Heidi Betts - Loves Me, Loves Me Knot

She heard grumbling, but couldn’t quite make out what Zack was saying beneath his breath. Obviously, some of the wind had been taken out of his sails-something that should have pleased her, but didn’t.

If she’d been home alone, she probably would have been curled up in bed by now with… Rex? King? Tonto?… and another pint of Ben and Jerry’s. As it was, she was hanging on to her composure by a thread thinner than the yarn she was even now pulling loose from her wedding gown pattern.

Surprisingly, it wasn’t anger that threatened to bubble over, but sorrow, and she hoped to hell Zack left before she burst into tears and let him know how much he’d hurt her.

Thankfully, he did, but not without a bit of prompting from his friends.

“Come on,” Dylan said. “Let’s get out of here. You’ll feel better after a couple of beers.”

“I’ll feel better after she’s behind bars,” Zack quipped, and she could imagine a sneer twisting his lips. Ironically, his tone didn’t seem to carry the same vehemence of only minutes before.

Even knowing he couldn’t see the gesture, Grace raised a brow and calmly said, “And I’ll feel better after you break out in genital herpes and your cock falls off.”

“You hope he breaks out in genital herpes and his cock falls off?”

Ronnie repeated the line for what had to be the six-thousandth time, followed by her six-thousandth chortle of laughter. This one just happened to be limoncello-induced.

Jenna was sipping at her own bright yellow drink, but even though Grace’s parting remark to Zack had been amusing, she hadn’t gotten quite as big a kick out of it as Ronnie apparently had.

After Zack had stormed out of the craft store with Gage and Dylan in tow, the ladies had continued on with their meeting. It had been a bit beyond them to pretend nothing had happened, but Grace had staunchly refused to comment on Zack’s accusations, remarking only on his infidelities and some of the less insane ways she’d handled it.

Not that taking scissors to a man’s hockey scrap-book and abducting his two-hundred-pound canine sounded particularly sane to anyone listening.

The women had all agreed, however, that she’d had every right to toss his clothes into the street-which had then led to a discussion about the classic scene in Waiting to Exhale when Angela Bassett’s character had stuffed everything her cheating husband owned into his car, doused it with lighter fluid, and set it afire.

Jenna cringed at the reminder, afraid it might be giving Grace fresh ideas. As it was, Grace took a tiny notepad out of her purse and jotted down the titles of every wronged-woman film the others in the group could recommend. Waiting to Exhale, Fatal Attraction , Double Jeopardy , and Chicago topped the list, but there were so many, Jenna thought she might have to confiscate Grace’s video rental card before she got the chance to do any more “research” into the fine art of making a man’s life a living Hell.

Soon enough, though, the meeting had broken up, and Grace, Ronnie, and Jenna had all agreed to head over to The Penalty Box for a drink. Even though she knew Gage would be there, waiting for her, Jenna felt the need to suggest that perhaps they go somewhere else. Because, of course, Zack would be there, too, and the way Jenna saw it, putting Grace and Zack in the same room together-even a very large room, filled with dozens of other people-was a recipe for disaster.

But Grace didn’t want to avoid the Box, she informed them haughtily. She wanted to go there, order a martini the size of Lake Erie, and have a good time, if only to prove to Zack that he couldn’t scare her away.

The Penalty Box had been their hangout for as long as Jenna could remember. Not just Zack’s and Grace’s, but the entire gang’s.

Jenna’s attention skimmed across the bar to where Gage sat with his friends. Zack was leaning on the round tabletop, wearing a deep scowl and sending the occasional scathing glance in Grace’s direction.

Ronnie’s boyfriend, Dylan, looked much more pleasant, sipping his beer and staring openly at the woman he loved. His gaze wasn’t exactly scorching, but there was a definite heat there, and Jenna thought he was probably calculating how much longer he had to hang out with the guys and let Ronnie hang out with her girlfriends before he could pluck her out of the booth and drag her home for a long and thorough ravishment.

Truth be known, Jenna was thinking something along those lines herself. Gage’s confession that he hadn’t been with any other women since their divorce-and certainly not before, thank goodness-played through her mind. Even when he’d been free, even when he would have been well within his rights to date and sleep with other women, he hadn’t.

Her heart gave a little flip at that, and at the knowledge that he was probably one of the most trustworthy men on the planet.

Gage chose that moment to look up, and their eyes met. She expected him to smile, maybe wink, but instead his expression remained stoically blank.

So much for trying to figure out how soon she could make her excuses and drag him home for some good old-fashioned slap-and-tickle.

Turning back to her drink, she used the tiny swizzle straw leaning against the side of the slanted glass to toy with the yellow liquid.

“Okay, you are entirely too quiet tonight,” Grace remarked.

Jenna raised her head and gave her friends a crooked smile.

“Sorry, I was just…”- feeling guilty-“thinking.”

Grace stole a glance over her shoulder. “About Gage the Wonder Stud?”

Heat flared into Jenna’s cheeks.

“Oh, stop!” Grace chastised lightly, wrapping an arm around Jenna’s shoulders and giving her a sideways hug. “Just because my life is currently circling the toilet bowl doesn’t mean you shouldn’t be happy. Look at Ronnie, she’s positively giddy, and I only half want to strangle her.”

They both turned their gazes to Ronnie, who was wearing a wide smile and staring off across the room at Dylan.

“It’s sickening, isn’t it?” Grace asked in a soft aside.

Actually, Jenna thought it was kind of nice. She remembered that part of the courtship ritual and how great it was to be head-over-heels in love, to have the world and every breath revolve around another person.

“All right,” Grace said with a sigh, pulling her arm back and taking a long, strong suck of her quickly disappearing limoncello. “I can see I’m the only one having a down-with-men moment here.”

“I’m sorry,” Jenna told her, “I know you’re having a rough time right now. I don’t mean to be distracted.”

Grace shrugged a slim shoulder. “That’s okay. I’m getting kind of tired of talking about the cheating louse, anyway. It’s taking up too much of my time.”

She raised a hand to get their waitress’s attention and signaled for another round of drinks. “So tell us what’s been going on with you and Gage. And I sure as hell hope he has been a wonder stud instead of just some damn Shetland pony.”

Jenna’s face flushed with color once more. Not so much from Grace’s remark this time as the memories it invoked. Memories of exactly how wonder-studly Gage had been the past few days.

“Nothing… much has been going on.”

Grace and Ronnie exchanged a glance before sly grins slid over both their faces.

“Oh-ho,” Ronnie laughed. “That means a lot has been going on. Come on, Jenna, give us the scoop.”

Jenna covered her eyes with a hand and gave her head a little shake. It wasn’t that she didn’t want to share the details of recent events with her best friends, but since she wasn’t clear herself on exactly what was going on, she didn’t quite know what to say.