Page 85 of My Favorite Bad Decision
“Ihave a thing tonight,” I tell Miller the next morning. He’s wearing nothing but suit pants at the moment and pulling on a dress shirt.
I could die happy, watching Miller get ready for work.
He tugs at the shirt cuffs. “Will I see you after?”
“Yes, but it’ll be late. Expect me to be in a bad mood.”
He grins. “I always expect that, Kitten.”
I throw a pillow at him and climb from the bed to pull on yesterday’s clothes. “If you always expect that, it’s a wonder you want to see me at all.”
He crosses the room and tugs me against him. “Your mood mysteriously improves around me.”
I go on my toes and kiss him. “Arrogant. But probably true.”
When I get back to my apartment, I research returning to medical school while lacking the courage to actually call and discuss it with anyone, and then get dressed for tonight’s family dinner.
I wish I wasn’t spending the evening away from Miller, but the bright side of these get-togethers is that Harvey doesn’t normally come while Charlie and my dad usually do. Charlie will bring some model or heiress who can’t keep her hands off him and pouts when he ignores her to go talk to Maren. My dad will refer to Roger as “the longest suffering man in Manhattan” at some point, and my mother will be furious for a solid ten minutes before she forgets why she was mad. Maren will be there with her badly behaved puppies, who will destroy something or shit on the floor, only to be disciplined by Maren with cuddles and baby talk, which will provide a strong indication of how my future nieces and nephews will turn out. All in all, it’s pretty entertaining. I wish Miller could see it. I wish he could become a permanent part.
I arrive at the club and head to the room my mother has reserved—The Skyline Suite, her favorite, because it has a lovely view of the city through the floor-to-ceiling windows that line one wall and an endless mahogany table big enough to seat all of us, along with any surprise guests we bring along.
My stomach sinks the second I enter: Harvey has shown up tonight. Worse, he’s brought his idiotic brother, Buck, who has long “joked” about how we should have had a double wedding with Maren and Harvey.
“Let me know when you cut Blake loose” is how he’s ended every conversation I’ve had with him over the past year, so it’s no surprise when he immediately sidelines me and starts bragging about today’s gains on the market. I excuse myself to get a gin and tonic, but picking up on no social cues, he follows me to the bar, and he’s still following me when the door opens…and Miller walks in, his brow furrowed for a moment before his gaze lands on me.
I stare at him. Maren stares at him. My mother stares too. Only my father is unsurprised, reaching out to shake Miller’s hand. “The intrepid explorer! Glad you made it.” He turns to face me, my mom, and my sister—all of us incredulous. “I invited him to tell us how many times our Kitty Cat fell climbing that mountain.”
“Henry,” Miller says to my dad, “I was trying to give you the benefit of the doubt about sending Kit to Kilimanjaro, but you make it difficult by openly admitting you knew about her coordination issues.”
Everyone laughs aside from me. Why the fuck didn’t Miller tell me he’d be here?
Granted, I didn’t specifically say I’d be at the family dinner, but I told him I’d be in a bad mood and surely he could have connected the dots. We should have discussed it, at least. I’d have dissuaded him from coming at all, but even if he disagreed, there are a thousand questions that could be asked that might prove awkward, answers we should have worked out in advance.
Did you spend much time together?
Did anyone hook up on the trip?
Miller, where’s your place again? The Caribbean? Been there recently? Oh, you were gone the same days Kit was! How incredibly curious!
Miller circles the room, greeting everyone, and Maren is unable to take her eyes off him. He thought I was making too big a deal of the situation, but I know my sister: Miller has only gotten more handsome. He’s also charming and intelligent and funny and kind, whereas Harvey could basically only pretend to be those things for a minute or two and no longer pretends at all anymore.
And while I’d welcome her realization that Harvey is a bag of dicks, I don’t want her focused on Miller instead. So, in other words, nothing has changed in the last ten years: Maren and I both want Miller, and because of that, I’m going to insist that neither of us have him.
Miller finishes talking to my mother—I’m not sure why I resent how traitorously pleasant she’s being to him after he dumped Maren when I just had him going down on me over coffee this morning—before he moves on to me.
“Hello there, little Kitty Cat,” he says, giving me a hug.
“What the fuck, dude?” I whisper.
“I’ll explain later,” he replies before he draws away. “You look fucking amazing, by the way.”
He gives me a glance that says he would like to take me around the corner and repeat everything we did this morning, and as furious as I am about being blindsided, my core is clenching.
My mother is traitorous. My vagina is just as bad.
We’re all seated eventually—somehow I’ve wound up across from Miller and beside Buck, who is trying to look down my dress while telling me about the boat he’s just bought in a way that indicates I’m meant to be impressed. I murmur appropriately timedhmmms andohhhswhile typing out a text to Miller.
WTF? How could you not tell me you were coming?
