Sweet Little Lies Read online

  right about now.

  “Burgers and hot dogs!” a guy yelled walking through the courtyard. It was Jay. He owned the food truck that usually sat out front, but now he had a tray strapped on him and was making sales left and right like he was going up and down the rows at a baseball stadium. “I’ve got beef burgers and six inches of prime sausages here! Get ’em while they’re hot!”

  “Six inches would do me just right,” Mrs. Winslow said wistfully. “I wouldn’t know what to do with seven or eight.”

  Try nine, Pru thought and clapped a hand over her mouth to keep from saying it out loud.

  “Something you want to share with the class?” Haley asked.

  Most definitely not, but the vultures had the scent of roadkill and were circling.

  “Oh, she’ll talk,” Elle said, staring into Pru’s eyes. “She’ll talk over a loaded pie and a bottle of wine. Girls, let’s hit it.”

  And she walked off.

  “She’s so badass,” Willa whispered, staring after her. “I mean look at that dress. She’s badass, kickass, and she has a great ass. It’s really not fair.”

  “I can hear you,” Elle called out over her shoulder without looking back. She snapped her fingers. “Put it in gear.”

  And Pru, Haley, and Willa followed after her like puppies on a leash.

  Chapter 24

  #SuitUp

  Pru had no idea how Elle did it, but by the time they got to the street, there was an Uber ride waiting on them.

  “Lefty’s Pizza,” Elle said to the driver.

  “I thought you were on a diet,” Haley said, climbing into the car.

  “Some days you eat salads and go to the gym,” Elle said. “And some days you eat pizza and wear yoga pants. It’s called balance.”

  “I always eat pizza and wear yoga pants,” Willa said. She gasped. “Does that make me unbalanced?”

  “No, actually, it makes you smarter than me,” Elle said with a small smile.

  Willa sighed. “Or maybe I’ve just given up on men.”

  “That’s only because you dated a few frogs,” Elle said.

  “That’s an extremely nice way of saying that I’m a loser magnet. And I couldn’t get rid of that one frog either. I still owe Archer for stepping in and pretending to be my boyfriend so he’d back off.”

  “That’s not why he backed off,” Elle said. “He backed off because Archer threatened to castrate him if he contacted you again.”

  Willa gaped. “He did? I was wondering at how easy he made it look.”

  “And you can make it look easy too,” Elle told her. “Next time you want to lose a guy, just tell them ‘I love you, I want to marry you, and I want children right away.’ They’ll run so fast they’ll leave skid marks.”

  Willa snorted. “I’ll keep that in mind.”

  Thirty minutes later they were in a booth, one bottle of wine down, another ready to go, and a large pizza on its way to being demolished. Pru’s stomach hurt, but that hadn’t slowed her down any.

  Willa pulled a book from her purse. “Have either of you been to that new used bookstore down the street from our building?”

  “I download my books right to my phone,” Elle said. “That way I can read while pretending to listen in on meetings.”

  “Your boss doesn’t mind?” Pru asked.

  “My boss knows everything,” Elle said. “And one of the things he also knows is that me doing my thing allows him to do his thing.”

  Made sense.

  “Plus, I know where the bodies are hidden,” she said. Probably she was kidding.

  “Well, I like the feel of a book in my hand,” Willa said and looked at Pru.

  “I go both ways,” Pru said and then blushed when they all laughed. “You know what I mean.”

  “I do,” Willa said and handed her the book. “Which is why I bought this for you.”

  Pru eyed the title and choked on a bite of pizza. Willa had to pound her on the back while Pru sucked a bunch of wine down to try and appease her burning throat. No go. “Orgasms For One?” she finally managed.

  Willa nodded.

  “Um . . . thank you?”

  “I bought it after you told us that you hadn’t dated in a while but before I heard about the dumbwaiter, so . . .”

  Pru sighed. “So everyone knows about the dumbwaiter.”

  “Little bit,” Haley said. “What we don’t know are the deets.”

  Elle pointed at Pru. “You. Finn. Go.”

  “It’s . . . a long story.”

  “I love long stories,” Willa said.

  Elle just arched a brow. She didn’t like to be kept waiting.

  “Might as well start talking,” Haley told Pru. “She’ll get her way eventually, she always does. I’ve found it’s best to give in earlier than later. Besides, I’m tired.” She accompanied this statement with a wide yawn.

  Pru rubbed her aching stomach. She was starting to feel sick. “Maybe we should postpone this for another day. When I haven’t eaten my weight in pizza.”

  Elle didn’t break eye contact with her. She didn’t budge a muscle, not even to blink.

  Pru sighed. “Fine. Maybe something’s happened between me and Finn, but it’s not going to keep happening.”

  Willa grinned. “So you did sleep with him.”

  “Past tense,” Pru said, her gaze still held prisoner by Elle’s. “Even if I wish it wasn’t.” Dammit. “Where did you get this super power?” she demanded. “I need it.”

  Elle smiled. “I’d tell you but—”

  “—But she’d have to kill you,” Willa finished on a laugh. “Love it when you say that.”

  “Except you never let me say it,” Elle pointed out.

  Pru’s stomach turned over yet again and she put a hand on it. “I really don’t feel so good.”

  “Because you’re holding back on your new BFFs,” Willa said.

  “I like you for Finn,” Elle said to Pru. “He hasn’t chosen anyone in a long time. I’m glad it’s you.”

  “Oh, no. That’s the thing,” she said. “It’s not me. I mean, it was great. He was great. And when I was with him, I felt . . .” She closed her eyes, the memories washing over her. “Really great.” She could still hear his low, sexy voice in her ear telling her what he was going to do to her, and then his even sexier body doing it, taking hers to places it hadn’t been in so long she’d nearly forgotten what it was like to be in a man’s arms and lose herself.

  “So why is it over then?” Haley asked. “Do you realize how rare ‘really great’ is? I haven’t had ‘really great’ in so long I don’t even know if I’ll recognize it.”

  “You’ll recognize it,” Elle said, looking at Pru, waiting on her answer.

  But Pru didn’t answer. Couldn’t. Because she hated the reason why. “It’s . . . complicated.”

  “Honey,” Elle said with surprising vulnerability and wistfulness in her voice. “The best things always are.” She paused. “You’d be really good for him.”

  Elle wasn’t a woman to say such a thing unless she meant it so Pru felt herself warm a little at that. Even if it wasn’t true. She wasn’t good for Finn. And when he found out the truth about her and who she was, she’d in fact be very bad for him.

  “He hasn’t dated since Mellie,” Willa said thoughtfully. “And she turned out to be—”

  “Willa,” Elle said quietly. Warningly.

  “I’m sorry,” she said, not sounding sorry at all. “But I hated her for what she did to him. To him and Sean.”

  “It was a long time ago,” Elle said firmly.

  “A year. He liked her, a lot. And he got hurt,” Willa said. “And you hated her for it too, admit it.”

  Elle gave a slight head nod. “I would have liked to kill her,” she said casually in the way most people would comment on the weather.

  “And it changed him,” Willa said. She turned to Pru. “Mellie had the dressy boutique here in the building for a while before she sold it. She was wild