Gently, Hope asked, "Did you have something with him while you and Tyler—"
I shook my head so hard I almost spilled my wine again, then took another gulp for courage. "No. Absolutely not. I never cheated on Tyler. Except–"
Everyone waited for me to finish my sentence. I went for more wine. I wasn't used to talking about this kind of thing. I'd gotten used to keeping secrets, had been away from my sisters for too long.
"Except?" Quinn finally prompted.
"Except for my wedding," I finished in a rush, bracing for the uproar that followed.
"What happened at your wedding?" Sterling screeched. "I can't believe Dad made me stay home, and I missed all of this."
"If something scandalous happened at the wedding," Quinn assured her, "no one had any clue. It was perfect."
"Ugh," I grunted, draining my glass again and flopping back into my chair. "I'm so sick of perfect. Perfect Parker. Perfect wedding. Perfect husband. Perfect life. It was all a fucking disaster. I'm a fucking disaster. And I'm so fucking tired of pretending I'm not."
Four sets of wide eyes stared back at me. "You don't have to be perfect, honey," Hope said. "We love you just the way you are. Disaster and all."
"I love you too," I blubbered, "I really do. I'm so glad to be home."
Sterling leaned forward and snatched my wine glass. "No more of this until you finish. I don't want you getting distracted. You love us, we love you, and we're all a fucking mess in one way or another. Now tell me what happened at your wedding before I lose patience and call Nash myself."
I laughed, wiping under my eyes. "He kissed me. We didn't meet until that night," I explained, drifting back in time to what had formerly been the best kiss of my life. Until Nash kissed me in his kitchen in New York. Unconsciously, my finger drifted up to press into my lower lip.
"He shook my hand in the receiving line and it was like–" I searched for the right word to describe something I still didn't understand. "Lightning. It was like being struck by lightning. He was so much. I'd never wanted anyone like that. Out of nowhere, needing him to touch me. Wanting to just be with him. Near him."
"Inconvenient since you'd married his brother only minutes before," Savannah commented, her eyes warm with compassion. "What miserable timing."
"It was awful," I agreed. "And there was no way I was going to do anything about it. Our father, the Kingsleys, all their friends. I wasn't going to run off with my brother-in-law at my wedding. The scandal would have been–" I shook my head. "That's just not me. That's never going to be me. But after we met, for the first time, it struck me that maybe I'd made a terrible mistake in marrying Tyler. So of course I ran as fast as I could in the opposite direction."
"How did that end with him kissing you?" Quinn asked, refilling her own glass of wine. I wished I had mine back, but Sterling was right. Any more and I wouldn't be able to finish this. Plus, I hate being hungover.
"I was walking down a hallway, just trying to get some air, a minute to myself, and he pulled me into a dark closet. I'd never been kissed like that. He asked me to run away with him, but I couldn't bring myself to do it, even though a part of me knew that the real mistake was Tyler. I turned Nash down and he walked away. After that, I didn't see him until his father died. Nash stayed away from Tyler. Away from me. We barely spoke."
I shut my mouth, unable to share the rest. I couldn't tell them that every time I was near Nash, something deep inside me relaxed and sighed,Finally, this is the one. I'd been ignoring that voice for so many years. And now Nash was coming here. Was I going to keep ignoring that little voice?
Quinn read my mind. "What are you going to do?"
"We don't know that he's here for me," I protested, my mind still reeling at the thought.
"He doesn't strike me as a man who's going to wait around. If he is here for you, you'll know soon enough. You should have a plan, just in case." That was Hope, ever practical, always the woman with a plan. Savannah nodded along with her. I wasn't going to ignore two of the smartest women I knew. Except I didn't have a clue what to do about Nash.
I chewed on my lower lip, thinking, while voices raised around me. "She should just sleep with him until she figures it out." That was from Sterling.
Hope started to argue. I looked up to see Quinn studying me, her blue eyes heavy with melancholy. "What does your gut say?" she asked quietly.
"That I want Nash," I whispered, cheeks flaming at what I was saying. All the familiar arguments echoed in my head. I'm still married. He's my brother-in-law. It didn't matter. The truth was, I wanted Nash, and I always had.
Quinn gave a quietly decisive nod. "Then go for it. Life is too short. Believe me, I know. It's better to regret something that didn't work out than it is to regret missing an opportunity because you didn't have the courage to go for it."
Everyone turned to look at Quinn. Shifting uncomfortably, she tucked a wave of her shining dark hair behind her ear. Sterling nudged her in the ribs and said, simply, "Tell."
Quinn jerked a shoulder in a shrug. "There was a guy. After college. I took that whitewater training course, and he was one of the instructors. I had such a huge crush on him. I didn't think he had any idea. We always ended up hanging out after a long day on the water. We had the best conversations." She let out a long sigh. "I used to go to bed at night dreaming of kissing him, getting him naked, but I never had the nerve."
"What happened?" I asked, dreading the answer.
Quinn wiped a gleam of moisture from under her eye. "I finally worked up the nerve to ask him out, right before I left for home. He was interested."
She sighed again, the sadness pouring off of her. "He was really interested, said he'd been planning to ask me out once the class was over and he wasn't my instructor anymore. But he was leaving on a kayaking trip with some buddies and wouldn't be back for a few months. He was a pretty big name in that world and they were making a movie."
