Total pages in book: 154
Estimated words: 148473 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 742(@200wpm)___ 594(@250wpm)___ 495(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 148473 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 742(@200wpm)___ 594(@250wpm)___ 495(@300wpm)
Also true.
Eleanor gasps, her eyes shining a little. Spencer smiles at his wife, clearly touched by her reaction.
Luckily, I can share the real story without giving away the private details. “She was caring and thoughtful, and she helped a lot of people with her openness,” I say, looking at her.
Maeve smiles at me, her eyes soft. “So did you.”
Eleanor reaches for her husband’s hand. “That’s lovely.” She pauses, then asks me, “Did you know then that you simply had to marry her?”
Did I? When she walked into that meeting ten years ago, I saw something special in her hazel eyes. They were sad, deeply so. But also hopeful. She knew she needed people. She knew she needed to talk and found what she needed. And I suppose I did too. We bonded over late nights snacking and watching comedies. Anything to escape the ache—me for Nora, who’d died before we could even try to be just friends, and Maeve for a life without her parents. We started visiting dive bars and diners, conducting hot sauce tests on burgers—veggie burgers for her—and we parlayed that into a decade of big adventures.
“I was impressed with her ability to handle hot sauce,” I say dryly.
Maeve gives me a look, shaking her head. “No, you were jealous that I can take it hotter than you can.”
“You’re so mean, Mrs. Callahan,” I tease the woman next to me.
She bobs a defiant shoulder. “It’s just the truth.”
Looking at the Greers, I point my thumb to Maeve. “She never lets me live it down. Fair, I suppose, since her heat tolerance is ghost pepper-level.”
Maeve stage-whispers, “He’s still in the green pepper stage.”
Spencer tosses his head back, chuckling, then deadpans, “No shame in that, Asher. At least you’re decent on the ice.”
“I won’t quit the day job, then,” I say, laughing.
“You’d better not,” he says sternly.
Eleanor presses for more romance. “So you bonded over hot sauce, and then you knew it was meant to be?”
Spencer tuts, squeezing his wife’s hand. “Darling, I’m sure it took them time to figure it out.”
Time. So much time. Was it wasted, though? Did I squander all those years when I could have been…what? Romancing my best friend? I dismiss the thought as pointless. Something in me is broken and has been for just over a decade. I wasn’t even in love with Nora when she died, so it’s not like I’m hung up on my first love. But losing her—someone I had loved, someone I wanted to keep as a friend…It’s the kind of moment that changes a person. You realize all the ways that real love, in all its shapes and forms, can go wrong. But Maeve and I aren’t doing this romance for real. So I give Eleanor the rom-com vibe she’s after. “Well, the funny thing is,” I confess, “we made a marriage pact two years ago.” It’s another bit of edited truth, and it fits with our public story. “I suppose that’s when I knew it was meant to be.”
“Ah, I love it. A pact,” Eleanor coos.
I picture Maeve and me at Beckett’s wedding the night we made the pact. The night I first noticed Maeve’s glossy raspberry-colored lips and discovered how perfectly she fit in my arms. The moment I came face-to-face with how hungry I was to kiss her.
“Yeah, I knew it then,” I confirm, my words thick with the memory, heat rushing through me.
Maeve’s smile fades as she stares at me, lips parted, eyes wide like she’s never seen me before. Or, rather, this side of me. “You did? Back then?” she asks, like it’s just the two of us here.
In for a penny, in for a pound. I shrug, owning it. “I did.”
She’s quiet for a beat, her brow furrowing at the unexpected revelation. Well, it was certainly unexpected to me. But Maeve recovers with an easy smile, picking up the story and sending it toward the goal. “I thought he was joking about the pact,” she tells the Greers with a chuckle.
“But why?” Eleanor’s eyes sharpen, her nose twitching like a Bloodhound as she gestures to Maeve’s hand. “He gave you that ring. Clearly, he wasn’t joking.”
Oh, dammit. No wonder Eleanor’s dog is named after the famous English sleuth. Why didn’t I think about the inconsistency in the ring timeline with a marriage pact? Is Eleanor trying to deduce why, if Maeve and I were engaged before Vegas, is she wearing that big, shiny gem for the first time today? Because pics will prove this ring is new. I’m convinced the words Sham Marriage flash in ruby-red neon over our heads.
But Maeve serenely raises her hand, admiring the ruby, seeming even a little transfixed by it. “The ring is only new. But I suppose it was meant to be too. I was looking at this ring months ago in my favorite jewelry shop. It’s my color—red. And when we returned from Vegas, Asher surprised me with it. It still hardly feels real.”