Page 2 of Tempting Mr. Knightly

He ate lunch at his desk, turkey on rye, no mustard, because mustard was an unnecessary variable. His phone sat beside the sandwich, silenced. He’d checked it four times since Gabriel’s text, and each time, his thumb had drifted toward the search bar.

The destination was Flour & Honey in Park Slope, the bakery Lucy owned, the one he’d been to a dozen times on Devney’s errands.

He ate his sandwich.

At two fifteen, Ronan appeared in his doorway. This was unusual. Ronan used to summon people. The summoning had been efficient, hierarchical, and psychologically appropriate for someone running a billion-dollar firm. Now Ronan wandered into other people’s offices because Devney had told him it was “more human.” And Ronan was committed to being human. Knox found the project both admirable and exhausting, like watching a linebacker learn calligraphy.

“Got a minute?” Ronan asked.

“I’ve got about ten. I have a call at two thirty.”

Ronan dragged the visitor’s chair an inch closer before he sat, which was new. On the desk, next to the monitor, sat a framed photo of Gabriel and Tessa. Knox had turned it face down earlier that morning, as he did every morning, because watching his best friend grin like a man who’d won the lottery while he tried to calculate depreciation schedules was disorienting.

Ronan turned it face up.

Knox turned it face down.

Ronan just looked at him for a long moment, then said, “Devney and I were talking last night.”

“Dangerous.”

“About the wedding. Gabriel and Tessa’s.”

“I’m aware of which wedding. There’s only one pending.”

“They’ve moved the timeline up. September instead of December. Tessa found a venue she loves, but it’s only available in the fall.”

Knox did the math. September was five months away. “That’s aggressive.”

“Tessa’s an event planner. She could coordinate a full-scale invasion and still have time to argue about napkin colors.”

“Fair point.”

Ronan leaned forward, his elbows on his knees. The posture was new, something from the post-Devney era. Old Ronan sat like a man carved from marble. New Ronan sat like a person. “Gabriel wants you as his best man. And the planning starts this week. He’s got a whole schedule mapped out. Meetings, tastings, rehearsals.”

“I’ll write a check.”

“You’ll show up.”

“How much would it cost to not show up?”

“Your dignity and my friendship.”

Knox studied Ronan’s face for any sign of negotiation. There was none. Marriage had made Ronan softer in some ways and immovable in others. He’d built this company on control and now ran his personal life with the same uncompromising conviction he’d once reserved for quarterly targets.

Except now the objective was happiness, and that terrified Knox.

“Fine. I’ll attend the planning meetings.”

“Good. The first one’s this week. At Flour & Honey.”

Knox’s hand stilled on his pen.

“Lucy’s handling all the desserts. Tessa asked her personally.”

“Lucy Wang.”

“Do you know another Lucy?”