Page 22 of Heartbreak & Cupcakes
The bachelor dinner. Nick had eaten up the attention at the event. He’d had polls up on his Twitter to pick out what he wore. He’d done Instagram lives throughout the night. He’d held an afterparty at his house.
I was going to show up. Not stay a second longer than was required. And go the fuck home.
“Lexi is my plus one.”
“No.” Nick shook his head. “You can’t play the Lexi card.”
“It’s not a card. She’s my daughter.”
“You promised her no more boring dinners,” Maddox pointed out.
I had. Over the years, I’d dragged the poor thing to at least a dozen “social” events that I’d been obligated to attend because I knew she’d start yawning by eight and I’d have the excuse to leave citing it was her bedtime.
But Maddox was right. I’d promised her no more boring dinners. In my defense, that was before this had come up. It was true that I did my best not to spoil her, but that didn’t mean I wasn’t above bribing her. If she’d go with me, I might cave and get her the puppy she’d been asking for. Or Disneyland. She’d been asking to go to Disneyland for the past year.
“Hey, how’s Cupcake Girl?” Nick asked, pretending the two topics had nothing to do with one another. He was not exactly the king of subtlety.
I had several regrets in my life and having one too many during our monthly poker game and mentioning Sadie ranked in the top three.
What the fuck had I been thinking?
In fairness to me, I’d only said her name because the boys were trying to have a second intervention with me surrounding my lack of a social life. They were pushing hard for me to get on a dating app. I was resistant and Maddox insisted that it wasn’t healthy that I hadn’t been interested in anyone since Ash. I’d had one too many shots of whiskey and told him he didn’t know what the fuck he was talking about, Iwasinterested in someone. They thought I was lying and called my bluff. I should’ve left it at that. So what if they thought I was lying. I’d rather them think I was lying than be dealing with this shit four months after the fact.
“You need to ask Cupcake Girl to go with you to the event.” Maddox always went the direct, sincere route.
I actually found myself entertaining the idea for about a second. I had a flash of Sadie on my arm. Then I remembered what she’d told me today. She’d said that she was on a dating sabbatical. I’d never heard of such a thing before, but I had questions. Lots of them. None of which I’d be sharing with Tweedledum and Tweedledee today at lunch.
