Shine Not Burn(63)

I nearly choked on my outrage. “Hey! That’s out of line! Even for you, Candice.”

“Hey! I’m just giving you the tough love you’ve needed for years. Now listen up, because I know my time is about to be cut off. This is hard shit to listen to, but you need to hear it. You have terrible taste in men because you’re always trying to get them to fit into a box. You fall in love with potential instead of reality. You are attracted to characteristics on paper instead of the real man underneath. Stop putting men into categories. Stop making checklists and measuring men up next to them! Luke was a puke and Bradley is a turd sandwich. He doesn’t care about you; he cares about what his friends think about you. He’s obnoxious, and one day he’ll be kicked out of the Bar because I’ll bet he cheats. I’ll bet he cuts corners! You’re too good for him and all those other buttheads you’ve gone out with. But maybe not this cowboy. Maybe this guy is the real deal.” She finished in a softer voice. “He sure seemed nice when I met him.”

I’d begun crying halfway through her speech and now I just sat there, numb. The pain was terrible, not so much because the words had come from the mouth of someone I cared about, but because they were all true. I knew they were true, but I also knew I wasn’t strong enough to do anything about it but ignore them.

“Thanks for the call, Candice. I have to go now.”

“Oh, no you don’t! No way am I going to live with another friendship dry spell! Talk to me. Tell me what you’re thinking right this second!”

“I’m thinking that I have to go.”

“No. I don’t accept that. Try again.”

I let out a long, shaky sigh. “I don’t know what you want from me, Candice.”

“Honesty. Tell me right now, in all honesty, how you feel about the cowboy. What’s his name, by the way?”

“His name is Mack. And how I feel about him? I don’t know. It’s confusing.”

“Give me a bullet list. You like lists.”

“Shut up.”

“No, I’m serious. Bullet list. Go.”

“Fine. You want a bullet list? Here it is: Sexy. Handsome. Smart. Sexy. Magnetizing. Compelling. Muscles. Good family. Confident. Polite. Sexy.”

“I’m getting the impression that there’s some chemistry going on over there.” I could tell she was smiling by the tone of her voice.

I took another shaky breath, afraid to admit what I’d done but knowing it was relevant. I really wanted to confess my sins to Father Candice.

“Tell me what you’re not telling me,” she insisted.

“You’re a mind reader now, too?”

“Yes. I always have been. Did you sleep with him?”

“In Vegas? Yes.”

“No, dummy, in Oregon. Don’t play games with me. I have a color and cut in ten minutes.”

“Go ahead and go. I have to call Bradley. He’s left me a ton of messages.”

“I can get on a plane and be out there in less than six hours.” She was threatening me.

“No. Stay put. I already have enough trouble juggling what’s here. I don’t need to add you to the mix.”

“Then tell me. You had sex again, didn’t you?”

“Promise you won’t squee in the phone again.”

“Squeeee!! You totally did it, you big fat ho!” She was laughing out loud, probably in the middle of her salon.

“Yes. Last night. It was amazingly erotic and the wrong thing to do and … shit, Candice! I don’t know what the hell I’m doing!” I felt and sounded like I was on the edge of sanity.

“Of course you do! You’re going with your heart and your vagina instead of your head for a change! Good for you! It’s about time. Damn, when we were in Vegas I thought you’d finally figured it out. But then we got back and you put your head right back up into your butt. Ruby and Kelly and I thought you were a goner. But now you’re back, baby, you’re back! Don’t quit on us now. There’s too much riding on this.”

“Too much of what?” I was smiling through my tears. Candice had such a way with words.

“Too much happiness, sweetie. I think this cowboy could make you happy. Why don’t you give him a chance?”

“I can’t,” I whispered, looking up at the pictures on Ian’s shelves.

“Why not?” Candice sounded like she was going to cry right along with me.

“Because I think he has a girlfriend. I think she’s his roommate.”

“Well,” Candice said, sparking up again, “then she’s gotta go. You got there first, you’re his wife.”

“It’s not that simple.”

“Sure it is. If he had a girlfriend who meant anything would he have slept with you last night?”

“Maybe not. Or maybe he slept with me to teach me a lesson.”

“A lesson? A lesson about what?”

“I don’t know. He seemed mad at me from the moment he saw me.”

“Did he remember you were married?”

“Yes, I think so.”

“But he was mad at you, even though he took off and never called.”

“Yes.”

“Hmmmm… Well, how come you never called him? Weren’t you even curious why he disappeared?”