“You and me both. It was almost one by the time we finished.”
Terri’s eyes widened. “Wow, the conversation must have been good.”
“It was. Like I said, he’s great, so easy to talk to, and we just didn’t realize the time.”
“Because you were so busy…talking.”
Despite herself, Rachel colored a little.
“Oh my goodness, you’re blushing!”
“I am not.”
“You are. What the hell happened last night? What did Greene say to you?”
Rachel shook her head, mortified. “Nothing. It was just a nice night. Hell, Terri, I barely know the guy. Besides, in case you’ve forgotten, I’m engaged to Gary.”
“Who didn’t seem to know you were meeting another guy for dinner.”
“Honestly, it wasn’t like that.”
“Hey, it’s okay. Don’t be so hard on yourself. Ethan seems lovely, and I’m glad you had a good time. And for what it’s worth, I didn’t say anything to Gary about it either,” Terri added meaningfully.
Why was she sounding almost like a coconspirator? Because there was no cover-up or conspiracy. Ethan was a nice guy, but he was attached, as was she. They’d been thrown together by circumstance, and she owed him a debt of gratitude for saving Gary’s life in New York.
Last night, they’d had fun, exchanged life stories, and enjoyed one another’s company, but that was all there was to it.
End of story.
Chapter 36
Terri felt like a cat on a hot tin roof. She couldn’t believe that this morning, far from crying into her coffee about Gary’s deceit, Rachel had actually had a lovely night with Ethan Greene.
She had to smile at the irony, and while of course, she hated the idea of her friend being embarrassed or humiliated, she took some pleasure in the fact that after a nice evening with Ethan, Rachel had the next morning found her errant fiancé passed out, drunk and drooling all over the place.
But what was Ethan up to? He obviously hadn’t told Rachel about the mix-up last night, because she was still wearing the ring this morning and evidently had no idea about anything untoward.
After all, he must have realized the mistake pretty soon after it occurred. Terri thought again about the frantic phone calls he’d been making and then his sudden appearance at the bistro yesterday.
Clearly he was here to get the ring back, so why hadn’t he?
Especially when the mistake had cost him a lot in more ways than one. According to Rachel, he’d planned a proposal, but of course that would have gone awry.
Poor guy. To think that he’d gone out of his way to help the likes of Gary and then gotten rightly shafted in the process.
She still couldn’t believe that Gary hadn’t copped to the cause of the mistake and had instead been going around thinking it was some random stroke of luck that he’d ended up with a diamond worth a small fortune.
So why hadn’t Ethan confessed all to Rachel? Terri could only imagine how anxious he must be to get it back. She thought again about the quietly contented expression on her friend’s face this morning. Could it be possible that the two of them had truly clicked last night at dinner, and as a result, he was afraid to hurt Rachel?
That had to be it. Perhaps Ethan couldn’t bring himself to tell her the truth just yet and bring her entire world crashing down. Terri had to admit she understood exactly how that felt.
***
“Have you heard from Dad today? What time is he coming home?” Daisy asked.
Vanessa’s eyebrows automatically shot together, but then she quickly smoothed her expression. After yesterday’s discussion, she didn’t want to come across as impatient, but she had to admit that she was actually way past that and now full-on agitated.
It was almost midday and Ethan hadn’t called since the day before.
