Page 197 of Wild Card 13

It did not come.

Alois only stood there, steady and serious, like choosing people was not a thing he did casually.

I looked down, adjusted the cuff of my glove for absolutely no reason, and nodded once. “Yeah,” I said, because anything more would have made me sound like I needed medical attention. “Of course. I’d be honored.”

Alois nodded back.

That should have been the end of it. Obviously, my survival instincts were terrible. I lifted my head. “Who is the best man?”

Alois started toward the door. “You don’t know him.”

I followed, because my legs remembered we had a game even if my chest was still being dramatic. “Does he have a name?”

“Bobby.”

“Can I get Bobby’s number?”

Alois stopped in the doorway and turned his head slowly. The hallway light cut across his face in hard green and white, making him look even less approachable than usual, which was impressive considering his baseline was European prison wall. “Why?” he asked.

“To plan your bachelor party.”

“No.”

“Why?”

“I said so.”

CHAPTER 24

LUCY

NOW

Ihad Naomi in one ear, Charlotte Anderson in three open email threads, and a half-eaten container of lo mein cooling beside my keyboard like evidence of every poor decision I had made since six o’clock.

“I know you’re still at the arena,” Naomi said through my earbud.

I clicked into the access audit spreadsheet and highlighted Charlotte’s old credential number for the second time, because apparently exhaustion had turned my brain into a decorative object. “You don’t know that.”

Across the office, Dottie slept on her bed, curled in a shape that suggested she had no moral objections to abandoning me during a crisis. One ear had flipped inside out. Her front paws twitched once, probably because she was dreaming about emotionally betraying me in a field somewhere.

“I do.” Naomi’s voice softened without losing the dry edge. In the background, I heard the muffled clink of dishes and the low hum of the espresso machine at Paper Lantern. She must have been closing late after one of the winter reading events she pretended exhausted her and secretly loved. “But I am glad you called.”

“I called because you texted me a photo of a man shelving poetry under business leadership.”

“He said Rilke had management energy.”

“That is a cry for help.”

“It was also three hours ago.” A door creaked on her end, followed by the familiar jangle of the shop’s front bell as Naomi locked the door. “And yet, in all that time, you have not complained about Buzz once.”

I picked up my water bottle and took a drink. It had gone room temperature, but at least it had not become another coffee I could forget until it developed a personality. “He is not here.”

“That has never stopped you before.”

“He played in Denver tonight.”

“I know,” Naomi said.