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“To be a playboy.”
“Yeah,” I replied, “that.”
Because there was no way I was ever going through this again. No way would I ever allow myself to feel this way.
To hurt this badly.
To want something—and someone—I couldn’t have.
I would never give my heart to another woman.
Ever again.
Cooper chuckled, like he actually found my reply funny. “I’m not Brady. That’s not even close to what I’m going to say.” He adjusted his cuff links, his arms returning to the top of the chair. “Instead, I’m going to give you the best piece of advice anyone will ever give you.”
“Sure you are.”
His brows rose. “You don’t believe me?”
“You’re only two years older than I am, Cooper. What the hell do you know about life and women at this point?”
“More than you.”
I downed the rest of beer number seven, added the empty to the pack, and took out number eight, missing the trash can when I tossed the cap in its direction.
Maybe I was starting to feel buzzed.
“I can’t wait to hear this,” I groaned.
“There are women who will come into your life who are there just to have fun. Like some of the dudes you go to college with—they’re a blast when it comes to partying, but after you graduate, you won’t see or hear from them again.” He paused, like he was letting that sink in. “Then, there are women who will come into your line of vision, and the moment you see them, they’ll blow your fucking mind. You’ll do anything to be near them. Talk to them. Hear their voice.” He closed his eyes and shook his head. “Smell their skin.” When he opened his eyelids again, he added, “Those are the women who will completely change your life.”
Like Marley?
Fuck that.
I hissed out all the air I’d been holding in. “I don’t believe it. That shit doesn’t exist—at least not anymore.”
“All right, we’ll see about that. But when a woman has the power to make your grumpy ass smile—and I’m talking really smile, where it starts in your stomach and goes up your chest and you feel it deep in your bones—you’ll know she’s the one.”
I chugged half of my beer, not bothering to wipe my lips. “Bullshit.”
He smiled in a way I hadn’t seen before. “Just you wait and see, brother.”
ONE
Macon
“How do I bring all of you to the best strip club on Kauai and not one of you”—I circled the air around the Daltons (Dominick, Jenner, and Ford—a group of three brothers), along with their cousin Camden and their best friend, Declan Shaw—“motherfuckers get a lap dance?” I shouted across the party bus that we’d rented for the night.
I already knew the answer to my question.
They were wifey’d up and didn’t want a woman on top of them who wasn’t their girl. Lawyers from LA, they were now part of our family, professionally and personally. Although my introduction to them went all the way back to high school when I’d played soccer with Camden. That wild kid had been my best bud ever since. But Walter had known the Dalton family for much longer and had been using their law firm since he and my father had built their first hotel.
Now, the Spade and Dalton families were merging. Jenner was marrying Jo—Walter’s daughter, my cousin.
And this weekend, their whole crew, along with my brothers, had flown to Hawaii—where I’d been living for the last month—to celebrate Jenner’s bachelor party. Since our hotel was still under construction, I’d been staying in a suite at our biggest competitor—a resort a few miles from where we were building. Some of the guys were crashing with me; some were in the suite next door to mine. Not because of the money—this group’s combined income was in the billions—but because we all wanted to be together.
It felt like college all over again.
