“She looked good. Like different. But in a good way. Older.”
“Did you think she’d still look like that baby-faced twenty-two year old you once knew?”
He exhales. “Yeah. Kind of. In my mind, she looked just the way I remembered her. Did you know she got married?”
I squint. “No.”
She mentioned she moved here for an ex, but I assumed it was a boyfriend, not a husband.
“I guess she moved here with her husband, but then she said it was her ex-husband …” his voice dwindles into silence. “It’s just so weird.”
“What’s weird? That she moved on?”
“Yeah,” he says.
“Did you think she’d sit around waiting for you to come back or something?”
“No,” he says. “I mean, I don’t know. I guess I never really thought about her that much over the years.”
I’m not surprised. He couldn’t get rid of Jovie fast enough once we got back from Tulum. With Stassi as the new object of his affection, it was out with the old and in with the new.
“Aren’t you two still friends on Facebook?” I ask.
Right after he dumped her, he mentioned to me he wasn’t going to block her on social media because he thought it would be “healthy” for her to see him happy and moving on. He thought it would give her closure. I figured eventually she’d unfollow him or cut ties, but she never did. The whole thing was strange, but I tried not to look into it. People do all kinds of things for all kinds of reasons.
“Yeah,” he says. “But I don’t think she’s updated her profile in years. At least last I checked.”
“So you creep on her sometimes?”
“I have a couple of times over the years.” His tone is sheepish. “Don’t you ever get curious about people and wonder what they’re up to?”
“Of course, but the last place I’d look is online. None of that shit is real,” I say. And I know from experience since almost every divorce I handle involves one spouse submitting incriminating screenshots from social media and the other spouse denying their validity because ‘everyone lies online.’
“I wonder who the guy was,” he says.
“And I’m wondering why you give a shit all of a sudden. You’re getting married in less than two months. You need to get your head in the game, not out of it.”
A light rap at my door provides the perfect interruption to this conversation.
“I gotta go,” I say. “Thanks for the update on the tux.”
I end the call as my door swings open.
“That was fast,” I say, expecting it to be my assistant with the files I requested a minute ago. Only it’s Becca. “Oh.”
“I’m going out of town next week and I need you to meet with one of my clients.” She lays a file on my desk.
“I’ll have to check my schedule.”
She rolls her eyes. “Please.”
“Can’t you ask one of the other partners?” I ask. “We just brought on two new junior partners in the last month.”
“I don’t trust them with this case.” She taps her candy apple red fingernails against my desk. “It’s not as cut and dry as the ones they’re used to. It needs a little more … finesse.”
“Which part needs finessing? The case or the client?”
“Both.”
Few things in this world excite me more than a chance to get my hands dirty with a good challenge.
“I guess I can help,” I say, keeping a straight face.
“He’s coming in next Friday,” she says. “One o’clock. I’ll have your assistant add it to your calendar.” Checking her watch, she adds, “I’m late for a meeting.”
Becca tuns to leave.
“You’re welcome,” I call out when the door swings closed. Reaching for the file, I glance at the name along the label tab.
Jason Whitlock.
Never heard of him.
Chapter Fifteen
Jovie
* * *
Age 21
* * *
“Do you ever get tired of being the third wheel?” I ask Stone as we camp out in Jude’s car as he pumps gas.
“I should ask you the same thing.” His nose is buried in his phone.
I give his shoulder a playful smack. “I’m not trying to insult you. I’m asking if you ever thought about, I don’t know, dating someone. Then we could double date or something. Could be fun?”
He looks up from his screen, though his eyes are focused on the hood of the car.
“I date,” he says, a hint of umbrage in his tone.
“When?”
“All the time.”
“I’ve never seen you date anyone,” I say. I’ve been with Jude almost two years now and not once has Stone brought a single girl around or so much as mentioned one.
I’m beginning to think he has impossible standards. He probably has some over the top notion of what the ideal woman is like, and anyone who doesn’t hold a flame to that is automatically cast aside. I knew a guy like that once. Nothing less than perfect was good enough for him.