“Come on, dude. Tessa doesn’t have that level of planning in her.”
Andrzej snorts. “You still don’t see it.”
“She showed up half crying about how she shouldn’t have bitched about Robyn. Brought lemon bars. I ate ’em and told her to leave before eight so I could work.”
“It still looks like cheating when you put in the video. You gotta put yourself in Robyn’s shoes.”
I drag a hand over my face. “Jesus. That’s what she thinks?”
He just stares.
“I’m serious. Tessa wouldn’t stop apologizing. I didn’t know she posted the video until Robyn brought it up. I’d have been angry.”
“And now? You’re still doing a lot of defending her.”
“Yeah.” I trace the rim of my glass, the condensation slick under my thumb. “I’m still pissed at her, don’t get me wrong.But she made a mistake. Didn’t mean to post it, clicked on the wrong draft.”
He mutters something under his breath in Polish that sounds like a curse and a sigh at once. Louder, he adds, “You’re falling for it.”
“There’s nothing to fall for. In any case,” I add, staring at the bottle behind the bar, mesmerized by the way the light hits the label, “it’s my fault. I mishandled the whole thing.”
“We can agree on that.” Andrzej asks for two more shots when I’m not even halfway through the beer.
“Want me to take one for the team?” Andrzej winks. “Give Tessa a good fuck so she stops bothering you?” He grins, teeth flashing.
I bark out a laugh that makes the guy two seats down glance over. “I thought you had something with those twins?”
“It’s a work in progress,” he says, hands up. “I keep getting their names mixed up. Pissing both of them off.”
I shake my head, smiling into my glass. “You’re unbelievable.”
He points at me. “Better unbelievable than unfaithful.”
The words unfaithful and cheated are a punch to the gut every time. The kind you know you deserve.
Andrzej leans back on his stool, arms crossing. “You’d be okay with me going for Tessa?”
“Wanna fuck someone you can’t stand? Go for it,” I toss back, barely looking up from my beer.
He studies me for a beat, eyes sharp under the low bar lights. Then he huffs a laugh, leaning forward again, elbows on the counter.
“Nah,” he says, shaking his head. “She’s not hot enough for that level of crazy.” His smirk is deliberate. “Robyn, though—all hot, no crazy…”
The stool legs screech when I turn toward him. “Dude, stay the fuck away from Robyn.”
He lifts his hands in mock surrender, grinning.
I take the shot, throat burning, and set the glass down harder than I mean to. “That was a trick, wasn’t it?”
Andrzej shrugs, sliding his shot to me. “You’ve been such an idiot. You can’t blame me for wanting to have Robyn’s back in case you’re wishy-washy. But you really love her, huh?”
“Yeah.” My voice cracks a little. The alcohol burn settles low in my stomach.
He signals the bartender to keep the shots coming. The bar hums around us with low music and chatter. The air feels thicker with every shot, my head buzzing with that loose, weightless kind of drunk that makes it too easy to talk.
I rest my elbows on the bar. “I didn’t cheat on her. I swear.”
He studies me for a long moment, his expression softening. “That’s the thing with cheating, dude. Sometimes, it doesn’t feel like a line until you’ve crossed it. And you”—he points at me—“you’re still too much in defensive mode to make amends.”
