Page 86 of The C Agreement

“I’ll do that.” The words coming out of my mouth felt like a lie.

“I look forward to it. It was nice seeing you again, Cade.” With a kiss on my cheek, she was gone.

“She’s beautiful,” Beau said.

“She is. And very successful. If she really suggests our restaurant to people, we will be very lucky.”

“You’d better call her then to keep her happy.”

“Eh,” I said with a lift of my shoulder.

“Who are you, and what have you done with my best friend?”

Your sister’s ruined me, I thought as Em approached our table.

“Hey, Cade.” She sat down next to Beau and kissed him. “Hey, hon.”

A jealous feeling came over me. Not because I wanted Em, but because I was actually envious of what the two of them shared.

Where in the hell had this come from? I wasneverjealous.

“You missed it,” Beau said to his wife. “I just met one of Cade’s regulars.”

“Shut up.” Em’s mouth hung open. “And I missed her?”

“Yeah.”

“Dammit.”

“You two are not funny,” I told them.

“You know what’s really funny?” Beau asked, all humor gone from his face.

Something told me not to answer.

“What’s funny, hon?” Em asked for me.

“Remember the night we made the bet and the woman texted Cade about their plans that night?” Beau was talking strictly to Em, but I knew his words were for me.

I sat back as a sinking feeling came over me. I felt like I was missing something, but I couldn’t figure out what.

“How could I forget?” Em said.

“Well, when Cade called me later, I asked him if the woman who had messaged him was the woman he was seeing for the month, and he said yes.”

I closed my eyes as the conversation came back to me. I thought I had actually said something less concrete, like, “Yeah. Sure,” but it was an affirmative answer all the same. At the time, I had done it to get him not to pry further.

“So, that night, when he had gotten that text at dinner, I’d happened to see the name on the screen. And wouldn’t you know, it was the same name of the woman I just met a little bit ago? Only she hasn’t seen Cade in a month.”

Shit, shit, shit. I couldn’t believe that tonight, of all nights, we had run into Leila.

“Do you think Cade slept with her and then someone else during the bet?” Em asked.

“Nope. Because this woman said something about Cade canceling on her.”

I was so screwed.

“Uh-oh,” Em said and looked at me.