I open my mouth to say that she’s not my anything, and certainly not my girl, given that she’s a sexy, bold woman, but Ricky gives me a cold stare that dares me to disagree with him, and my mouth clacks shut for once.

  Because the truth is . . . I want anything and everything he knows about Tiffany Young.

  “Okay, so we’ll skip the bullshit you know about Tiffany Young,” Ricky says, leaning forward. “We know Elle told you a bunch of stuff, and that’s all true. At least about her background.”

  “Well, most of the time, Elle was covering for her own ass,” Billy says. “Like the dares. Let’s face it, Tiffany was her sidekick, but that was Elle’s thing.”

  “True . . . like remember that time they did topless karaoke?” Ricky says. “Man, you know Elle wanted to but—”

  “But she needed Tiff to dare her to do it,” Billy finishes, grinning widely.

  “They what?”

  “Ah, relax,” Ricky says. “They still had their bras on and it was just at the end of a karaoke routine.”

  “Yeah, they got booed for being boring. Can you imagine?” He shakes his head in disbelief. “Nah, truth is, Tiff and Elle were like Yin and Yang, you know? Elle needed Tiff to hold her back, Tiff needed Elle to feel taken care of. And most of the time, the dares were totally silly stuff.”

  “Except that time Tiffany dared Elle to go after Colton,” Ricky points out. “I know for a fact that Tiff dared Elle to make a copy of her ass to leave in his office.”

  “What?” I shout, shocked.

  “Hey, it worked out in the end,” Ricky says as I take a steadying breath. I don’t want to yell about my daughter . . . and he’s right. It did work out in the end. Besides, if I call her up and chew her out about it, there’d be questions. Like how I found out and why Ricky and Billy are spilling their guts.

  “Okay, go on.”

  “You gotta watch out for that metabolism,” Billy says, pointing at me in warning. “Seriously, that girl can go from happy to hangry in like, an hour sometimes. Especially if she’s nervous. She’ll just start machine gunning little nibbles, like a squirrel or something.”

  He mimics a chipmunk or squirrel gnawing at a nut or snack, and I dimly remember seeing that even in our dinner. She didn’t take big bites but almost buzz-sawed her vegetable bits in quick, rapid bites.

  “Yeah, but her faves are those peanut butter crackers,” Ricky adds. “You know, those nasty ass orange ones they stock in the vending machines downstairs? Those are basically her emergency supplies if she goes through the two packs in her purse and the box in her desk.”

  “Definitely a two pack a day girl,” Billy says. “I tried to get her on granola, but she said she kept missing her tosses.”

  Somehow, the idea of Tiffany bouncing a granola nugget off her cheek makes me smile. “What else?”

  “She’s got a memory like a fucking data stick,” Ricky says in admiration. “Like, she meets someone once, and bam, she knows everything. Remember Reice, the barista?”

  “Oh, yeah,” Billy says. “A barista at this coffee shop she and Elle used to go to. Anyway, one time, we go in, and Tiff doesn’t just stick a buck in the tip jar. Oh, no, she pulls this envelope out of her purse and hands it directly to Reice. She’d put two hundred dollars in there because a month earlier, she’d overheard Reice saying something to another coworker about taking an extra shift so she could buy something nice for her little brother’s high school graduation. Tiffany had remembered, knew what school the kid went to, all of it, and just . . . damn.”

  “Her heart’s about this damn big,” Ricky says, spreading his arms wide. “I mean, she knows Mac’s granddaughter’s name and pretty much everything about everyone on her team. But she’s also like the fuckin’ CIA around here. She can quote department deadlines for projects that she’s not even resourced on. She’ll just be like, ‘Yeah, the Jacobs team is going to be working late on that report tonight. Make sure they’ve got coffee,’ to her team. And ten to one odds, they will be.”

  “Don’t forget her brother,” Billy says. “Ace. Guy was a fuckup, and she damn near saved his life a while back when he was in a bad way after a breakup. Her and Ace are tight. Tiffany fixed him, and he’s got a girl now. A business too.”

  “Dog daycare,” I murmur, and Ricky nods.

  “Yup. And if you’re on Team Tiff, you’re a hundred percent on,” Ricky says. “Not just her brother. Like Elle. She loves that girl like they’re blood. You remember when she threatened to chop Colton into little pieces and feed him to sharks so no one would ever be able to find him?”

  Billy laughs. “I swear to God, the man pissed Earl Grey when she said it.”

  They keep going, and with every word, I’m more intrigued, more enamored. Some of it’s repetitive, some of it I already know. But I don’t care, it’s all things I want to know and am filing away for future use, but I swallow my pride and ask what I really need to know.

  “Who does she date?”

  Billy and Ricky both stop, and Billy gives me a shake of his head. “No one that I’ve seen. She works, sees her family, talks to Elle, and goes home. Kinda boring, honestly. Reminds me of someone else I know.”

  “Well, there’s that one guy she likes,” Ricky points out, “but she never talks about him. At least not to us.”

  I hate him already because he has Tiffany’s interest. I wonder if I could take a cue from her rulebook and cut him to bits the way she threatened Colton, literally cutting out the competition?

  “Who is he?”

  Ricky leans back, crossing his arms over his massive chest and giving me a triumphant look. “You.”

  “What?”

  Billy sighs and leans forward. “Pull your head from your ass, Uncle Daniel. I know Ricky and I might not have went to some fancy school, but on this you’re dumb as fuck.”

  “He ain’t lying.”

  I blink, not accustomed to being called stupid, or being told to pull my head from my ass, for that matter. In fact, I can’t remember the last time someone said that to me. It might’ve never happened. “Really?”

  “You’re the gold fuckin’ standard in her eyes and have been for about as long as I’ve known her,” Ricky says. “And that girl, she don’t settle. You rise to her occasion or she walks on by.”

  They pause, letting that sink in through my apparently thicker than I’d realized skull. And people say Ricky and Billy are thick? They just made me look like I’m about half a step below a Neanderthal.

  I eye them carefully, trying to decide whether they’re fucking with me, but all I see is honesty on their faces. Maybe a little exasperation that it’s taken me this long to be asking these questions, but there’s no deception there.

  I mull over the fact that maybe this isn’t some recently developed crush resulting from my swooping in to save her, but rather something she’s been wanting for a long time.

  Could it be?

  Could I have been that oblivious?

  Absolutely.

  I’ve been so wrapped up in . . . roles, in images, in presuppositions. I mean, how long did it take for me to recognize that Tiffany, my daughter’s college friend, had grown into such an intelligent, beautiful, sexy woman?

  I relegated her to a role in my mind long ago and never reconsidered her placement there, even after Elle moved away.

  Actually, maybe Elle’s moving away and my lack of connection with Tiffany over the last year are what made me see her in a new light now, giving way to a possibility where there was none previously.

  Every interaction I’ve had with Tiffany over the years reframes itself in my mind, clicking into new focus. She transforms in my mind, becoming a woman I want to know more of.

  The hits keep coming, though, and not all of them good.

  Billy chuckles. “She’s driven Elle nuts for years lusting after you behind your back.”

  “Daddyyyy!” they mimic, and I know it’s true because I can hear the name rolling off her tongue in her drunken stupor. It’s all sinking in deeper and deeper into my brain, and honestly, into my cock. Thankfully, I’m behind my desk.

  That kiss was fire, and I can feel instinctively that Tiffany and me together would be earth-shattering. “Damn.”

  “I think he’s getting it now,” Billy says from far away.

  “Fina-fucking-ly,” Ricky says, raising his arms to the ceiling in praise. “Okay, if that’s it, I’m going to head home so I can still get Miranda and the kids to the movies. Bring me my money tomorrow.”

  “Wanna go for a beer?” Billy asks me, standing up as Ricky departs. “You look like you could use it after that mindfuck.”

  I think it over and nod. “Actually, yeah. I know just the place.”

  I don’t tell Billy that I want to go to The Den just in case Tiffany does go there again. He probably already knows, anyway. And I need to let all this new information settle so I can turn it over in my mind and figure out my next move.

  Chapter 12

  Tiffany

  The sound of dogs fills my ears as I open the door, and in so many ways, it is sweet music to my ears. I know doggos, and I know that the number-one thing they have in the world is an almost unlimited amount of love to give.

  Right now, I need it, and I’m glad Ace asked me to stop by the daycare tonight after work. After the past few days, I need doggos. Daniel didn’t say one word to me today. Mostly because I didn’t see him, but he could’ve texted me or emailed me or stopped by my desk.

  But nope. Silent as a ghost.

  And with Vanessa back at her desk, I don’t have an excuse to go up there again.

  I even stayed a little late, reasonably thinking that maybe he was waiting for everyone else to leave before approaching me. But when I started looking at Instagram on my work computer and he hadn’t even left his office—not that I was stalking the elevator or anything—I knew it was time to get out of there.

  I think I might’ve overplayed my hand. Maybe I should’ve taken what I could get? One night of magic on his conference table certainly wouldn’t have been a bad thing. It just wasn’t everything.

  But now, I have nothing.

  Except puppy breath and fluffy fur, which is pretty much the cure for everything and exactly what I need.

  Harper is here helping too because it’s a Doggie Date Night, some marketing genius that Ace came up with. The dog parents get a night out without ‘the kids’, and the dogs get a special dinner menu of meatballs and peanut butter truffles, music to dance to, and special toys to play with like rubber champagne glass squeakers and sparkly tug-o-war ropes.

  Ace has posted plenty of pics of it on his business Instagram, and they’re so cute that he has followers that aren’t even in this area. They follow his ’gram simply for the awwws.

  Like tonight. The boy dogs are all wearing bowties and the girl dogs have bows in their ears. Except for August, who is wearing both because they’re an equal opportunity sniffer. Some of the dog parents went all out and brought their dogs in full costumes because Ace is also doing pet portraits of the dogs.

  “Hey, guys, where can I help out?” I ask as I come in, squatting down to scratch the ears of a Scottish Terrier in a plaid vest. “Well, what clan are you, buddy?”

  “That’s Willie, and he needs his ball to pose properly,” Ace says, holding up a green lumpy rubber ball. “But with Harper on the printer and me on the camera, I’m out of hands. Wanna be the prop bitch?”

  “Sure,” I reply, and minutes later, I’m moving the ball around while Ace rapid-fire snaps shots of Willie. “Think you got enough?” I tease after he’s taken easily twenty shots.

  “As the pros say, never work with animals or children,” Ace says with a grin as he swaps out memory cards to pass over to Harper. “It’s not like these guys even smile. Well, other than Angel, but she smiles all the time. But babe’s going to spend ten minutes trying to pick out the one shot she thinks works. And yet we’ve re-shot how many pups today, babe?”

  “Four,” Harper answers, giving Ace a big smile as she sets Willie free to go play with his friends. “And each of them was completely worth it. You even said you’re going to use the retake of Zeus in your marketing.” She pats Ace on the shoulder affectionately, and out of the corner of my eye, I see the glittering rock on her finger.

  I go over, giving her a huge hug. We’re likely swapping dog hair from our clothes, but this is a celebration worth getting covered in dog glitter. “I’m so happy for you.”

  “Huh . . . would have thought you’d send condolences,” Ace jokes. “A few years ago, you would have.” He’s trying hard to frown, but his happiness bubbles over and his face stretches into a goofy smile.

  “You’re not that wrong,” I admit, giving my brother a hug too, “but a few years ago, a good woman like Harper wouldn’t have given you the time of day, much less said yes. So . . . story time!” I clap my hands greedily.

  “Ace took me to the wine country,” Harper says as she plugs the memory card into her computer, “and it was as beautiful as you’d expect. We stayed at a B&B that was built onto a real winery. It was gorgeous.”

  “We woke up in the morning with a view of the vineyards,” Ace adds as he goes back to shooting another dog, this one a lot more cooperative.

  “It was straight out of a magazine article,” Harper gushes. “But that first day . . . can I tell her, honey?”

  “Sure, it worked out in the end,” Ace says, rolling his eyes. “Eventually.”

  “Eventually?” I double-check that the ring is on Harper’s finger because that does not sound like a sweet proposal-and-instant-yes type of fairy tale story.

  Harper clicks around on the computer as she explains, “Ace set us up with a tour of the winery, the full experience. We got to watch them bottling from casks, preparing bottles, but the most fun was watching them crush grapes. We got to go up on a big walkway, looking down where they had these huge tubs with a big screw-like paddle in the middle. They’d feed the grapes in the top, and out the bottom would come this sludgy stuff, the juice and the skins and seeds all sort of mixed together.”

  “They don’t stomp the grapes?” I tease, and Harper laughs.

  “You can. They’ll let you, but for the big operation, it’s that screw thing,” Harper says. “They strain it, of course, but anyway . . . I was watching the juice when Ace says my name, and there was something weird about his voice.”

  “I was nervous as hell and trying not to forget what I planned to say,” Ace interjects.

  Harper looks at Ace as if that’s the sweetest thing she’s ever heard. “I turn and . . . I’m getting misty eyed.”

  “I think you’re allowed to.”

  Harper grabs a tissue and wipes her eyes. “Okay. Anyway, I turn, and he’s down on one knee, he’s got the ring out, and I just—” Harper can’t get the story out because she starts laughing hard. It’s a long minute, maybe two when she finally says, “I got so excited, I started jumping around, and I accidentally slapped his hand, and the ring went flying right into one of the vats.”

  “Oh, no!”

  “Ace freaked out, thinking I was saying no.” She rolls her eyes like that’s utterly ridiculous. “I had to hang onto him to stop him from diving into the vat. He was hanging, half off the walkway, yelling, ‘Noooooooooo! It’s . . . it’s . . .’ ”

  “It’s PRECIOUS!” Ace finishes, both of them breaking down in fits of giggles at the memory. I can’t help it, I join in, laughing so hard my gut’s aching by the time the fits end.

  “Thankfully, the winery was more than happy to go through their sludge for the ring,” Harper says. “They were cool with it, said it won’t hurt anything.”

  “Well, that’s good,” I finally get out. “And you two look so happy.”

  “It’s amazing,” Harper says breathlessly. “Oh! And we’re thinking a short engagement and wedding soon.”

  I stop, looking back and forth at Harper and Ace curiously. “How soon? And how far along are you?”

  “Tiffany! Not like that! I’m just . . . ready. Like I need to go shopping this weekend,” Harper says. At first, I think she’s kidding, but then she says, “I, uhm, already made an appointment to look at gowns if you want to go with me?”

  Talk about lifting a girl’s mood. “Oh, you mean soon-soon! Hell yes, I wouldn’t dream of being anywhere else!” I exclaim excitedly. “I need to make sure you don’t choose a wedding dress that looks like a nun’s habit. Or a teacher,” I say with a smirk, looking at her sensible flats, ankle-cut pants, and waist-knotted T-shirt that she definitely wore to work today. “Maybe we can find a dress with a sheer bodice? Or a thigh-high slit. Something with a little va-va-va-voom.” I shimmy my shoulders at her, and Harper blushes.

  “I’d like to get through my vows without having a stroke,” Ace says before realizing what he said. “Not that kind of stroke either!”

  Harper swats at Ace affectionately. “Both of you are too much! No, definitely not a Hollywood dress.”

  “Hollywood dress, rent-a-dress, brown paper bag . . . I just can’t wait to lock you down before you realize you can do so much better than me,” Ace says. “This insanity will pass before I know it, and I need to have you legally chained to me before then.”

  Harper comes over, giving Ace a big kiss on the cheek. “Don’t say that, you’re my most favoritest person.”

  Ace ignores his camera and pulls Harper into his lap, the two of them rubbing noses and getting kissy faced. It’s like the cutest form of foreplay or something ever, and I have to roll my eyes and pretend to gag. “Blech, if you keep that up, the dogs are going to puke up the peanut butter truffles, and I’ve done more than my fair share of clean-up duty lately, so that’ll be on you two.”

  Ace sticks out his tongue like he used to do when we were kids, but they do pull back a little bit. They can’t stop making goo-goo eyes at each other, though, so I still feel like a third wheel. “So, where are we going?”