“Detective Benson from Law and Order: Special Victims Unit?!” I squealed, traveling up the scale in about three seconds.
Grant rolled his eyes fondly. “I’ll leave you two ladies to the fangirling. I’ve got to circulate, press the flesh.”
Lacey made a mock-warning face. “Press the flesh, huh?”
Grant kissed her cheek. “Only of the oldest, ugliest, and most wealthy couples in the western hemisphere, I assure you.”
Lacey gave his butt a little swat. “Well, alright. As long as they don’t press back.”
They gave each other a lingering kiss on the lips before Grant headed out, and I looked steadfastly away, trying not to feel the jealousy worming up inside me. It was easier with Grant and Lacey than it had been with Dove and Asher, probably because I knew and liked the former. But it was still hard, to see that affection and to know that it was going to be awhile before I had that level of ease and comfort and love with another person again.
Lacey turned around just quickly enough to catch the chink in my armor, and her eyes went wide with sympathy. She patted my arm and lowered her voice. “How are you, really? Is Stevie still being an ass?”
“Calling that douchebag an ass is an insult to both donkeys and human anatomy,” I snapped, boiling over like Mount Vesuvius. “I can’t believe what I ever saw in that guy! I want to find a time machine and travel back in time and slap myself in the face the second I said yes to a date with him, and then slap him, and then slap him again, and then maybe push him in front of some oncoming traffic!” My volume had reached the point where people around us were pricking up their ears, so I took a deep breath and continued, slightly more quietly: “Or maybe just leave an anonymous tip with his advisor that half his thesis is plagiarized from the undergrad kids he T.A.’s.”
“It’s not too late to do that, is it?” Lacey asked, righteous indignation lighting her face up. “He shouldn’t get away with that!”
That’s my Lacey: valiant champion of underdogs everywhere. I felt a rush of affection for my best friend, and gave her a little shoulder-shove.
“Ah, that smarmy jerkwad would just have an excuse ready and waiting. Believe me, he’s agreed with so many of his advisors’ opinions that the man thinks the sun shines out of his ass and is responsible for our temperate California climate.”
Lacey made a sympathetic noise. “That sucks. Sorry it’s so hard right now.”
“He’ll get what’s coming to him eventually,” I prophesied, though I wasn’t sure how that was ever going to happen, especially when I had trouble getting him to just leave me alone. Maybe an intervention by the United Nations? “I don’t want to spend this whole evening moaning about Steve the Thesis Hunter. Let’s talk about something happy, like kittens or my imminent business success or how fly you look in that dress. Present from Grant?”
“Bought this one myself, actually,” Lacey said proudly. “From a designer I discovered while we were in Milan. Although—” and her eyes sparkled with mischief—“you could say that what I’m wearing underneath is a present for Grant. From me, and indirectly, from you.”
“You go, girl!” I said. “Damn, but I remember when it was like pulling teeth to get you to wear my designs for a man. It was all, ‘Kate, he’s an asshole,’ and ‘Kate, I don’t like him like that,’ and ‘Okay, yes, Kate, we slept together and it was amazing but now he’s brooding at me like he thinks he’s Heathcliff from Wuthering Heights’—”
“I never said that,” Lacey said, laughing and giving me a playful shove. “You’re the one with all the fancy literary references; I just go for my spy shows and the occasional movie. Though if you’re looking for a Heathcliff, I think Mr. Dark and Broody over there has been giving you the eye.”
I followed her gaze to a waiter who indeed had a very brooding brow, with a low tumble of dirty blonde hair, flashing dark eyes, and slacks that clung nicely to all his…attributes.
“Mmm, yummy,” I agreed. “I can’t go hit on someone on the job, though; I get enough of people doing that to me all day long to ever turn it around.” I spared him one last regretful look. Oh, but those shoulders would look nice framed against my bedspread…
“Girl, we need to find you a distraction,” Lacey said, slinging her arm around my shoulders. “Want me to be your wingman? Grant’s got a lot of yachting friends that, were I not happily about to be hitched, would catch my eye. And possibly also other parts of my anatomy. So. See anything you like?”
She was happier and more relaxed these days than I’d ever seen her before in her life. And I was happy for her. Of course I was. Really.
It was just hard, sometimes, realizing I had gone from the happy-go-lucky friend with a bag of good advice to the moping downer who needed to be cheered up.
“How’s that wedding coming along, by the way?” I asked in a change of topic so transparent you could have used it in manufacturing windows. “Got everything sorted out?”
Lacey sighed, just slightly put out. “We had to delay again, because we’re going to be in negotiations with Genji Inc. in June. It’s just as well, though, since that timeline works better for my parents—something about Mars being in the fifth house—” she rolled her eyes fondly; Lacey’s parents are great people, but man, sometimes they are exactly like the cartoon picture you would find next to the word ‘hippie’ in a kids’ dictionary—“and it does give me more time to get the details just perfect.”
Uh-oh. When Lacey spends time obsessing and over-thinking little details, it’s usually not long before a freakout and tears are on their way. “What kinds of details?”