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A choking sound that had my gaze whipping toward Bailey, who was being weird. My brows dragged together, and I widened my eyes, mentally asking her,What the fuck?
It was great Dessie was here.
She’d been nearly as busy as I was with rebuilding Monroe’s and getting the business back on track again. In fact, since Roger (the owner) had opted to step back from those decisions, choosing instead to be a silent partner, Dessie was going to be the name and face of the new Monroe’s.
And she was killing it.
But she’d been working crazy hours to get there.
None of which made any since as to why was Bailey being so fucking weird about the Three Musketeers getting together for a long overdue visit.
There.
Done.
Mission accomplished. We were at her place, ready for wine and snacks.
“Hey bitches!” Dessie called, striding into the room, moving to Bailey, and hugging her tight. Then to me. Huggingmetight.
Something I sank in to.
Until I saw what was happening behind her shoulder.
Until I saw that the front door hadn’t closed…because Axel was talking to someone else outside it.
Someone who was walking up the concrete path, up the stairs, up—
Ah,Christ.
I understood why Bailey was acting so weird.
Because…Axel stepped back, tugged the door wide, and Joel strolled right into the house.
“See?” I said as we walked out of the room, having just barely made it out—mostly because the wine had worn off with about fifteen minutes left on the timer. “You sototallyneeded kick-ass-and-take-no-names-Billie Rose.”
Bailey wrinkled her nose.
“Admit it,” I pressed.
That nose wrinkled further, and damn, my niece was cute.
She was also stubborn.
Just like Dessie, who shook her head, ordered, “Donotadmit that, Bailey. She’ll be insufferable for the rest of the day if you do. And we still have dinner to get through.”
Get throughwas right.
I’d been conducting extreme evasive maneuvers, making certain I’d never gotten too close to Joel.
To the man who’d held me and given me washi tape and—
Nope.
Not going there.
I shrugged, focused on my friends instead of the men who were walking ahead of us out of the room—acting likethey’dbeen the ones who put the pieces of the puzzles together,hmph—and grinned at Bailey. “She’s right. Iwillbe insufferable.”
Dessie snorted.
