I’d clocked her across the room as soon as I walked in, and nearly forgot my own name. She’s the kind of gorgeous that sneaks up on you and kicks you in the gut. Low-key and lethal. Copper hair, flushed cheeks, a beautiful mouth.
Fuck.
Lulu leans toward Tamara, keeping her voice low. “Okay, what the hell was that?”
“She’s spiraling,” Tamara whispers back. “She was obviously really into that guy she met online, and he ghosted her. She’ll be in the laundry bathroom regretting her life choices.”
The words hit like a bullet, and everything inside me burns. Because I’m the ghost. I’m the Pinot Noir–baptized fuckingghost.
“Hey,” Logan says beside me, squinting. “You good?”
No.
“I’m fine.”
“You look like you just solved a crime in your head.”
“I said I’m fine,” I repeat, grabbing my glass of water and draining it in one go.
Leah reappears with towels. “Mason, honey, the guest bathroom is down the hall if you want to clean up a bit.”
“Thanks. I’ll—yeah.”
I step out of the room, pretending to head down to the guest bathroom, but I don’t go there. I go to the other one. The one off the laundry.
As I walk quietly, I try to figure out what the fuck I’m going to say, but just as I reach the door, I hear her voice.
Slightly shrill. Definitely panicked.
“…I pouredred wineon hisdick, Ana.His dick.”
I freeze outside the door. The voices are muffled, but still very audible.
“You should’ve seen the look on his face. He was staring at me like a science experiment.”
“Oh my god,” says a second voice, tinny through the speaker—Ana, I guess. “Okay, but like, is he hot?”
“Ana!”
“No, but genuinely! Hot enough to push through the humiliation and still climb him like a tree?”
Frankie groans. “He’s so hot it’soffensive.I saw his hands and my brain stopped working. He has a slutty firefighter mustache and good manners. I cannot be around this man.”
A third voice chimes in—definitely a guy. “Sounds like you’re halfway in love already. Marry him, or at the very least make sure you have a festive orgasm.”
I like this guy.
My lips twitch, but it doesn’t last. I can’t stand out here all afternoon stroking my own ego, I need to make this right.
So I knock, and silence instantly follows.
Then a murmur through the door. “Bathroom’s occupied.”
I knock again. “It’s me.”
Another pause. “Whichme?”
“…Mason.”
