I pull the blanket on my back over my head. “I hate all of you.”
“Nisha, hon,” Piper tries again. “Look, you know we’re your ride-or-dies. Sarina and I literally cut off all ties with Patton when you guys split. And we’d do it all over again if we had to. But that doesn’t mean we didn’t love the kid we grew up with and the man he became.”
“But we also hated how heartbroken you were when you left him,” Sarina adds, as if finishing Piper’s thoughts. “We knew that if we stayed in contact with him while you were trying to get over him, it would hurt you. But what happened between you two wasn’t any one person’s fault; it was just terrible circumstances.”
My throat constricts, and I want to tell her I know that. I know it wasn’t any one person’s fault, and I know they cut Patton off because of me. He was like a protective and sweet brother to them.
And, God, I feel shitty about that. So fucking shitty.
Because even though I never made them choose explicitly, I knew they were doing it, anyway. For me.
I never thought about what the loss of their friendship might have felt like for him. How alone and abandoned he might have felt.
Especially when feeling alone and abandoned was something he never wanted to feel again. But I did that to him . . .
“Patton was always a good guy,” my sister continues. “A good friend, a good brother-in-law, son-in-law?—”
I pull the blanket off my head, making the girls gasp when they see the tears streaking my cheeks. “But he wasn’t a good husband . . . not when it counted.”
Piper and Sarina make their way out of the hot tub first before the rest of the girls follow. And soon they’ve surrounded me, nudging my masseuse out of the circle.
I’m sure she’s awkwardly standing in the corner, wondering if she should have called in sick today.
Sarina lowers herself, cupping my cheeks before wiping my tears with her thumbs. “Which is why you left him. But, babe, you’re the only one in denial here. Because it’s clear there is still something between you two. Something he wants to explore again.”
“He’s trying his damndest to get his wife back, Nish,” Kavi adds. “I think what we all see is a man who is putting in the work?—”
“Until his next movie. Until he’s stuck on some fucking mountain with no connection to the real world and no clue that I need him.” I sniffle, my voice hoarse.
“Maybe,” Piper says, tucking a strand of my hair behind my ear. “But maybe not. Do you think he’d be back, immersing himself in your life like this if all he wanted was to show you more of the same?”
I swallow. “I don’t know what I think anymore.”
“You know what helps to reboot your brain sometimes?” Piper asks, a renewed gleam in her eyes suggesting it’s time to get us all out of this funk. It’s my sister’s day, after all.
“What?” I ask, looking between them, knowing I’m going to regret the answer. Nonetheless, a smile still creeps up on my face, replacing the heartache and confusion there.
Piper saunters away toward a table near the sauna, coming back with a tray. And just like the night at her house with the green tea shots, when we toasted to “the tea” I spilled about meand Patton, there are seven shot glasses lined up with coffee-colored liquid.
“Oh, God. Not again,” I groan.
“The Brain Eraser,” Piper announces, handing us each a glass. “Because sometimes you just need to erase the past and start over. Down the hatch, ladies!”
The converted barn is more stunning than I could have imagined. There are string lights draped over exposed beams, high-top tables adorned with flickering candles lining the dance floor, and a stunning bar that’s clearly stocked for a serious celebration.
Everywhere I look, faces both familiar and unfamiliar are laughing and chatting, celebrating the most important couple of the night—Sarina and Troy.
What I didn’t expect was the discreet security positioned around the perimeter of the barn and scattered around the ranch. They’re a little reminder that tonight’s guests include a Hollywood A-lister, a well-known billionaire, and many high-profile ballplayers.
“Wow,” I yell over the R&B music playing on the speakers to Kavi. “You and Hudson don’t half-ass anything.”
She giggles, lifting her glass to clink with mine, swaying before she winks at her husband seated at the bar next to Dev, Troy, and?—
Ugh. The man I can’t seem to avoid, outrun, or exorcise, no matter how much sage I’ve burned.
With dark denims hugging his long, muscular thighs, a white V-neck shirt showing off a thick neck I’ve french kissed like soft-serve ice cream in the summer sun, and a light-grayVersace blazer I remember gifting him on our second wedding anniversary, he’s laughing at something Troy has said.
And though I can’t hear the timbre of that laugh, I feel it all the way down to my toes. Just like I feel his gaze when his head turns and our eyes collide.
