”

  “Of course not.”

  She gathers her messy hair into an even messier bun, securing it with the hair tie from her wrist. “Your supposed dream girl met you, dumped your best friend a week later, then moved to your city a week after that …”

  “I know how it sounds, but it’s not like that. At all.”

  “It better not be. You can’t do that to Grant. I know he’s a douche sometimes, but he’s your best friend.”

  Spending time with Brie was so natural—as if we belonged together. The conversation was never stilted or awkward. Her eyes never left mine for a moment, intense and curious as she gazed at me through a frame of dark lashes and latched onto my every word like she was hungry for more.

  And then there was the disappointment in her voice that she tried to hide when I told her I had to go. I didn’t show it, but I felt the same.

  I didn’t want to leave.

  I wanted to cancel the meeting, tell one of the junior partners to cover for me, and spend the rest of the day just the two of us.

  I opt not to share those particulars with my sister.

  “I would never.” Which is why I also don’t bother sharing with Claire the fact that I knew Brie’s favorite authors before she even told me. And I knew because of the dream. The dream Claire insists was nothing more than mental gibberish. “I’d never do that to him.”

  And I mean it.

  I can’t. And I won’t.

  27

  Brie

  “Have a good weekend, Brie!” Denise, our front desk manager, bids me farewell Friday afternoon. A group of ladies from accounting and HR follow her in a small herd toward the elevator. I overheard them talking about getting drinks later. Paulina, the other actuary, invited me to her daughter’s ballet recital at some private fundraiser, though I think she was simply being nice because I told her I didn’t have much planned for the weekend.

  I’ve been here two weeks, and it’s no easier to make new friends here than it was back home. Everyone has their cliques. Everyone has to be one-hundred percent sure they can trust you before they let you into their inner circle. And I get it. I’m not offended. It just means I’ll be spending another quiet weekend in the confines of Maya’s beautiful apartment.

  Except for tonight.

  Tonight I’m seeing Chicago on Broadway. It’s just about the touristiest thing a non-New Yorker can do, and I have zero shame about it. I’ve seen the movie about a dozen times, and I saw the show four times when it came through Phoenix a decade ago, but I’ve never seen it here.

  I check my email for my ticket confirmation code before shutting down my computer and locking up Maya’s office. I’m halfway to the elevator when Grant calls.

  “Hey,” I answer, but only because I ignored his last two calls. Ever since I moved here, he’s been calling and texting daily. I think it makes him anxious, me being so far away. It’s like he’s convinced I’m going to meet someone else and get swept off my feet. Never mind that it’s an irrelevant fear. Regardless of what may or may not happen while I’m here, it changes nothing back home with him.

  We’re friends. It’s all we’ll ever be.

  I stop at Atlantis on my way home and grab a coffee. The show isn’t for another couple of hours, and the whirlwind week I’ve had is catching up with me.

  Being here is unexpectedly bittersweet. Two weeks ago, Cainan and I sat at the table in the back and had coffee. Two days later, I texted him about The Alchemist.

  He read the text, but never responded.

  Radio silence.

  Maybe it’s a loyalty thing. Perhaps he felt guilty afterward for hanging out with his best friend’s ex? Maybe he thinks he’s doing the right thing?

  “What are you up to tonight?” Grant asks as I leave the coffee shop.

  “Just catching a show later.” I try to keep our conversations vague, short, and neutral at all times. I don’t want to give him false hope. I don’t want to foster any kind of conversational intimacy.

  “Oh, yeah? Which one?”

  “Chicago. What are you doing this weekend?”

  “The usual ... ” He keeps his answer vague as well, though I’d guess his intentions are different than mine. I think he wants me to wonder, to assume the worst, to imagine him painting the town and hooking up with beautiful Phoenician women. “Actually, I was thinking of laying low. Cainan’s planning this insane Vegas weekend next month.”

  “Is he now?” There’s a twinge in my chest, though I’m not sure what it means. Jealousy, perhaps? Though I have no right being jealous of Grant chatting with his best friend.

  “Yeah. Says he wants to cheer me up.”

  “I’m sure the two of you will have a lovely time together.”

  He chuckles. “Oh, there’ll be eight of us total. Going to rent out this suite at the Waldorf Astoria. Hit up a bunch of clubs. Get crazy.”

  Grant is definitely trying to make me jealous. Only instead of picturing Grant covered in stunning, gorgeous, half-naked women … I’m picturing Cainan.

  My middle turns tense, and my skin is blanketed in a hot flash of displaced jealousy.

  “Sounds like a good time,” I say, forcing an upbeat tone.
>
  “Hey, I have a work trip coming up in a few weeks,” he changes the subject. “I thought maybe … if you were cool with it … I could stay with you?”

  My jaw turns slack as I search for the right words. Cainan’s words from the other week, about not sugarcoating, come to mind. “Grant, I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

  The old me would’ve fed him a bunch of excuses, would’ve told him it’s not my place, and I don’t feel comfortable allowing someone else to stay there with me. Instead, I zip my lips and leave it at that.

  Grant utters some kind of protest on the other end, but I’m no longer listening … because up ahead, rounding the corner is none other than Cainan James himself.

  “Hey, I’m sorry,” I tell Grant. “I have to go.”

  “Everything okay?”

  “Of course,” I say, thumb hovering over the disconnect button. “Talk later?”

  “Yeah, sure.” He doesn’t mask the frustration in his voice before hanging up.

  Cainan spots me, and my stomach caves as I wait for his reaction. Holding my breath, I remind myself to breathe.

  “Hey, stranger.” His smile almost makes me forget he’s ignored me for the past two weeks.

  Did I text the wrong number by mistake? There’s a chance Cainan didn’t get my text. It might’ve gone to some random person instead, and I’ve gotten my panties in a wad over nothing.

  “Hi.” I force a smile. And then the question comes before I have a chance to stop it. “Did you get my text the other week?”

  He sucks in a breath through clenched teeth, wearing an apologetic mask. “Yeah. I did.”

  I lift my brows. “And?”

  His eyes search mine. He’s trying to come up with an excuse, I can tell. Only, doing such a thing would be an act of hypocrisy given his strong stance on not sugarcoating the truth.

  “If this is about Grant …” my voice trails off, half of me willing him to assure me it isn’t.

  Only that isn’t what happens. At all.

  “I’m going to be completely honest with you,” he says. “It’s absolutely about Grant.”

  His words are a swift blow, a sucker punch to the ego. But I don’t let it show.

  “I don’t understand,” I say. “Grant gave me your number. He told me to reach out to you if I needed anything. I don’t think he’d be upset about us having coffee or talking books …”

  Silence weighs between us, heavy with a thousand unsaid words.

  Did he feel it too? And if he did, would he ever admit it?

  Does he not trust himself around me?

  “You know what, don’t worry about it.” I wave him off and check my watch. “I’ve got to get going. I’ve got plans tonight, so …”

  I won’t beg him to be friends with me.

  I also won’t stand around and pretend I didn’t fall asleep last night imagining the intensity of his kiss against my mouth or the way my body would melt against his without a single protest, no matter how wrong it would be.

  “What are your plans?” he asks.

  “I’m catching a show on Broadway.”

  “Let me guess … Chicago.”

  I smirk. “Either you’re psychic or you’re making fun of me for being a predictable tourist …”

  “What time is it?”

  “Five fifteen.”

  “No—what time is your show?”

  “Seven thirty. Why?”

  His lips press together and his brows meet. He looks like a man on the cusp of a bad decision. “You want to come over for a drink before? Maybe tell me a little more about that book?”

  I nod before I have a chance to talk myself out of it.

  * * *

  His place is as quiet and impressive as he is.

  Marble floors in the entry. Tall ceilings. Oversized limestone fireplace. Pristine chef’s kitchen. The faint scent of bergamot and sandalwood baked into the walls. Dark wood accented with burnished metal. Leather wrapped everything. Comfortable but not gargantuan or in-your-face.

  He takes me to what appears to be a bedroom converted into a library, and, for the first time in my adult life, I’m weak in the knees—a term I’d always thought was an expression until now.

  “I’ve never met a man with a library before,” I say, dragging my fingertips along a shelf sectioned off by poetry and bookends shaped from black quartz. “Favorite poet?”

  “I don’t know that I could pick just one, but Pablo Neruda is definitely top five.” He slides a small book from his collection, flicks it open to a page in the middle, and clears his throat. “I do not love you as if you were salt-rose or topaz or the arrow of carnations … I love you as certain dark things are to be loved … in secret … between the shadow and the soul.”

  A body-tightening shiver runs through me, followed by a spray of knee-weakening goose bumps.

  “Anyway.” He inserts the book back to its rightful position. “What’s your drink?”

  “What do you have?”

  “Everything.”

  “Vodka cranberry. I’m a simple girl.” I give him a wink.

  His mouth pulls up. “Something tells me you’re anything but.”

  Disappearing down the hall, he leaves me to my own devices in the comfort of his suede-and-walnut scented library with its floor-to-ceiling shelves chock full of poetry, philosopher’s tomes, and all the classics.

  Cainan is a renaissance man.

  Grant was never into books. He told me once that he’d paid underclassmen to write his World Lit papers in college and he’d maybe finished one book in his entire life—a biography on Michael Jordan. He said he could never sit still long enough to focus.

  Cainan’s inherent tranquility is all the more fitting now that I’ve seen this side of him.

  “Here you are.” He returns a minute later with my vodka cranberry and two fingers of an amber-hued liquor for himself, and then he makes himself comfortable in a cognac club chair. “Help yourself. You can borrow anything you’d like.”

  I select an antique copy of The Picture of Dorian Gray and carefully flip through its fragile pages, making my way through the initial chapter while working on my cocktail.

  When I glance up several minutes later, Cainan is staring at my wrists again. Just like he did that day at Atlantis.

  “Why do you keep looking at my wrists?” I half-laugh.

  His brows meet. He hesitates. “No reason.”

  Maybe it’s a nervous tic? Though he doesn’t come across as a nervous man in the slightest …

  I check the time and remember I still have a show to catch.

  “I should probably get going.” I fold the book, set it down, and take one last sip of my drink. As much as I want to borrow it, it’s clearly a first edition, signed by the author, and probably worth thousands. “Thank you for inviting me up. Next time don’t wait two weeks …”

  “Don’t forget your book.” He hands it to me. “It’s due back three weeks from today. If you need to renew, let me know.”

  Our hands brush in the exchange. My heart trills.

  If this is all it takes to get me going, I can only imagine the way my body would react if things were … different … for us.

  He’s a good man.

  I wish I wanted him less …

  “You ever going to read The Alchemist?” I ask as he shows me out, book pressed against my breathless chest as if it could possibly disguise my current state.

  “What makes you think I haven’t already?” He winks before closing the door.

  I swoon all the way to Chicago.

  And when it’s over, I swoon all the way home.

  Walking the sidewalks of New York in a daydream haze, I’m flattered that Cainan took time out of his busy schedule to read a book I recommended—but now I can’t stop wondering: as he flicked through the soft manila pages, did he ever think about me?

  28

  Cainan

  I’m losing my mind.

  I take a seat in the living room as soon
as Brie is gone, and I slide my copy of The Alchemist off the coffee table. I didn’t want to read the book when she recommended it to me two weeks back. In fact, a handful of times over the years, I’d tried … desperate to know what all the hype was about but never making it past the first few pages, because it read like a poorly-translated Aesop’s fable, choppy and simplistic in places.

  This time I pushed through.

  I finished the first chapter.

  Then the next.

  And the one after.

  By the time it was over, I’d read it in one sitting, my neck kinked and my hands stiff from holding the same position for hours.

  Perhaps in the past, the message of the book didn’t resonate. I couldn’t relate. I didn’t want to take the time to wade through the jerky paragraphs to find the heart of the message.

  If timing is everything, this book couldn’t have smacked me in the soul at a more perfect chapter of my life. In fact, there are many ways Santiago’s journey mirrors mine. The dream that haunts him. His relentless quest. His obsession with destiny.

  In my dream, I knew Brie’s favorite authors. I knew she loved Chicago on Broadway.

  There’s no explanation for that. I highly doubt she was spouting off her verbal autobiography as I lay dying in my mangled car that fateful night.

  But there’s also no explanation for the missing tattoo.

  She caught me staring at her wrists earlier, and on instinct, she covered them with her sleeves and said she had to get going.

  That has to mean something.

  My phone buzzes beside me. A text from Grant fills the screen.

  GRANT: JUST EMAILED YOUR VEGAS TICKET. CAN’T FUCKING WAIT. YOU HAVE NO IDEA HOW BADLY I NEED THIS.

  I check my email, confirm the eTicket is there, and send him a thumbs’ up emoji.

  GRANT: HAVE YOU SEEN HER AROUND YET?

  He’s asked this on a daily basis, ever since I made the mistake of mentioning we had coffee together. I also casually mentioned she’s staying in the neighborhood. Now he’s hell bent on using me as his personal extra set of eyes, diligently checking to see if there’ve been any new sightings or developments.