Daisy was silent for a long moment. “I understand,” she said finally. “Having people treat you differently because of things in your past can be…hard.”

He bit his tongue to stop from asking about the painful things in her past.

She glanced over at him with a teasing smile. “I promise not to be the least bit careful in what I say to you from here on out. Swear.”

“Easy promise to make,” he said, nudging his elbow against hers. “Seeing as you’re flying home tomorrow.”

“Too true,” she said, her voice bright. But her smile slipped just the tiniest bit, as though the thought made her melancholy.

Strangely enough, Lincoln thought he understood. Because the thought of her leaving made him a little melancholy as well.

Tonight, for the first time in a long time, he hadn’t been the odd man out. Tonight he’d been part of a pair. Part of a something.

And it had felt far too damn good for comfort.

Chapter 10

“True or false—these pigs in a blanket are low-cal because they’re baby-size,” Whitney Silva said as she speared another of the greasy delights with a toothpick.

“Oh absolutely,” Daisy said, smacking the blender against her palm to see if the margarita needed any more liquid. Deeming it perfect, she poured it into the two presalted hand-blown margarita glasses. “Miniature hot dogs wrapped in pastry dough, then brushed with butter are definitely low-cal. Nonfat too.”

Her lifelong best friend slumped back in the bar stool in Daisy’s kitchen with a happy sigh, chewing the appetizer as she wiggled her fingers for the margarita. “Gimme.”

Daisy handed the drink over. They both lifted their glasses, toasting each other, but not actually clinking the glass. An agreement had been made on a long-ago margarita night that clinking the glasses risked dislodging the salt and was thus a no-no.

“Mmmm,” Whitney said into the glass. “This is low-cal too, right?”

“Always is,” Daisy said as she picked up a toothpick and stabbed a pig in a blanket for herself.

Every other Tuesday, Whitney came over for what had started as Taco Tuesday but eventually evolved into an excuse to have margaritas with anything and everything. Truth be told, Daisy would prefer to do something a bit lighter, but despite Whitney’s constant ambitions of dieting, her friend had a weakness for all things fried and processed.

Daisy didn’t mind. At least she had someone to cook for. Oddly enough, that was one of the things she missed most about being married. She’d long since been cured of the romance of marriage—the idea of true love and two people making each other happy forever and ever.

But she did miss the companionship. The way that, in the early days, she and Gary would split a bottle of wine over whatever new recipe she’d tried out. Not that he’d ever complimented her effort, but back then, it had been enough that she enjoyed the process.

She still cooked, but cooking for one wasn’t the same. Thank goodness for Whitney. Sure, pigs in a blanket barely counted as cooking, and her best friend’s all-time favorite food was four-ingredient spinach dip. But putting food in front of her friend let Daisy pretend for a little while that she was taking care of someone.

That someone wanted her to take care of them.

“Okay, so,” Whitney said around another huge sip of margarita. “I want to hear all about the wedding. Like everything. How mad was Em that I couldn’t make it?”

“Not at all,” Daisy said, meaning it. Emma and Whitney had never been close, but they’d always liked each other. Daisy had always appreciated that they’d never seemed to resent the other person. Whitney got the whole twin thing, and Emma had never seemed threatened by Whitney’s ever-increasing presence in Daisy’s life.

In fact, Daisy was pretty sure Emma was relieved when Daisy had had an outlet for all of her extra-chatty tendencies. Emma had always been happy to spend a Friday afternoon alone with a book, while Daisy and Whitney had hightailed it to the mall.

Emma and Whitney were close enough that Whitney had warranted an invitation to the wedding, but she hadn’t been able to get time off work. As a real estate agent, weekends were Whitney’s bread and butter for the prime showings.

Like Daisy, Whitney was a divorcée. Unlike Daisy, Whitney’s divorce hadn’t come with a big old house and massive alimony checks.

There was no resentment though. In fact, it had been Whitney who insisted Daisy take every penny of what her lawyer had gotten. Justice money, she’d called it—Gary’s conscience at work.

Daisy knew better. Knew that it was hush money. Gary hadn’t fought Daisy for a single penny, and only the two of them knew why.

It was the one secret she kept from Whitney. From Emma. From everyone.

Whitney held out her glass for more margarita, and Daisy dutifully complied, topping off both their glasses with what remained in the pitcher.

“Wedding,” Whitney said. “Talk. Tell me you banged a groomsman.”

“Most of them are married or attached,” Daisy said.

Whitney lifted her perfectly arched dark eyebrows. “Most but not all?”

She pursed her lips and Whitney bounced a little in her seat. “You got laid!”

Daisy laughed. “I did not.”

Whitney pouted. “You didn’t? But you haven’t been with anyone since Gary. Don’t you miss sex?”

Her friend did a little wiggle that did impressive things for her big boobs. Whitney had the round, voluptuous figure of a woman who loved fried food and was lucky enough to carry most of the extra weight in her upper half. Combined with her perfectly styled brown hair and the ever-present black eyeliner that made her unusually light blue eyes look alluring and mysterious, Whitney had always had more sexy in her little finger than Daisy did in her entire being.