“Sure thing.I’ll get you ladies some cowboy nachos and sliders unless you want something else?”Larry eyes the three of us, waiting for one of us to add to the order.We’ve been coming here for years.He knows what we like.
Emily just smiles.“That should hit the spot, right, ladies?”
I nod along.Her family owns theBucking Bronco Bar & Grill.Emily is, technically, Larry’s boss.The cowboy themed bar looks like Doc Holliday might come strolling through the door any minute.Cowboy hats, cowboy boots and metal wall decorations are wedged between lassoes, saddles and western themed art.Three, half-sized horse statues were made to look like they’re leaning up against the bar, waiting for a shot of whiskey.It’s rustic, charming and very popular with tourists.Something I’m not, but after today, might wish I was.The entire town was in that church.The whole damn town.
“Today was worse than the day I barfed on Josh Bennett’s shoes.”I still haven’t forgiven Mr.Hanson for making me run until I puked.It’s simply not possible to live down throwing up all over the shoes of the cutest boy in school when you’re sixteen and live in a small town.For years, they called me Cookie Tosser to make sure I never lived down the humiliating experience.
“That was an excellent day.Josh Bennett was, and still is, a tool.”Emily waves Larry back over to us.Guess we aren’t done drinking.I’m not unconscious yet, so I agree.
Hannah, my hopelessly romantic, bookish friend, places a warm arm around my waist and leans in for a side hug.“Don’t beat yourself up.He had us all fooled.”Her dark head rests on my satin covered shoulder and I drop my head to rest on top of hers.I do love my friends.Total lifesavers.
Emily snorts and rolls her eyes.“No, he didn’t.”
I sigh.“Don’t say it.I know.I should have listened to you.”Emily told me to dump Nicholas the first day she met him.If she’d been able to give me a tangible reason, I might have listened to her.I hate that she was right.As I generally give people the benefit of the doubt—a bad habit I need to consider breaking—I brushed off all the warning signs.That damn calculator she has for a brain sees things way before I do.“Maybe after this, I won’t be so stubborn.”
Hannah snorts.Emily just shakes her head.She’s right.Not possible.
I study Emily’s face and notice it seems like all the color leaked out.“Are you feeling all right?”
Emily grins and taps the side of her shot glass with one long, perfectly manicured fingernail.“Just need to eat.All I’ve had today is liquid.So, if we’re going to keep doing shots like this,” she holds up her second shot glass, full of top dollar, silver tequila, “then I need to get something in my stomach.So should you.”She toasts me before knocking the shot back.
“Maybe you’re pregnant.”Hannah blurts from my opposite side.
“Hannah!”My mouth drops open at her suggestion.Emily is such a control freak, if she ever decides to have a baby, she’ll preselect the kid’s birth date and time her sexual encounters accordingly.
Emily snorts.“If I am, y’all will be worshiping me and my Immaculate Conception.I haven’t had sex in a long time.My vag is probably filled with cobwebs.”
“Gross.”I did not need that visual.
Hannah mumbles around the piece of lime she’s sucking on—from the previous round of shots.“In your dreams.Even if you have a miracle baby, I’m still gonna kick your ass at trivia.No mercy.”
“You read too much,” Emily counters.
“Someone has to.”Hannah’s fingers wrap around the dark green rind but she freezes with the demolished fruit halfway between her mouth and the two platters Larry put down on top of the bar.“Holy shit, those guys are hot.”
What?What guys?
Nope.Not looking.
“Maddie.Seriously.You have to see these guys.”Hannah nudges me with her elbow.
“No.Woman, you’re crazy.I refuse to even think about hooking up with another man right now.”I just ran out of my own wedding!
“Why not?Nicholas David Cunningham the third, certainly did.”Emily’s bland comment reminds me that she never liked Nicholas.Never approved.She told me, too.She did her best friend’s duty and told me he wasn’t right for me, that she didn’t like him, that something was ‘off’.But he was so damn perfect, at least on paper, I refused to listen.I could teach a master class on denial.
“Yeah, well, I’m not Nick.”Looking back now, I knew something was off between me and Nicholas, especially when it came to sex.I just figured maybe I didn’t have enough experience to satisfy him in the bedroom.I thought time—and analyzing the love scenes in a few of Hannah’s favorite romance novels—would help me fix that part of things between us once we were married.Now I know the truth.Nothing short of me being a man would have helped.
Hannah chuckles, her dimples making me smile despite the shitty situation.“I think catching Nicholas today was destiny.I mean, you’re free now.And look at those guys!”
I groan.It’s too soon.I literally just got jilted—if finding out your future husband is just pretending to be into you to avoid telling the truth about his sexuality to his wealthy, homophobic parents, counts.
Yes, it fucking counts.I’m still in the damn dress.“No way, Hannah.I don’t care how hot they are, I’m not interested.I’m swearing off men for the foreseeable future.Who needs them anyway?It’s why battery-operated-boyfriends were invented.At least my B.O.B.doesn’t stop until the job is done.”
Hannah wiggles her brows.“Oh, I’m certain with what those guys are packing, they’re far superior to any B.O.B.”
Nope.Still not going to check them out.
“Wow.”Emily’s fingertips strum along the top of the bar with a distinctivetap-tap-tap-tap.Emily always looks like she just stepped off the pages of a fashion magazine and is about as out of place in the Bucking Bronco as a princess in a biker bar.“They’re smoking hot.I bet they really could outdo a B.O.B.”
