Aaron keeps going, looking at me like he thinks he’s clever. “You know. Since things are so serious. Come hang out with the guys. Be part of it.”
It’s a challenge, obviously. A dick move dressed up as an invitation, an attempt to force a crack in this whole thing and see if I back off.
I don’t want to go to this asshole’s bachelor party. I would rather do literally anything else.But I also know exactly what happens if I hesitate.
He’ll spin it.He’ll make Carly feel small.He’ll make her pay for his bruised ego.
So I don’t hesitate.
“Fine,” I say.
Aaron’s brows lift like he didn’t expect that.Neither did I, frankly.He recovers fast, giving me another one of those smug little smiles. “Great. Give me your number.”
“No. Call my work with the details,” I say, turning back away from him.
He and his friends drift off toward a table, loud again the second they’re far enough away to pretend none of that rattled him.
Maddox turns to me slowly. “That’s a terrible idea.”
“Obviously,” I say.
Cole folds his arms over his chest. “You know he invited you to be a prick, right?”
“Yes, Cole. I picked up on that.”
“And you’re still going.”
I look down at my drink for a second, then back toward the table where Aaron is laughing up a storm already.“Yeah,” I say, picking up my glass again. “I'll do it for her.”
Chapter 29
Carly
Six Weeks
The house smellslike sharp cheddar, butter, and toasted breadcrumbs, which is exactly what Penelope wanted when she very sweetly requested homemade mac and cheese this morning. She'd looked at me so adorably, her lower lip puffing out, that I'd taken the request more like a private chef agreeing to an entree and less like the version of me I knew I'd end up as this evening — an exhausted woman with her hair clipped up and flour on her black tank top after three failed attempts and one success at a roux.
“Is it done yet?” Penelope asks for the fourth time in ten minutes, dragging a dining chair across the kitchen tile so she can kneel on it and peer dramatically at the oven.
“If you ask me again, I’ll put asparagus in it out of spite.”
She gasps. “You wouldn’t!”
I bite back a smile as I squat down beside her to stare into the oven. “You heard me.”
“Daddy won’t let you do that. He hates ‘spar-a-gus.”
“Your daddy isn’t home yet. I can do what I want.”
Penelope narrows her eyes at me, deeply suspicious, and I’m still giggling at her when I hear the door into the garage open.
I don’t need to turn around to know it’s him and not someone making a delivery or the maid dropping in like she does once a week.It’s ridiculous, honestly. Ridiculous and annoying and a little humiliating, the way my ears seem to clock Gray before the rest of me does. I know the sound of his footsteps now, the routine of the door closing, keys dropping onto the side table, shoes slipping off.
Penelope launches off the chair. “Daddy!”
He catches her one-handed, suit jacket still on, tie loosened, salt-and-pepper hair a little mussed like he’s been dragging a hand through it on the drive home. He looks unfairly good for a man who spent all day in meetings and somehow still manages to come home looking like the expensive, fantasy version of a dad in a Rolex ad.
“Hey, bug.” He presses a kiss to her cheek, sending her into a fit of giggles, then looks at me over her shoulder as I push myself back up to standing. “Smells good in here.”
