by Elise Faber
Sera stepped in front of her, arms crossed. “Why was Luke Pearson lurking in your hallway?”
“Living room!” Bec pointed.
Abby held up her cell, revealing CeCe and Heather’s faces on the screen. “We’re all here, so spill.”
Bec grabbed a bottle and opener. “I need more wine for this.”
Rachel snatched it from her. “Go, sit down. I’ll do this.”
“You don’t know where everything is. I can—”
“Bec.”
A unison of voices calling her on her shit.
“Ugh. Fine.” She strode into the living room and plunked down onto the couch.
“Nope,” Abby told her, tugging her back up and shoving her in the direction of her bedroom. “Pajamas first. We’ll get everything ready.”
Bec nodded and escaped to her bedroom.
Why had she invited this maelstrom of femininity into her house in the first place? Oh yeah, because she’d been trying to prove to herself that Luke’s words from the past didn’t matter . . . or not that they didn’t matter so much as they were no longer true.
She wasn’t just work, only work, all work. She wasn’t a lawyer robot without a heart.
She was a living, breathing human with real feelings and emotions.
And like only seventy-five percent work.
Twenty-five, yup a solid twenty-five percent, were meaningful, important, and dare she say, significant sentiments because they did not revolve around her work.
Bec was just nodding to herself in the mirror, a confident, encouraging bob of her head she’d given herself more than once before an important case, when she heard the blender start up. And now that she was paying attention, she could also smell pizza. Or at least something equally carby and cheese-filled.
Her stomach growled as she slipped on a pair of pink fuzzy socks.
“Pizza’s here!” Sera called just as Bec was pushing to her feet.
“Yes.” She opened the door and went out to join the girls. Her shoulders inched higher and tighter with each step, but she forced herself to relax them. Even putting her desire to prove Luke wrong aside, she knew that calling in her friends was the right thing to do. They were there for each other, hands down, no holds barred, no judgment—okay, so maybe a little judgment because they truly wanted what was best for each other, and sometimes that required tough love with a dash of judgment thrown in.
Regardless, she’d handled Luke alone before, and look where that had gotten her.
She needed the Sextant, and she needed them STAT.
Rachel stuck a margarita in her hand the moment Bec crossed the threshold into the living room. “Drink first. Talk second.”
Abby scoffed. “I disagree with that notion because . . . uh . . .” Her words trailed off, probably because Bec had drained the entire glass in just a few swallows. “Never mind.”
Sera laced her arm through Bec’s and led her to the couch. “So, Luke’s in town, huh?”
Bec nodded, reaching for another glass, wine this time. Maybe the combo of the two liquors would bring her oblivion, make her forget that she’d agreed to go on ten dates with Luke. Maybe then she could pretend she hadn’t been bested by the man who’d broken her heart.
“So who is Luke exactly?” Rachel asked.
“Bec’s ex-boyfriend and fiancé. Sera, Bec, and I met him when we were all shipped off to boarding school,” Abby said. “He went to the boys’ high school next door.”
“You had a boyfriend?” CeCe asked.
Bec bristled at the shock in her friend’s tone. “I’m not asexual,” she grumbled. “I’ve dated, had boyfriends.” She gulped down some wine. “And, I like penises. I just haven’t had much use for them of late.”
“Sleeping with people isn’t exactly dating.” Sera grinned. “Also, I think the proper term is peni.”
“Nope.” Heather. “Definitely not. Also, ew, Sera. The word peni should never come out of your mouth.”
“Why?” Sera made a face. “Why do you all get to be dirty and I can’t even say peni?”
“It’s penises!” Rachel said, lifting her own glass to her lips. “And I don’t know, Sera. You’re like . . . too innocent.”
Blue eyes glared. “I own five vibrators!”
Silence then a collective, “Ew.”
“Oh my God,” Sera muttered. “You guys are evil.”
“It’s like an innocent old lady telling me how she likes to get off.” Heather shuddered.
Sera glared. “I’m neither old nor innocent.”
“You don’t even like to curse,” Bec reminded her.
“Well, how about this? Fuck. Fuckity. Fuck.”
More silence.
Then Abby shook her head and wove her arm through Sera’s. “Nope. Just doesn’t compute. You’re too nice, Sera.”
“I’ve decided that being nice sucks,” she muttered. “But”—she sighed and straightened her shoulders—“enough about my innocence. I want to hear more about Bec and Luke.”
One big gulp of wine to fortify herself before Bec blurted, “We’re married.”
Silence. And this time it had nothing to do with Sera’s vibrators.
Heather was the first to regain her voice. “Well, this is unexpected.”
CeCe snorted. “Because she took a page out of your book?”
Heather shushed her. But CeCe’s teasing was on point. Heather and her husband Clay had pulled a Vegas cliché by getting blackout drunk and then standing up before an Elvis impersonator to exchange vows.
Enemies in the business world to husband and wife, all before they’d gone on a single date.
“I didn’t take a page out of Heather’s book,” Bec said, setting her glass down and leaning back against the couch. A pleasant swirling feeling was circling around in her head. “We did have a secret, impulsive wedding. It was just ten years ago.”
And more silence.
“I—” Abby started to speak then stopped with a shake of her head, out of words for maybe the first time ever.
Sera touched Bec’s arm. “Why didn’t you tell us?”
She kept her eyes closed. “I thought we were divorced.”
“There’s a plot twist I didn’t expect,” Rachel said into the quiet.
Bec sighed. “We got married right before I graduated from law school. We’d been dating for a lot longer than that, though. Since senior year of high school.” A shrug. “Getting married seemed like the next logical thing to do.”
Abby found her words. “But we all expected you two to get married. You were together for ages. Why hide it?”
“His parents wanted us to wait. No.” She shook her head, enjoying the way her brain seemed to slosh around in her skull. “That’s not entirely true. Yes, they thought we were still a little young, but there were plenty of people in our circle who’d gotten hitched.” A shrug. “Luke and I had always planned to get married. I guess I pushed the secret wedding because I wanted something that was ours and ours alone.”
“Then what happened?” A gentle probe from Sera.
Bec smiled. “We had a really good nine months. We’d graduated, were both working, living together. It was—” A sigh, her eyes filling with tears at the memory of late nights pouring over work, ordering in pizza, getting up early to brew his favorite type of coffee, making love, and Luke holding her tightly afterward. “It was about as perfect as you could get.”
“Is he hot?” Heather.
Four sets of eyes—three in Bec’s living room, one through the airwaves—swiveled to glare at Heather.
“Really?” Sera asked.
But Bec shot Heather a grateful look, which Heather acknowledged with a nod. She might be opening up to her friends, might be sharing her sad, sad tale, but dammit, she wasn’t a fucking watering pot, and she absolutely refused to cry over Luke Pearson.
Been there, done that. Got the souvenir shot glass.
“He’s even hotter now,” she admitted, begrudgingly.
“I sec
ond that,” Rachel chimed in. “Well, I didn’t know him before, but the view I got tonight . . .” She brought her fingers to her mouth, affecting an Italian chef. “Muah! The man can fill out a pair of jeans.”
Abby sank down on the couch next to Bec. “Yes, he’s hot, but what’s he doing here now?”
Bec explained about his engagement, the courthouse burning down, and their divorce paperwork not going through.
“Is he still engaged?” CeCe asked, concern edging into her voice.
Bec froze. “I don’t know.”
Heather and Abby began talking, Rachel and CeCe chiming in with an occasional comment, but Sera didn’t join the conversation. Instead, she snatched up Bec’s phone, smiled at what she saw on the screen then began typing something, thumbs moving furiously.
“What are you—?”
“He’s not engaged,” Sera announced.
The girls stopped talking.
“How do you know?” Heather asked.
Sera shrugged. “I asked him, and he said, and I quote ‘I couldn’t marry Tiffani because I knew I was still in love with Becky.’” She held the phone to her chest. “Aw. That’s so sweet.”
Meanwhile, Bec couldn’t find a retort because her heart was pounding.
I was still in love with Becky.
Love.
Becky.
Finally, her brain unstuck. “Give me that,” she said, snatching it from Sera’s hands.
It’s Bec.
A pause.
Hi, sugar pie.
She narrowed her eyes at the phone, damned stubborn man.
Bec. Not Becky. And sure as shit not sugar pie.
Barely a heartbeat before,
How about sweetheart?
“Oh, I like him,” Rachel said, making Bec jump and look up from her cell. She hadn’t realized that Abby, Sera, and Rachel were huddled around her.
“What’d he say?” Heather asked.
“She said her name is Bec, just Bec, and so then he asked if he could call her sweetheart,” Abby stage-whispered.
Bec made a sound of disgust when she saw Heather grin.
“You guys are the worst.”
“You love us,” CeCe said, lips curved into a wide smile.
“Maybe,” Bec grumbled.
“Group hug!” Abby declared, and before Bec could protest or wiggle away, three sets of arms wrapped around her.
“I’m hugging you, too,” CeCe declared.
“I’m not,” Heather declared. “This is just too cheeseball for words.”
“Shut it,” Abby said. “You love our hugs.”
Heather sniffed but didn’t deny that fact.
Bec's phone buzzed, and they pulled back, all looking at the screen. On it was a day and time, followed by a question mark.
They all glanced at Bec for an explanation. “I kissed him—”
Sera squealed.
“To prove I didn’t feel anything for him.”
If Bec had been feeling amused, she might have laughed at the way her friend’s face fell.
“We made a bet,” she said. “If I felt nothing, he’d go away and we’d officially get divorced.”
“And if you felt something?” Heather asked.
“I’d go on ten dates with him. One for every year we’ve spent apart.”
Sera sighed. “That’s so romantic.”
“And?” Abby prompted. “What happened?”
Bec made a face in answer.
“Holy shit,” Rachel said.
CeCe crowed. “This man must be something to get the best of Rebecca Fucking Darden.”
“Don’t remind me,” Bec muttered. “I made a shitty agreement, and I felt something, and now I’ve got to go on ten dates with the only guy who’s ever broken my heart.”
“But—”
“He couldn’t handle me or my success a decade ago. How the fuck is he going to react differently today? My work—”
“Doesn’t define you,” Heather said.
If anyone besides Heather had said those words, Bec would have been able to brush them aside. But coming from Heather O’Keith, quite possibly the only other person on the planet who’d pulled as many hours as her, they weren’t so easy to dismiss.
“Yeah,” she muttered.
“I think the bigger question here,” Abby said, “is why did you agree to the deal in the first place?”
“I—”
Abby made a slashing motion with her hand. “No. No excuses about how Luke is so sexy he made you lose your head. That’s bullshit.” She met Bec’s stare head on. “And you know it. No one has ever made you do something you didn’t want to, so you need to come to terms with why you agreed to this in the first place.” She touched Bec’s hand. “And whether your agreement means that deep down you really want this second chance with Luke.”
“Damn,” Rachel said, tone awe-filled. “She’s good.”
Sera smiled. “Yes, she is.”
Bec didn’t reply. She’d been too shocked to the core by the truth in Abby’s words.
Thankfully, her friends seemed to recognize that, so they changed the subject to CeCe and Colin’s latest travels, and then a hilarious story involving Abby’s son Hunter, and then an idiotic investor who’d tried to double-cross Heather and hadn’t stood a chance.
A few hours later, Heather and CeCe hung up, and Rachel, Sera, and Abby packed their things.
Hugs and goodbyes and a raised eyebrow glance from Abby punctuated their departure. Bec nodded, letting her friend know she’d truly heard her statement earlier that evening and was seriously considering it. There were some things that didn’t require words after close to twenty years of friendship, and Bec’s acknowledgment of Abby’s insight was one of those.
With one last goodbye, she closed and locked her door.
Her cell buzzed and she wasn’t surprised to see a text from Abby. Yes, there were some things that didn’t require speaking, but her friend didn’t often have the willpower to be silent.
Go along for the ride. You might decide you like it.
Bec sighed, sent a text back,
I did that once. Want to guess where it got me?
A beat then another buzz.
Multiple orgasms?
Yes, but that was beside the point.
Goodnight, Abs.
One more buzz.
Goodnight.
A beat. Then a GIF of a cheerleader shouting, “Go for it!” came through. Bec grinned despite herself and headed into her bedroom. Her friends had done the dishes, despite her protests, but it was nice to just slip between the cool cotton sheets and close her eyes.
Unfortunately, they didn’t stay closed for long.
Maybe it was the alcohol. Maybe it was Abby’s words. Maybe she’d just gone insane.
Or perhaps it was all of the above.
Because Bec opened the text chain from Luke, grinning when she noticed that Sera had saved his number with the name Sir Sexy Pants.
The man sure could fill out a pair of Levi’s.
Not the point, but her slightly-buzzed mind still spent a good minute picturing that yummy, two-glorious-handfuls of an ass in those faded jeans.
Yup. She wouldn’t mind grabbing on to that as he pounded into her—
Focus.
Bec blinked. Read back through the chain and mentally lifted her chin as she typed out a response.
Sweetheart TBD. Depends on how good you are on Friday night.
A long minute passed before a reply came through.
I mean to prove to you how good I can be.
Heaven help her, but she wanted to see exactly how good that was.
Eight
Luke
Unaccountably nervous, that was Luke.
And not only because he wasn’t sure if Becky would show up for their first date, but also because . . . he wasn’t sure if Becky would show up for their date.
Hilarious.
But bad dad jokes aside, Luke had a sudden case of what-if-he-was-doing
the wrong thing? Not about coming back for Becky or trying to convince her that they were worth a second chance . . . but what if at the end of this she didn’t want to be with him?
Then it was too late for doubts.
A car pulled into the empty lot and parked right next to his rental. He knew it was Becky even before he caught a glimpse of her through the windshield. The car just screamed Rebecca Darden, sleek and dark with just enough of an edge to make him proceed with caution.
Luke pushed off the hood of his rental, made his way over to Becky’s, but before he could open the door and help her to her feet, she’d gotten out.
That hadn’t changed.
Still independent, still would force him to find creative ways to care for her.
“Hi, sweetheart.”
She crossed her arms. “Don’t sweetheart me,” she said. “You haven’t earned sweetheart privileges yet.”
He swept in, pressed a quick kiss to her cheek. It took every bit of his willpower to not stay close, to not soak in her scent and nuzzle the spot just beneath her jaw that used to drive her crazy. The only reason Luke didn’t do those things—well, two reasons he supposed—was because, first, she hadn’t given him those rights and, second, she was wary. This would be a battle won with patience and small steps.
And if Luke had learned nothing else over the years, it was how to be patient.
Patient while he paid his dues in the corporate world. Patient while he helped a father who despised needing him. Patient while he dealt with a nervous board and paranoid investors.
He could be patient if required.
His Becky required it.
“Hi,” he repeated, stepping so close that she had to tilt her head back in order to keep meeting his gaze. That nearness fucked with his mind, made him want to get closer, to bend and close the gap between their mouths. But only millimeters separating them also meant he could see Becky’s reaction. See he wasn’t the only one affected.
