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That’s what I keep telling myself.
We place our order a few minutes later and move down the line, waiting for our drinks.
“So who is she?” Finn says.
“Who is who?”
“Your mystery date last night,” Finn says, grinning and waggling his eyebrows.
“Jeez, Finn. We’re not seventeen anymore.” I roll my eyes theatrically, hoping he’ll laugh it off and talk about something else.
“Nah, man, we’re all still seventeen at heart,” he says, smacking me on the shoulder. “Come on, spill. I’ll show you mine if you show me yours.” Finn pulls up his phone and starts scrolling through pictures.
The thought has the blood draining from my face.
“No pictures,” I say. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. Anyway. I went back to the room alone.” It was about nine this morning when I went back to the room, but the words themselves are true enough.
“Uh-huh,” he says, elbowing me but not looking up from his phone. “Here she is.” Finn holds his phone in my face to show me a candid photo from the bar last night: it’s Finn and a lithe, gorgeous blonde, laughing at each other and the camera.
“Nice,” I say, pushing his phone away from my head.
“Yes,” says Finn suggestively. “Yes, she was.”
“You’re a pig,” I tell him. “And I say that with love.”
“And you’re a liar,” says Finn, poking me in the same shoulder he smacked just a minute ago. “You went home with somebody.”
“There was nobody,” I insist, feeling my neck get warm. Determined not to fidget, I shove my hands in my pockets. This is why I can never lay a hand on Callahan. If Finn found out I’d so much as kissed her last night… let alone the other stuff. Let alone alone the kinky stuff. And the threesome part. “Even if there were somebody, we’re at the beach. For a wedding, for God’s sake. It’s a fling. One-night stands are called that for a reason—they don’t last. And they sure as hell don’t matter.”
Finn raises an eyebrow.
“And you say I’m a pig,” he smirks.
“You are a pig.” The small, sweet voice comes from behind me, and I close my eyes against the knowledge that Callahan heard every last word I just said.
12
Callahan
“Hey Lucy,” I say, answering the phone and nodding at the doorman as I leave the hotel. “Everything okay?”
Lucy Baxter is the most levelheaded person I know. I left her in charge of Hale House for the long weekend while we were out of town. It’s not the first time she’s been on her own, but it is the first time I’ve not been locked up in the house next door while she’s working. She wouldn’t be calling unless something was wrong.
“The house is fine,” she says, wasting no time on small talk. “And the animals are all fine; no trouble there. But we just had a visit from somebody from the city council. His card says Bob Sopa?”
“I know him,” I say, feeling my shoulders tense in recognition. “What did he want?”
Sopa was a longtime member of the city council whose children aspired to entrepreneurship. They didn’t care what business they got into, just that they got to call themselves CEO and founder of a “startup.” Bob’s youngest daughter went into dog grooming, positioning herself as my direct competition and trying to price me out of my customer base.
It was working, and better than it should have. Possibly because daughter dearest had a relative on the council and she didn’t have any trouble leaving her own home.
I rub the heel of my free hand over my sternum, trying to calm down.
“He said Hale House’s business license is going to be revoked,” continues Lucy. “What’s going on, Callie?”
“I’m not sure,” I say, lying through my teeth. “Did Sopa say anything else?”
“That was it,” she says. “He left his card. I think he was pissed you weren’t here, but he never asked to see Finn.”
