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And since Soph had told Larry about our side hustle, the old grump took it upon himself to make all the arrangements.
“Very impressive, Steinbeck,” I said, shoveling the food into my mouth, glad to have a reason to hang with her on Saturday. It used to just be a job, a side hustle that helped people, but now I actually looked forward to crashing weddings when she was with me. “You’ve got all the details we’ll need?”
“I do,” she confirmed, sounding proud of herself. “The cheating fiancée, Lilibeth, is having an affair, but Garrett, the groom, can’t call it off because her father is the chief financier of his business.”
I hadn’t heard anything but the bride’s name. Lilibeth.
Lilibeth.
Time slowed to a stop as the name echoed in my skull.
“So I want to help not only because this is Larry’s family,” Sophie said, “but because the groom is in the same situation I was in. Powerful daddy-in-law in a position to ruin a career? I feel like I’mmeantto help him or something.”
It couldn’t be her. It just couldn’t, because what were the odds? Yet I knew that it was. It had to be.
I just knew it.
“Have you ever noticed that rich fathers are always the problem?” she asked, talking a mile a minute, completely unaware of the turmoil she’d just dropped on top of my world. “Wealthy men ruin the world, I swear to God.”
Still, I had to be sure, and my voice cracked when I said, “I’m sorry, what did you say the bride’s name was again?”
“Lilibeth—what a name, right?” Her voice was full of snark when she said, “There’s nothing wrong with it, but it’s just such a rich girl’s name. Lilibeth Palmer, daughter of a bank president, destroyer of a groom’s heart.”
Fuck. Fuck, fuck, fuck.
Holy shit, fucking fuck.
“And you said that she’s...” I cleared my throat. “Having an affair?”
I pushed the food away from me as I tried to wrap my head around what was happening. “And her fiancé wants out?”
“Bingo.” She made a noise—I think she was talking to her cat—before she said, “It’s in Lincoln, so only an hour away. We’re in, right?”
I couldn’t hear over the roaring in my ears.Lilibeth. Fucking Lili.“Actually, maybe we should pass on this one.”
“What?” she gasped, sounding utterly horrified. “Why would we do that, Max? Is this becauseIgot us the job? Is the big man the only one who can get jobs? Why wouldn’t we want to take this one?”
“Christ, Soph,” I said, trying to work through this fucking nightmare.“I just think that exposing a woman’s infidelity in public is a bad idea. She’ll get judged a lot more harshly than a man would.”
“I guess that would make sense, except we did Callie’s wedding, remember?”
I breathed in through my nose and closed my eyes. “That was different.”
“Different how?” she asked, wildly insistent all of a sudden.
“Callie was a monster,” I replied, having a hard time even carrying on this conversation.
“True,” she said, “But how do you knowLilibethisn’t a monster?”
“I just...” I said, rubbing the back of my neck, clueless how to convince her. “I just don’t want to do this one.”
“Seriously?” she asked again, sounding as if she couldn’t believe what I was saying.
“Yes,” I said through clenched teeth, wanting tonotthink about whatever the fuck Lil was going through at the moment. “Let’s pass.”
“Are you kidding?”
“No, Soph,” I said, trying really hard not to snap at her but failing. “For the love of God. I want. To turn. It down.”
