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An hour later, two texts pinged on my phone. The first was a two-minute video, shot on cell phone from the audience of the show I’d just played. Denver singing the bridge of “All the Way Down” while we played. We looked fucking good. We sounded better, even on cell phone audio.
The second message was a text.
Finn: Congratulations. That was an incredible show.
I stared at those words for a long moment, thinking about Finn somewhere in that audience, jumping and singing with the crowd in the beer-soaked dark. I hadn’t known he was there, but it didn’t surprise me. Of course he had been there. No one had recognized him. He was supernatural, like only the bane of my existence would be.
I answered him the only way I knew how.
Juliet: Fuck you, Finn Wiley.
SEVEN
Finn
Not only did Juliet get in my car when I arrived on Friday afternoon, she was on time. It was a miracle. Honestly, I hadn’t been entirely sure she would show.
She stood in front of the door of her apartment building with a duffel bag at her feet. It wasn’t raining for once. The day was crisp, sunny, and cool, and Juliet’s blond hair was windblown. She wore sunglasses with red plastic frames. Beneath the frayed hems of her jeans, she wore flip-flops.
My stomach dipped in excitement, but I hid my expression behind my Ray-Bans. I pulled my Mercedes up and opened the door to get out, to grab her bag, but Juliet was faster. She opened the door to the back seat, tossed in her bag without ceremony, and dropped into the passenger seat beside me.
“Hi,” I said, closing my door again and starting the car.
Juliet took out her phone—there was a diagonal crack across the screen—and tapped it awake. “Finn, you have to help me,” she said.
I blinked behind my sunglasses as I navigated out of the parking lot. “What happened to not needing my help?” I asked.
“I changed my mind.” She tapped her phone screen, frowning, talking like we were taking up a conversation that had just been interrupted. “I’ve been trying to read all these emails, and I don’t understand a fucking thing.”
I switched on my turn signal. “Put on your seat belt.”
She dropped her phone into her lap to obey me, then picked it up again. “There are so many emails about this wedding. Who has time to email about this shit all day?”
“Is that your question?”
She scrolled through her inbox. “Who is Hayley? There are twenty emails from her. I didn’t think Hayley was a real name.”
I merged onto I-5, then slowed in the Friday afternoon traffic. “Hayley is your sister’s best friend since high school. You don’t know any of Vicki’s friends?”
Juliet was quiet for a second, thinking as she rubbed her thumb over her bottom lip. “Maybe I’ve met her. I don’t know. Vicki and I didn’t exactly hang out in the same circles.”
“Okay, well.” I could see where this was coming from. Juliet was heading into a weekend with a crowd of people she didn’t know, and she wanted some background intel. “Hayley and your sister are close. She lives ten minutes away, and her kids are the same age. From what Alistair says, the two of them hang out all the time.”
“Oh, great.” Juliet rubbed her lip again. “So she should have been the maid of honor, but I got the job instead. Which means she already hates me.”
“I don’t think so,” I said. Then, after a silent pause, “Well, maybe.”
Juliet scrolled again. “Melanie?”
“Melanie is Hayley’s cousin.”
“So she hates me, too.”
“It’s possible,” I had to admit.
Another scroll. “Petra? Where do I know that name from?”
“Petra was Vicki’s college roommate,” I said. “She works for Nordstrom, so she used her corporate discount for the bridesmaids’ dresses.”
