Flirting with the Frenemy (Bro Code #1)(36)

I spread my arms. “I’m free until my kid’s up.”

“How’d Ellie break it?”

“Maybe I did it.”

“Dude. If it was your kid, you would’ve just told Beck. If it was you, you would’ve just told Beck. If you’re calling me to fix it, it was Ellie. Man up and do something about it already.”

Easy for him to say.

He has a career—and a bank account—that mean he doesn’t move every one to four years unless he wants to. He doesn’t have an ex-wife and a son to take care of, and no idea what he’s going to do to support them if he has to leave the military next summer because of orders anywhere but Copper Valley. And he doesn’t have a clue how ill-prepared I feel to be a good partner to anyone, let alone my best friend’s sister.

Help her heal?

Yeah. I’m in.

Anything more than that?

I’m not the man for the job.





Fourteen





Ellie



“Oh my god, what happened?” A human-size tropical bird—I mean, Monica rushes to join me outside The Muted Parrot, Shipwreck’s bright, cheerful coffee shop, four hours after Davis made his unexpected appearance Wednesday morning.

“One of Beck’s friends showed up in the middle of the night,” I tell her. “I didn’t get much sleep.”

“Because he gave you two black eyes?”

“Oh! Oh. That. No, that was me walking into a cabinet door.”

“You had sex with Wyatt!” Monica whisper-shrieks like I didn’t just give her a perfectly reasonable explanation that had nothing to do with having sex with Wyatt. She claps her hands, and her fake red, yellow, and blue feathers all flap up and down with her as she bounces. “I knew it. I knew you weren’t fake-dating him just to make Patrick quit acting all superior.”

Oh, shit, I’m totally transparent.

“Of course I’m not,” I whisper back. “I sneezed right as I hit the big O and we knocked heads and I can never have sex with him again.”

She looks around.

I do the same.

Because I really, really shouldn’t have said that.

However…it will be a great reason to break up with Wyatt at the end of the week. No blame. Just the simple truth that it’s dangerous for us to be together.

There’s no sign of Patrick anywhere—yes, I continue to worry he’ll realize I’m a loser who’s still not dating—which probably means he’s on a work call. I wonder if Sloane’s bored out of her mind, or if she’s taken to mindlessly playing Treasure Hunter on her phone like I used to when I was waiting on Patrick to end one of his important work calls so we could go somewhere.

Some days I get really pissed at myself for not seeing the signs sooner that he didn’t check the box for good husband material, even if his resume did. I like to think he changed while we were dating, that he wasn’t always a workaholic tool, but what does that say about my influence and our relationship?

You drive men to work too hard so they can avoid you.

Lovely.

Monica pulls me into the coffee shop. She lifts two fingers for the barista, who doesn’t bat an eye at getting a sign language order from a parrot, and she points at the back table, then drags me around the seashell-themed room until we’re in the sun room at the rear of the restaurant.

Cautiously, it should be noted, but she’s still dragging me over.

We have to look crazy, even in Shipwreck. Me in a knee-length denim skirt and a different Jolly Roger T-shirt from yesterday, as requested, and her dressed like a five-and-a-half-foot-tall parrot. I’m pretty sure the costume is just to annoy Jason’s parents, but not completely sure.

I’m also impressed that she went through with it. I thought she was kidding when she showed me the costume online.

“Do we all get parrot costumes?” I ask as she pulls out a seat and points a wing, gesturing me to sit.

“No, I got you a monkey costume. Explain to me exactly why you think you can’t have sex with Wyatt.”

“We’ll both end up dead.”

She makes a go on gesture, like being dead isn’t reason enough to not have sex. It also makes her beak flop around her head, and her brightly-colored feathers all dance with the motion.

I lean in close and lower my voice. “The first time we had sex, I had my car accident. We…messed around a little two nights ago”—yes, yes, it was just a kiss, but I’m warming up to this story—“and Beck’s Frogger game died mere hours later. We were in the middle of you know last night, and I sneezed and gave us both black eyes. We are not supposed to have sex. I can take a hint from the universe.”

“Wait. You said this happened mid-orgasm? Like, you got off, so the sex couldn’t have been bad.”

Bad? It was so far the opposite of bad that I don’t have a word for it.

And that was just his fingers.

I might burst into flames if we ever went farther.

“Ellie! You’re seeing someone? That’s fantastic.” Libby Rock, the middle-aged proprietress of The Muted Parrot, tucks her pirate wench skirts under her and pulls up a chair after setting a plate of scones on our table. “Who is it? Is it that handsome single dad from your lunch yesterday?”