“Don’t be a sucker,” Cord said, but without rancor. “Reba had the chutzpah to juggle the three of us—and we were best friends—for the better part of a summer. One more idiot wouldn’t have thrown her at all.”

Another silence, longer than the last.

J.P. broke it. With a verbal sledgehammer.

“How many times did you sleep with Reba?” he asked.

It was a question they’d never asked each other, which wasn’t surprising, considering that they’d rarely talked about Reba after that one Christmas at Bailey’s. And it was a damn personal question, to boot.

“Once,” Cord heard himself say.

He carried his mug to the coffee maker, decided against another shot of caffeine and retraced his steps, putting the cup in the sink.

“Yeah,” J.P. murmured reflectively. “Me, too.”

“What about Eli?”

“Hell, I don’t know. I think it might be a different story with him. You remember how they were all over each other, he and Reba, at that party.”

“So, if the kid’s on the level, Eli’s the most likely candidate.”

“Or not,” J.P. said, and the quick way he responded lent the words a defensive note. “They were necking, after all, when we saw them, not having sex. She and I did our share of necking, and I reckon you could say the same.”

Yet again, Cord asked himself what the hell Reba had been trying to pull that summer. Yes, she’d been wild, unpredictable and often reckless, but she’d never struck him as cruel.

He shook his head. What did he know?

He’d fallen for Reba—excusable, since he’d been a dumb-ass kid amped up on testosterone at the time—but then he’d proceeded to date all the wrong women he could find, all through college. In fact, he’d actually married one of them, Jenna Clifton, despite dozens of red flags. He’d met her at a college reunion the same year his grandmother died.

Just as his dad, Bill and Mimi’s only son, had gone ahead and married a young woman he barely knew.

Toby Hollister had met his future wife, Julie Welch, in an LA club one hot August night, while he was stationed in San Diego. Within a month, Julie was pregnant, so they’d eloped to Las Vegas, tied the knot and proceeded to live unhappily ever after.

Not that Toby lived that long.

He’d been killed in a freak accident on base, when Julie was six months along.

“Yo, Hollister,” J.P. interjected crisply. “You still with me?”

“Yeah,” Cord said wearily. “I’m with you.”

“I’m worried about you, old buddy. Lately, you’ve been downright drifty. And that isn’t like you.”

“I think a lot,” Cord answered, mildly annoyed. “You ought to try it sometime. Thinking, I mean.”

J.P. laughed. “Not just drifty, but prickly, too.”

“Asshole,” Cord muttered.

“I rest my case.”