Matched For Love(56)

“Fine. But I don’t see why we have to go into it all again. I said I’d marry you. Won’t that take care of the rest?”

“Your obvious excitement about getting married is warming my heart, Annie.”

Her head jerked back as if he’d slapped her. “Did you just use sarcasm? Or did the world just end?”

“Yes. I did.” Weirdly it made him proud. And grateful to Lori. She’d helped him recognize it a little better. “Now how many times a year are you going to agree to come home?”

As they hammered out the terms for the money, Deek’s mind kept wandering back to Lori. He hoped she’d be okay.

He missed her already.



Lori parked her car in front of the coffee shop where she was going to meet Mel Saturday afternoon. Tilting her head back, she struggled to hold her eyes open as she put more drops in to help with the redness from crying.

She was a mess. Her head hurt, her eyes were puffy, and her hair didn’t want to cooperate. It put her in a dark mood that she was grateful for. She’d probably need it to get through the discussion she wasn’t sure she wanted to have. She’d had enough heartache the night before watching Deek choose Annie, but Rachel had been right. Lori needed to find a way to move on, from Deek, Joe, and Mel. Fresh slate and all. Then maybe she’d be ready for a new relationship.

Rachel had asked again if she should come, but Lori was in just the right mood for a battle and didn’t need her sister to fight it for her. She stepped out of her car, threw her shoulders back, and reminded herself that no matter what happened, she was the one who’d been wronged. Not the other way around. Mel had better be contrite, or Lori was going to just leave. No use beating a dead horse.

Sounded good anyway. What she really needed to do was channel some of her sister’s hard-ass attitude. But then, that wasn’t her style and never would be. She was the nice girl who had been finishing last an awful lot lately.

The aroma of sugar and coffee made Lori’s stomach tighten with nausea as she entered the café and searched for Mel. Lori spotted her sitting at a table studying her phone. She watched her for a moment, until the flood of warmth from seeing someone she used to love with all her heart passed, then she crossed the busy little café. “Hi.”

Mel’s head shot up, and then she stood. “Hi. Thanks for meeting me, Lori. I ordered you a latte, the way you used to like. I hope that’s okay?” Mel held out a hand toward the chair across from hers.

“Thank you,” Lori said as she took a seat. She hadn’t noticed how much weight Mel had lost in the dark bistro when they’d run into each other before. And she’d aged a lot in the past two years. Hell, maybe Lori had aged that much too.

Mel sat too and then jumped right in. “First and foremost, I need to apologize to you, Lori. I am truly sick about what I did, and there was no excuse for it.” Mel huffed out a breath. “So, where to start, right?”

At least Mel was owning her actions. “We could just cut straight to that night.” And maybe get the meeting over with sooner. Lori’s stomach wasn’t feeling all that great all of a sudden.

Mel shook her head. “No. This started long before that.”

“What do you mean?” Lori’s heart banged double-time. Please don’t let Mel say that she and Joe had been having an affair for years. She didn’t know if she could take knowing that.

“It starts way back when Joe’s family moved into the house next to mine. It was the day I fell instantly in love with him, but he’d barely noticed me. Until my dad died, and because he was brought up by a single mom too, he started to come around more. To ask how I was. We had a special, private bond over our fathers we never told anyone else about.”

“That was when you guys were about fifteen, right? Why didn’t you ever tell me about that bond?” She and Mel had been best friends. They told each other everything.

Their coffee arrived, so Mel thanked the server and then waited until she was gone. “Because he told me the first day of school when I’d just met him, and we were walking home from the bus stop, that he’d met the girl he was going to marry one day. Said she was the prettiest girl he’d ever seen, and on top of it, she was the sweetest. Her name was Lori Caldwell and did I know her?”

“He told me that years later.” Lori’s eyes stung with tears over the sweet memory. “I’d forgotten that.”

“I knew I couldn’t ever tell Joe how I felt about him after that. He’d always said you and he were meant to be because what were the chances that he’d move next door to Lori’s best friend?”