Except, Beckett rarely actually called—he was strictly a texting kind of guy—so what if something was wrong? What if he needed help?
I hit the accept button, confronting any request for me to show up head-on. “I’m not going. I’m dead on my feet.”
Loud chanting greeted me on the other end. “Maisey. Maisey. Maisey.”
Deep voices mingled in with a few female ones, and my cozy night at home all but disappeared. If all my friends were all at the bar, asking me to come, I’d never be able to say no.
“That’s low, Beckett, even for you.”
He laughed. A slow, deep rumble that I felt all the way down to the pit of my stomach. Dangerously delightful. Dangerously off-limits.
“Fallon and Andie are attempting to pull off a trivia win. They need you, darlin’,” Beckett taunted. “You don’t show up, and you’ll be the sole reason the Femme Fatales lose tonight.”
On the other end, I heard Fallon demand, “Let me talk to her,” and two seconds later, she came on the line, pleading. “We’re down twenty, Maise.Twenty. And I’ve got something big riding on this with Parker.”
I couldn’t help the chuckle that escaped. “Stop betting sexual favors with your husband, and then you won’t have to worry about winning or losing.”
Her voice turned quiet and muffled, as if she was using her hand to cover her mouth so the others wouldn’t hear. “It’s not sex. Well… Not sex, per se. This is avery importantbet. You remember what I talked to you about the other day?”
She’d been talking about having another baby. Her little girl, Lila, was just over two years old now, and Fallon had gotten it in her head it was the perfect time to start trying for baby number three. This time, one she and Parker created together, rather than one they’d adopted or the one she’d had with the loser who’d knocked her up.
I sighed. “I need to go home and change. I’m still in my scrubs.”
“No one here cares what you’re wearing.”
But I cared. I’d lived too many years of my life feeling like the ugliest person in the room not to at least try to look good before heading into a bar full of beautiful people.
“If you want me to come, then you need to give me a few minutes to clean up.”
Fallon let out an exasperated sigh. “Fifteen minutes, Maise! I need you.” The phone shuffled, and from somewhere in the distance came her muffled shout, “Intermission! Andie and I are waiting on our relief pitcher!”
There was a mix of cheers and groans on the other side of the phone.
Then, Beckett’s voice was back in my ear, tantalizing me. “I’m wounded, Maise. Wounded. Not only are you showing up because Fallon needs you, when you wouldn’t show up because I did, but now you’ll be playing for the wrong team.”
“It’ll do your ego some good to be knocked down a peg or two.”
“You have to beat us first.”
“We will.”
“I like your confidence.” I could hear the amusement in his voice before it dipped low. “Care to place a bet?”
My heart skittered, stomach swooshing, but I was glad my voice didn’t reflect it. “Nope. You know I don’t bet.”
“Someday, darlin’, that’ll change.”
“Today isn’t that day.”
He laughed, told me to hurry, and then hung up.
Twenty minutes later, I was back downtown, feeling just as tired as before but at least a little more put together. I’d slipped into a yellow summer dress to combat the sticky humidity, touched up my makeup, and pulled my hair half-up in a messy, beachy twist.
It was nearing eight o’clock, but Main Street was still humming with the kind of easy energy that made evenings here feel like they stretched alittle longer than anywhere else. Cars edged the curbs where the shops and restaurants kept their doors propped open late, hoping to catch the last of the tourists drifting by.
Swift Rivers, built during the old Gold Rush days, still proudly wore its forty-niner heritage, with weathered wood siding, hitching post–style parking meters, and wrought-iron lampposts dangling baskets of bright blooms. Framed by snow-capped peaks, the whole town looked like it had been lifted straight from a movie set. And when night fell and the neon signs flickered on, they washed the Old Western streets in a kaleidoscope of color that felt part Nashville honky-tonk and part vaudeville magic.
When I was a kid, Swift Rivers had been like so many fading small towns, its storefronts emptying out as families traded mom-and-pop shops for box stores and theme parks. But then Fallon’s family transformed their ranch into a five-star resort, drawing the wealthy at first, and then the everyday vacationers. Now the place thrived through every season—skiers carving paths through the snow in the winter, hikers and rafters chasing sunlight in the summer.