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It was said in such a way that he appeared to be hopeful the ship hadn’t sailed, but Paige knew he wasn’t being serious. “I’m afraid so,” she told him, as if trying to let him down easy. “But it would’ve been fun being hit on by a hot bartender.”
David was now giving her a less-than-thrilled stare. “Should I leave so you two can really get your flirt on?”
Evan raised his eyebrows in amusement, but Paige’s drew together in surprise. “What are you … you’re not jealous, are you?” she asked.
“You get jealous when women flirt with me,” David pointed out, dodging the question.
“That’s different. Those women were actually flirting with you. Like hardcore. This—” she indicated herself and Evan, “—really isn’t flirting.”
“She’s right,” Evan said. “This—” he indicated himself and Paige, “—is more like … rapport.”
“Well, this rapport—” David waved a hand between Paige and Evan, “—is a little disconcerting, to be honest. So, stop it.”
The demand to ‘stop it’ had Paige pursing her mouth. “More disconcerting than Evan hearing us having sex thirty minutes ago? More disconcerting than finding out he’s your best friend, Dick, who saw one of my bras and seems to know everything about me? I think not,” she countered. “But if I can deal with all of that, then you can certainly deal with a little bit of rapport, don’t you think? So, get over it.”
With a grin at Paige’s response (because it was fun to see her put David in his place), Evan got up and mixed his own Margarita, since David had fallen down on his duties, then sat back down. Leaning toward Paige, but pointing at David, he said, “So, he’s the ex we were talking about. The asshole.”
She blinked. “Er, yes.”
David’s eyes widened. “You called me an asshole?”
“I didn’t.” She pointed at Evan. “He did. But in his defense, he didn’t know he was talking about you. And why are you offended? Your nickname for him is Dick.”
“Being called an asshole is worse than being called Dick. Especially since I wasn’t calling him a dick. And why was he calling me an asshole in the first place? What did you say about me?”
She tilted her head, thinking back. “Nothing bad, that I can remember.”
“She didn’t say anything bad about you,” Evan said. “She was defending you, actually. I was the one trash talking your ass.”
“Why were you trash talking my ass?”
“I didn’t know we were talking about you at the time. And it started off very innocently. I asked her what her story was, and she told me about her book—oh, shit!” He grabbed Paige’s hand and squeezed. “I read it, by the way. I really liked it.”
“You did? Oh, thanks.”
Feeling incredibly annoyed that because of Ashley, another person had known about Paige’s book before he had, David was caught off guard when Evan slapped his hands on the counter and blurted out, “Holy fuck, you’re Damon!”
“Oh, Jesus,” David groaned loudly and began mixing another batch of Margaritas. “Here we go.”
Cracking up, Evan pulled his phone out of his pocket. “I’m changing your name to Damon in my contacts. Hell, yeah, I am.”
“Don’t you fucking dare.”
“Too late, already done,” Evan said with satisfaction. “It still doesn’t make up for ‘Dick’, but it’s close.”
“Speaking of terrible nicknames, I’d like to circle back to mine.” Paige looked from Evan to David. “Why do I even have one in the first place?”
David paused for a moment. “If I tell you the truth, will you promise not to get pissed at me … or punch my balls?”
“I’ll promise to try. How’s that?”
“All right,” he said, then cleared his throat. “After the divorce, I didn’t want to talk about it. At all. Which meant that I didn’t want to talk about you. If the topic ever came up—which was rare, and usually only with Dick—I referred to you as my ‘ex-wife’. And I’m sure that seems shitty, but it just kind of hurt to say your name, so I didn’t. And after a while, it was a habit.”
“Okay, well, that doesn’t piss me off. I can understand your reasons, because I sort of did the same thing. No one I work with knows I was married, and my assistant, Andrea, only found out a few months ago because you ambushed me at work.” She pursed her mouth. “But that doesn’t explain why I’m called ‘Cat Lady’.”
“Well, I’d kept you mostly a secret for a while, you know, when we were, uh …” he trailed off with a quick glance at Evan.
“Pretending to date while fucking around in the name of sexual healing?” Paige supplied without thinking.
