“You’ve got to be kidding me,” she muttered, ducking behind a large fern tilted at an odd angle from the wind as it swung from the pergola overhead. She was on the back deck at Steven and Marnie Edwards’s place, the one that overlooked Crystal Lake, and there were a few other ferns swinging in the wind if she needed them.
I knew this would happen.
Just not today. Not without warning. And definitely not with such an intimate crowd to witness the entire god-awful thing. Awkward situations were always worse in close quarters. And Lily hated awkward almost as much as she hated a scene—unless it was one that she orchestrated.
And Lord knows she’d orchestrated a few whoppers in her day, but this was different.
A quick glance over her shoulder told Lily that no one had witnessed her idiotic attempt to hide herself, but with Mac Draper making his way across the beach, that would soon change.
Her stomach rolled at the thought and the usually cool-as-a-cucumber blond let out a jagged breath. What the hell was she going to do?
It was Memorial Day weekend and everyone was home. All the Bad Boys. Cain Black had already hopped over the railing and was making his way down toward the beach where Mac stood chatting up Cain’s wife, Maggie. Heavy with their first child, the redhead looked beautiful in a simple cream sundress, her long hair floating in the breeze.
Lily watched from behind her fern, a lump in her throat, as Cain’s hand slid around Maggie’s waist and settled on her stomach. Maggie leaned into her husband, their bodies melted together, and it was hard to see where one person ended and the other began. They looked content and happy and in love—three things Lily was pretty damn sure she’d never be.
She glanced to her right, over to her best friend Jake Edwards, who sat on a low-slung settee with the love of his life, Raine, across his lap. The two of them were talking quietly, intimately, Raine’s hands in Jake’s hair as she bent forward to kiss him. The knot in her throat tightened even more. If ever she felt like a third wheel, now was the time.
She should never have come. She didn’t do family. She just didn’t.
So why was she here?
Oh. Right.
She was that pathetic woman on the fringe who was invited to these sorts of things because she had no one else. No friends other than those gathered on this deck and no family close by—though that was by choice.
Lily had learned a long time ago that you couldn’t pick your family. She knew that blood didn’t always mean easy and happy, or even wanted—and it sure as hell didn’t mean love.
In the St. Clare household, the mantra had always been sink or swim, and Lily had swum as far away as she could, as soon as she could.
Now here she was, settled in Crystal Lake since January, about to revisit the night she’d lost control, which was something she hadn’t done in years.
“Shit,” she muttered.
She was pretty sure Mac Draper never thought he would see her again. Hell, he hadn’t asked for a name and she’d never provided one. That night hadn’t been about getting to know each other. It had been strictly a physical reaction—a need to be with someone, to matter to someone even if only for a night.
She shook her head. Who was she kidding?
She’d been drunk and lonely, and the mysterious hot guy in the cab had scratched an itch that needed scratching. It was nothing more.
Lily hadn’t found out his name until she moved into Raine’s stone cottage—the same place Mac had taken her to New Year’s Eve—and seen photos of the guy. While she’d stared at the pictures of a younger-looking man with Cain, Jake, Raine, and the deceased Jesse, she’d listened to Jake ramble on about the Bad Boys.
Lily should have packed up then and left town. But she hadn’t and now…
God, the thought of facing Mackenzie, here, with his friends… With Jake looking on? Steven and Marnie? Ugh, no.
It was time for this third wheel to roll the hell along.
Ignoring her hot cheeks, she turned quickly, her only thought to get as far away from Mac Draper as she could. She had a plan. She’d hide out at the cottage until he left town. From what little she knew about him, he wasn’t close to his family and he had some fancy job in New York City. He was most likely only home for the holiday anyway.
Okay. This was good. This would work.
“Lily, are you alright?”
Her head snapped up and she attempted a smile as Marnie Edwards walked toward her, a cocktail in her hand, a gentle smile on her face. As always, her heart warmed when she saw the woman. It was then that she realized why she’d come. As much as she didn’t do family, there was something about the Edwardses that made her feel wanted.
They were good people. Everything her family was not.
“I’m fine,” Lily said quickly. “I just…I feel kind of sick to my stomach.” She rubbed her belly for good measure.