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“Drinks? You mean alcohol?”
“It’s a bachelorette party,” he said. “Of course I mean alcohol.”
“How the hell did you?—”
“Are you going to ask questions, Juliet? Your party starts in less than an hour.”
Fuck. Gritting my teeth, I turned to Nicole, who was looking at me helplessly, and drew my finger across my throat. “Tell him he doesn’t need to do the run,” I hissed. Then I turned back to the phone. “I don’t know what weird magic you’re using, but knock it off. And I didn’t ask you to do this.”
“No, you didn’t,” Finn agreed. “You should have.”
“I had it handled,” I argued.
“You had a boat party with beer and pizza,” Finn argued back. How the hell did he know all my plans? He was Satan with gorgeous eyes and a nice ass. “That was good, but this is better. You want to impress your guests? You’re going to impress them tonight.”
Nicole had hung up with her dad and signed for the delivery. She and the delivery guy started up the pier toward the van. Behind the first van, a second pulled up.
“Now what’s showing up?” I asked Finn.
“Is there a second delivery? Oh, good. The flowers are arriving.”
I could feel my head exploding. This was supposed to be my party, and I had tried. I had fucking tried. I hadn’t asked for the other bridesmaids to chip in, or Mom, or Finn. I had insisted on paying for it myself—because it was my job, because no one thought I could do it. Because this was how I showed Vicki that I wasn’t a screwup, that I didn’t hate her. That I cared.
But because I had insisted on doing everything myself, I had ended up with a plan that I knew in my gut could be better. I wasn’t good at this, and I never would be. I was stuck on throwing a party that fed my pride instead of throwing a party my sister would actually enjoy on the night before her wedding.
The world doesn’t revolve around you, Jules!
I had once chance with Vicki, and I had almost made a mess of it because I was too deep in my head to do it right.
Or I had been, until Finn saved my ass.
The delivery guy had pulled a wheeled dolly from his van, and he and Nicole loaded boxes onto it. The second delivery guy opened his door, revealing the huge flower arrangements he was delivering. He got out a clipboard, too. Nicole greeted him and took his pen to sign.
“Juliet,” Finn said on the phone, “Vicki is my sister-in-law. This is my wedding party, too, and I’m going to make it nice. You’re right that it isn’t fair that you have to throw a big party and I don’t have to do anything. So I’m making it even. There’s nothing you can do about it.”
My throat was trying to close, making it hard to speak. I didn’t deserve everyone helping me out like this—Nicole, her dad, Finn. Nicole wasn’t even going to attend the party, because her recovery was too recent and she couldn’t be around alcohol. She was just doing this to be my friend.
“Fuck,” I managed.
“Is that Juliet language for thank you?” Finn sounded amused.
I took a breath. “Thank you,” I said, meaning it.
“Thank you,” he said back. “I believe I’ll be thanking you for life.”
I bit back a smile, my tension starting to unwind. When we’d gone to my hotel room after the Seattle show, I’d demonstrated my affection by going down on my knees as soon as we closed the door behind us. Finn’s surprise was matched only by how wildly turned on he was. We’d nearly woken up everyone in the hall. The whole thing had been gratifying, even for me.
Then we’d gone to bed for more. And before he left the next morning, I’d done it again.
I’d gotten a stunned text later that day, that was only one word: TWICE?? He’d sent me the same single word later that night, as if I’d robbed him of every other thought in his head.
I’d done it because I’d wanted him, and because I didn’t know how much longer I would have him. It felt like we were getting on separate ships that were going in different directions. I couldn’t swim to Finn’s ship, and he couldn’t swim to mine.
But until we started drifting, I wanted as much of him as I could get.
“That was a freebie,” I said to him now. “You don’t owe me because of that.”
“Twice,” Finn said. Then, “Twice,” and I laughed.
