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Sam couldn’t hide the grin. Liam’s eyes widened. “No way.”
“They bought the whole batch and want more.”
Liam’s grin was almost as big as Sam’s own. “I was wondering when you’d finally get off the pot and actually do something with all of this delicious juice.”
Sam’s smile dropped a fraction, knowing he owed it to Liam, to Riley, and to himself to admit why he’d finally taken this step.
But first he wanted to get a drink into his friend. Liam’s right hook was bound to be a little less potent after a whisky or two.
The bartender poured Liam a couple of fingers from the tasting bottle Sam had brought in, and the two men clinked glasses. “To ROON,” Liam said. “And to a damn good guy finally getting what he deserves.”
The supportive toast knocked Sam a little off balance. Was this what he deserved? Even after Payton’s Place made the offer, a part of him had still wanted to believe it was more of a lucky break than a hard-earned reward.
Just like
Riley had been more of a perfect fantasy he’d had to release before he broke it.
But what if he was wrong about that too?
It was time. “Hey, I need to talk to you about something,” Sam said, taking a sip of his drink and cupping it between his hands as he stared at the bar.
“ ’kay, but hold on. I’ve got a question for you first,” Liam said as he rummaged in his briefcase.
Sam nearly choked when he saw the magazine Liam pulled out.
Shit. Shit.
The very thing he’d spent the past week and a half trying to avoid, and the weeks before that trying not to think about, was now a foot away from him. For one childish moment, he actually contemplated batting it out of Liam’s hands so he wouldn’t have to see so much as a headline on the latest Stiletto issue.
He’d known Riley would write about him—about them. She’d threatened as much when she walked out that day, and he’d known he didn’t deserve to ask otherwise.
But he wasn’t brave enough to read it yet. Hell, he still remembered walking in on the weepy McKenna women when they’d read one of Julie’s article from the year before—the one where she’d put her heart on the line for Mitchell. Sam knew Julie only a fraction as well as he knew Riley, and even that had clawed at his heart.
This one would rip him apart.
“Put that away,” Sam said, trying to keep his tone joking. “You worried about how to combat winter weather’s effects on your delicate skin?”
Maybe Liam wouldn’t notice that Sam was about to rip the magazine out of his hands and either burn it or devour it.
“You read this?” Liam asked.
“Nope.” Was it his imagination, or was Liam studying him more closely than usual?
“Well, you probably haven’t heard about it, since you haven’t been to a family dinner in weeks, and you missed Thanksgiving, for God’s sake. Mom couldn’t even make it to pumpkin pie before she started crying over your absence.”
Dagger. Meet heart.
Liam continued. “But it’s the magazine’s fiftieth-anniversary issue, and all the writers had to do this personal behind-the-scenes type of story.”
Oh, I know about it all right. In fact, your baby sister propositioned me to sex her up so she would have something to write about.
“And?”
“Well, Riley’s article was … weird. Alarming, even. But what’s even weirder is that when I brought it up to my family, they all pretended it wasn’t weird. They’re hiding something from me.”
Sam’s palms began to sweat. So she’d told the rest of her family. It would explain the voice mails from Erin. And Josh.
And Meg.
