Page 83 of Sucker For You
Ethan echoed her nod. An instant later, however, he’d reached through the Monaghans to retrieve Bunsen’s leash. He tugged the retriever aside and opened the knot of discussion and embraces in her direction. He extracted a Frisbee from his backpack. Bunsen’s focus snapped from Wes to the disc with enviable ease. “We’re going to Seabright Beach. If I don’t work off this energy, we’ll get kicked out of the restaurant tonight.”
“What, so I didn’t wear you out this morning?” from Erin.
Adrian pulled a disgusted face. “Can you not say things like that before we ride a roller coaster?”
“Get your mind out of the gutter, Adrian.” Erin grinned at Ethan and pulled him in by the zipper of his vest for a kiss. While he and Bunsen jogged away, she told her brothers, “We ran the Stanford Dish trail earlier. We’re training for ‘Bay to Breakers.’”
Adrian flipped his sunglasses onto his head. “You couldn’t have just explained that? You had to—”
“—torture you?” Her grin twisted into a smirk, revealing a small, pretty gap between her teeth. “Like you tried to torture Ethan with the hot sauce? Yes. But—don’t worry, Isabel. We can be nice, too.”
“Sometimes,” Adrian added. With startling speed, he turned and extended his hand and a flash of a smile to her. Isabel’s stomach pitched backward in Ethan’s direction, but she held her ground. She accepted the handshake. For Wes. “I’ve heard about you, but we haven’t met. I’m Adrian. You’re Isabel?”
Isabel: from the yacht club disaster, now at Erin’s bungalow.
She nodded again.
Isabel: wearing Chase Meyer’s ring on September first,but today?
Today—
A dizzying swirl of anxiety sucked hard and suddenly at her gut—until Wes reached over to tuck a strand of hair behind her ear. His thumb grazed her cheek. Her breath caught, stilled. His gaze was level and warm. Steady. Reclaiming her free hand, his fingers uncurled hers from their instinctive fist. He ignored his brother and sister trading glances and said, “Yes, this is Isabel Wright. My fiancée.”
Silence.
Overhead, a gull screamed. Riders on the roller coaster answered. A distant sea lion yodeled. . . and then:
“What?” Adrian’s eyebrows rocketed up. He grappled for his sliding aviators. “You—what?No. She’syour. . .?”
“Yes.”
“No, seriously?”
“Yes.”
“But she was just—wasn’t she? With—”
“Ha!” Erin’s shocked gasp of laughter drowned out her brother’s protests.Shocked, but shocking too, because she swipeda finger beneath her tortoiseshell glasses and under her eyes, snorting now with evident amusement and shaking her head. She slapped Adrian on the arm. His own lenses clattered to the ground. She said, “Damn. I’ll admit I didn’t see this coming. But after that Friday, when Ethan told me he’d given out our beach-house address?God, I should’ve. Shouldn’t I? And. . . I have questions, Wes. So many questions. Obviously. First, though: Isabel—”
She tensed again, reflexively.
“—are you going to use our name? Because if not, theMr. and Mrs. Wrightjokes write themselves.”
“Jesus, Frizzy.” Answering laughter shook Wes’s shoulders.
And:Isabel Monaghan?
She liked it. She did. She liked it too much. Her hand in Wes’s spasmed, contracting into a second and tighter fist. Of course, he felt her twitch. An eyebrow lifted in concern.
I’m fine.
She’d promised. She had to do this. But still: after a pause so brief that she might have imagined it, Wes gave a tiny nod. He snagged Adrian’s sunglasses and hooked them crookedly over his brother’s ears, then meandered out of retaliatory range toward a churro stand. He changed the topic. “Who wants to make the Giant Dipper ride more interesting by fueling up with some fat and sugar? Or are you two cowards?”
Neither Erin nor Adrian resisted his challenge.
“Four churros, please,” to a cashier. Wes distributed the paper-wrapped sticks of fried dough, and bit into his with a crunchy puff of cinnamon. “Thanks, man. Adrian, how’d your Tuesday meetings at the Cal Academy go?”
Peace restored—at least temporarily—with sweets and shop talk, Adrian discussed water-reduction percentages, carbonsinks, urban cooling methods, and the investments he aimed to lock in with his pitches this week, before his next round of meetings in Washington, DC. They wandered past height signs for carnival rides and a vintage mechanical fortune-teller, to a condiment kiosk. Isabel’s hands were slick with grease from her churro wrapper, so she extracted a fistful of napkins from the dispenser. Erin grabbed mustard. Lightning-quick, she squirted a pungent yellow ribbon over Wes’s snack.
