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Daisy sat down, staring straight ahead.
Apparently Chris wore me out in more ways than one.
She smiled, tucking her hair behind her ear. “Guess I better get moving then, huh?”
“After coffee.” She handed Daisy the coffee, still staring, then lowered her head. “You seem…” She leaned forward, eyes wide, lips parted. “Oh my God, who is he?”
Crap, crap, crap. “Who is who?”
“Daisy Violet O’Rourke, you have a condom wrapper under your bed, you’re smiling, and you seem way too frigging relaxed considering you probably have a hangover, so that means one thing. It doesn’t take a cop to figure this mystery out.” She stood up—jumped up, more accurately—and pointed a finger in her face. “You had sex last night!”
Daisy’s cheeks went red hot. She’d made a rookie mistake and missed a frigging condom wrapper, of all things. Way to go, dumbass. “God, could you shout that any louder? I don’t think the wedding party downstairs heard you.”
“Who is he?” Lauren cried out again, sitting down but bouncing with excitement. “Do I know him? Is he a guest here? Can I meet him? I need to meet him.”
“No, yes, no, and absolutely not.” Daisy stood, bent over, picked up the wrapper, and crinkled it in her hand. “It was a one night thing. That’s it. I don’t even know his name.”
Lauren’s jaw dropped. “Daisy. You didn’t even ask him his name? After all the lectures you gave me when I was single and dating, about how I should never be alone with someone without telling someone else who I was with, and you were with a guy whose name you didn’t even know?”
“Well, I gave him a name. A fake one. Chris.” Daisy smiled. She couldn’t help it. Just thinking about him, and how they’d come up with those names, made her all warm and fuzzy inside. Oh God. She was broken. Chris had broken her. Turned her into a sap. “And I was Scarlett.”
Lauren blinked for a beat, clearly caught off guard, but she rebounded quickly. “Was he good? Was he cute? What did he look like? Can I meet him?”
“You already asked that,” she said, smiling despite her friend’s overenthusiasm about her sex life. “You can’t meet him, because I won’t be seeing him again. He doesn’t live around here, I don’t think. And…I might have told him I live in Colorado. Possibly. Hypothetically.”
Lauren snorted. “Nice.”
“When he asked where I was from, I told the truth. I just don’t live there anymore, is all. Like I said, it was just a night. A fun night. And I needed that.” She walked over to the trash can and threw away the piece of evidence she’d missed. “But, anyway, this changes nothing.”
“The hell it doesn’t. It means you’re ready.” She stood, fairly trembling with excitement. “And how convenient, too, since we’re at a wedding with a bunch of eligible men…including Mark. You remember him, right? The guy I was telling you about—”
“No. Absolutely not.” She crossed her arms, even though she was fully aware that the only reason she’d been invited to this wedding was because Lauren wanted to hook her up with her fiancé Steven’s coworker. They both worked for the groom at the Shillings Agency, which was why they were in attendance. “I told you, I don’t do military men.”
“He’s not in anymore.”
“No.” She shook her head. “I can’t. I won’t.”
Lauren bit her tongue. “Fine. Whatever. But still—you’re ready, and that’s amazing, Daisy. And once you meet Mark, you’ll change your mind.”
Daisy rolled her eyes. “You just won’t give in, will you?”
“Not until you do,” Lauren said way too cheerfully. “I know when I’m right, and I’m right. You two are meant to be.”
Her stomach tightened at the same words Chris had said to her last night. “Then you’ll be waiting a hell of a long time, because that’s never going to happen. Been there, got the T-shirt, wore it out. Not buying another.”
“The T-shirt fits pretty well on me and Steven,” Lauren said defensively. “He has his rough days, but I love him, and he loves me, and that makes it all worth it.”
“I’m sure it does. But I’m not you, and he’s not Steven, and I’m not going there.”
Lauren sighed, but nodded. “All right. I get it. But this Chris guy…tell me everything. Don’t leave out a single detail.”
Daisy grinned, sat down next to her best friend. “He came up to me at the bar…”
…
A few hours later, she’d told her whole story, leaving out nothing, and she and Lauren were dressed, their hair was done, and they had on enough makeup to put a group of middle school girls to shame. Laughing, they left Daisy’s room and closed the door behind them. As they turned, a man closed his arms around Lauren from behind, making her squeal. Daisy stiffened, about to kick some ass, but then recognized the red-haired man holding her friend.
It was Steven, Lauren’s fiancé. He worked at the Shillings Agency, along with the groom, Cooper Shillings, and a bunch of the groomsman, including Holt Cunningham, Jake Forsythe, and the always mentioned Mark Matthews, the man Lauren was determined to hook her up with.
