The boys stood in silence as I retrieved both my items, then settled back on the stones.
“Public relations,” I said simply. “You never know what skills you’ll pick up.”
It was a crushing blow to the collective male ego, but both men settled down beside me and gazed blearily at the flames. We sat in silence for a while, then all scooted forward of one accord to take advantage of the heat.
“Good job, Abby,” Nick mumbled half-heartedly.
“Yeah.” James bit his lip. “Team effort.”
I snorted and shook my head, tilting back against Nick’s shoulder. A second later, he opened up his arms, and I scooted inside—nestled snugly against his chest.
James glanced between the two of us with a curious frown.
“Okay so, you guys aren’t really engaged...but...you’re clearly something?”
It was a startling question—despite how obvious it must have seemed. The kind of question that Nick and I had never actually asked each other. The kind that only a friend as close as James would ever dare say out loud.
My eyes peered up at Nick’s in the dark. His face was dancing with the flickering flames, and his eyes glowed with a gentle smile.
“We’re...something.”
Something. I nestled back down with a little grin. I could work with something.
“Well when the fuck did that happen?”
Subtle as ever. Thanks, James.
Nick clearly thought so too, because he tossed a handful of pebbles the guy’s way with a little grin. “It happened when it happened—mind your own fucking business.”
James dodged them and grinned back.
“Oh—I’m sorry. Am I just supposed to pretend like all of this is normal?” When we said nothing, he raised his eyebrows and emphasized every word. “That Nick Hunter hooking up with Abigail Wilder, is somehow a regular turn of events?”
Again—only James would be so bold. That being said—only James was loved enough to get away with it. That being said—Nick had no idea how to answer the question.
“I don’t question your love life,” he tried to deflect.
But James only laughed. Truth be told, even I had to join in on that one.
“Please—you question my love life all the damn time.”
It was true. Nick happened to have very high standards when it came to who was, or was not good enough for his best friend. And ‘question’ was putting it lightly. The man interfered on a regular basis.
He messed around with a diplomat’s daughter and an ambassador’s niece. The friends were cut from the same cloth.
“I only do that when it’s absolutely necessary,” Nick said quickly. “When you’re settling, or compromising, or making a big mistake.”
James and I shared a sarcastic grin, before he rolled his eyes.
“Yeah, or when you’re in a bad mood, or a good mood, or you don’t know the guy, or if you’re simply bored and can think of nothing better to do.”
The man’s misdeeds were legendary. He had once actually forged a golddigger’s passport, swapped it out with her real one, then tipped off customs to get her arrested at the airport. All so she would miss her flight to Tahiti where James was waiting.
What had resulted was an unfortunate skirmish in a Turkish holding cell, during which I had to calm down tempers using nothing but a translation book and a smile—while Nick pouted in the background that the truth had come out, and the golddigger had gone free. But the woman had stolen one million dollars from James in a scam, and James forgave her. The woman had James twisted around her finger.
“She could have died,” he accused, obviously thinking of the same story.
Nick scoffed with a distinct lack of concern. “How could she have died?”