I can’t help but laugh at his dazed expression. “What are you dressed up for?” He’s wearing shorts and a nice shirt rather than his usual athletic shorts or swim trunks.
“Val’s daughter is visiting, so I’m meeting her for breakfast. Wanna come?”
Val’s daughter?My stomach sinks. He made plans without discussing them with me first? Wait. I force myself to take a deep breath. Why do I care? It’s not like he owes me a play-by-play.
“Uh, no. That’s fine. You, um,enjoy.” The word tastes sour on my tongue. “I had plans to head down to the beach, actually.”
“I’ll text you when I get back. If you’re still there, I’ll join you, yeah?”
With a noncommittal sound and a weak smile, I scurry intothe bedroom to change, and when the door at the bottom of the stairs closes, I let out a strangled scream.
At the beach, I spend a solid hour stewing, and eventually, I FaceTime Joey to pass the time.
“Hey, babe,” she cries when she accepts the request. “How are you?”
I swallow back my frustration. “I’m fine. What are you doing? Can you talk?”
“Yup. We’re in Catalina.” She flips the screen, and Cam waves from a doorway, wearing a bathrobe.
“Hi, Cameron,” I sing, but the screen is already back on my cousin.
“What’s up?” she asks. “Are you on the beach? Is Ezra with you?”
“No. Just me. He’s, uh, with Val’s daughter?” My voice goes up at the end, though I don’t mean for it to. “They went for breakfast or something.”
Joey frowns. “Why do you seem bothered by that?”
Shoulders pulled back, I lift my chin. “I’m not bothered.”
Joey’s infamous brows challenge me.
“Fine. I’m alittlebothered,” I admit. “But…”
“But you don’t know why?” She words it as a question, but she goes on before I can answer. “It’s because someone’s caught feelings for their fake husband.”
“Fifty bucks,” Cam shouts in the background.
“What’s that about?” I tilt my head, as if doing so will allow me to peer around her and eye her fiancé.
“Oh nothing,” she says with a wave of her hand. “Just that Cam bet you’d fall for Ezra before the trip was over.”
“It’s the Bearded Effect,” he calls out.
“Anyway,” Joey continues. “What’s wrong with falling for him? I can’t believe he’s adopting Kane.”
“That’s the hope. As for what the issue is here, the guy is theepitome of a family man, and I never really envisioned that for myself.”
She cocks her head to one side. “What happened to the Millie who planned her entire wedding on a PowerPoint instead of studying for her bat mitzvah?”
I laugh. She’s got me there, but… “I always planned to marry a woman.”
“So? You also made the DJ play ‘The Thong Song’ three times in a row. You’ve evolved since then. Just because your version of playing house involved two wives, that doesn’t mean you can’t marry a man someday. Love is love. Aren’t you always getting fired up about people giving bi babes a hard time?”
“First of all, no one said anything about love. Second, yeah, you’re right.” There are a ridiculous number of people out there who don’t understand that bisexuals aren’t “switching” between straight and gay.
“What do you want?”
“She wants that pierced dick.”
