Page 74 of Vegas with my Ex’s Best Friends

I keep doing that. Noticing things and filing them away.

It's going to be a problem if I don't stop.

I have a Thursday standing dinner in LA I’ve moved every week since we got here. A message from a colleague I keep meaning to return. I haven’t rescheduled any of it. I’m starting to think I won’t.

“Can I say something,” Andrew says.

“You're going to anyway,” Liam says.

“I don't want us to run this like a business problem.” He looks at both of us. “I know how Ethan thinks. And I know it works. But she needs to know where she stands. Not just from me. From all three of us, together. She's got three separate conversations and her own head filling in the gaps between them.”

He's not wrong.

Riley Monroe does not do well with incomplete information. I've watched her operate for weeks. Give her a gap and she fills it with the worst available option every time. I've seen her talk herself out of something good in real time without noticing.

“We tell her together,” I say. “After the dinner.”

Because she deserves to hear it once, not three different ways.

“Ethan—”

“Two days. We get through the Harrington table, and then we sit down with her. All three of us. No more separate conversations.”

Liam looks at Andrew. Something passes between them. Then Liam nods.

“Two days,” he says.

My phone buzzes.

I pick it up. Read it. Read it again because the first pass didn't sit right.

Connor: Hey. Hope all is well. Back in Vegas in two weeks. Looking forward to seeing everyone.

I set the phone on the table between us.

Both of them lean forward.

“Two weeks,” Andrew says.

“Two weeks.”

Two weeks to build something strong enough not to break when Connor walks through the door.

Liam sits back. His hand goes to the back of his neck. He's running the same numbers I am. Investor dinner in two days. The conversation with Riley after. Paternity results pending. The situation still unfolding.

And Connor landing at the end of all of it with no idea what he's walking into.

“We're not ready,” Andrew says.

“We don't get to decide that.”

Liam's eyes move to mine. He's already shifted. I've seen it happen before—the moment a manageable situation becomes the real version of itself. He gets quieter. More focused. The part of him that trained for this while on two tours and knows how to hold ground when everything else is moving.

“Okay,” he says.

Just that.

Andrew picks up his coffee. Sets it back down without drinking.