He turned and paced across to the window of his office to stare out over the water. “I was best man at Brittany’s wedding.”

Of all the things she’d expected him to say, it hadn’t been that. “Her wedding? The wedding? So you’re friends with the bastard who walked out on her at the end of their honeymoon? Oh, my God.” A suspicion formed in her mind. “We saw him. He was flying the plane Skylar took last weekend. I recognized him. The first thing Brittany did when she arrived at college was pin a large photo of him on the wall to remind her never to be stupid about a man again. I stared at his face long enough to be able to recognize him when I saw him in person. Did you know he was back here?”

“Yeah, I knew. Zach is the best pilot you’ll ever meet. He owns his own plane now and flies the mega-rich to their yachts and beach cottages. The rest of the time he does his own thing, and it so happens he’s chosen to base himself on Puffin Island.”

“He was flying for Maine Island Air.”

“He helps them out sometimes. I didn’t think it was something that needed mentioning as Brittany isn’t here anyway, and their marriage was over before it started.”

“You are the master at withholding information.”

“Whereas you clearly support the principle of full disclosure, so by all means go ahead and tell her he’s here if you think that’s going to make her day and lift her mood.”

She knew it wouldn’t. “If you were best man, then you must know him well. Are you two still friends?”

“Yes.” He didn’t hesitate. “Friendship isn’t something you throw away just because someone makes a bad decision.”

“Bad decision? You don’t think he should have left Brittany?” She saw tension ripple across those wide shoulders and he turned to look at her.

“What I think,” he said slowly, “is that he should never have married her in the first place. That was the bad decision.”

“So why does Brittany blame you?”

He gave a humorless smile. “Because I knew it was a match made in hell. He got cold feet and wanted to ditch her on her wedding day, and I drove him to the wedding instead of the airport because I knew she’d be devastated. I didn’t want him to hurt her. Turned out he did that anyway, and I made it worse. Ditching her at the altar would have been a hell of a lot less complicated than ditching her at the end of the honeymoon.”

It was a lot to take in.

“What about the rest of it?” She forced herself to ask one more question. “Did Brittany tell you to kiss me? Was that part of the deal?”

His eyes darkened. “You know it wasn’t.”