“No you don’t.”
“I really, really do.”
“And yet here we are.” She gestured at the wine bar. “You hosting book club, me providing moral support, both of us pretending you’re not having a crisis over a stranger.”
“I’m not having a crisis.”
“You alphabetized your spice rack on Tuesday and sent pictures like a proud mother hen. You don’t even cook.”
She had a point.
“I might start cooking.”
“Riley, you burned water last month. You somehow burned water.”
“The pot was defective.”
“The pot was fine. You forgot it was on the stove for three hours because you were writing a sex scene.”
“In my defense, it was a really good sex scene.”
“I’m sure it was. The pot is still dead.”
I didn’t have a response to that, so I just poured myself a glass of wine and pretended Sloane didn’t exist.
Jade arrived next, carrying enough chocolate to put everyone into a sugar coma. She had little bags of truffles and a box of fancy chocolates from that place downtown that charged eight dollars for four pieces.
“I went overboard,” she announced cheerfully. “But it’s been a week, and I decided we all deserved it.”
“Bless you,” I said, grabbing a truffle immediately.
Margo followed with vodka and the weary expression of someone who spent all day dealing with people’s worst decisions.
“Long day?” Sloane asked.
“A man tried to argue that his affair wasn’t cheating because it happened in a different time zone. I swear to god, I have no idea how people come up with this shit.” Margo set the bottles down with more force than necessary. “His exact words were ‘it was three AM there, so technically it was still yesterday.’ I need alcohol and fictional men who are terrible in entertaining ways, not pathetic ones.”
“That’s - That’s not how time zones work,” Jade said.
“That’s not howanythingworks. But try explaining that to a man who thinks geography is a loophole for infidelity.”
“Ready to discuss fictional murder as a love language?” I asked.
“Born ready,” she said.
The other members trickled in over the next twenty minutes. There were about twelve regulars, though attendance varied week to week. Tonight we had eight, which was perfect. Enough for lively debate, not so many that things got chaotic.
Patricia and Ellen arrived together, the retired librarians who had the filthiest opinions about book boyfriends and zero shame about sharing them. Marcus came in solo, the only man brave enough to attend regularly, clutching his copy of the bookwith several Post-it flags already marking pages. Then came the twins, Destiny and Diana, who always disagreed about everything and turned every discussion into a spirited argument.
We settled in with wine and snacks, the familiar ritual of it settling my nerves. Doris came out with a fresh cheese board, winked at me, and retreated for the day, leaving the keys with me. This was my space. My people. Whatever weird thing happened at the bookstore, it didn’t touch this.
I was just opening my copy of the book, prepared to lead the discussion, when the door to the wine bar opened.
I looked up, expecting a latecomer or maybe Doris with more wine. My brain short-circuited at what I saw.
Caelan the Australian was standing in the doorway, and I forgot how to breathe.
He was wearing dark jeans and a sweater, and he looked like he walked off the cover of one of my books. His blonde hair was slightly disheveled, his gray eyes scanned the room, landed on me, and stayed there.
