“You’re special, Hattie. And he knows it. He’s always known it. And I can’t speak for how he tried to draw it out, push you beyond what you were capable of giving to make you more when you were already great. My sense is, now he’s realizing how great you are and always were. And that doesn’t have to do with your dancing. It has to do with you being a daughter who would stick by her dad even when he didn’t deserve it.”

She made a study of watching her finger track his cheekbone, down past the corner of his lips, to his jaw.

“Babe,” he called.

Her gaze came to him.

“It’s never stupid to hope,” he repeated.

“Yeah,” she whispered, dipped her head and kissed him.

It got serious.

And then her phone rang.

They broke it off and she reached out and looked at the screen.

It said, FLYNN CALLING.

“Take it.” His voice was shaking with laughter.

“Axl, I don’t—”

“Take it, baby, naked Jacuzzi sex is on the line.”

She shot him a look then took the call.

“Hey, Flynn.” Pause then, “No. Um…” Pause then, “Well, actually, honestly, no. We haven’t been seeing each other very long.”

Axl beat back the audible laughter, but now his entire body was shaking with it.

She shot him a harder look.

And kept talking.

“Sorry, just to say, even so, we’ve known each other for a while, and I have the code to his phone.”

Axl made a noise like he was strangling.

She smacked his shoulder and got water in both their faces.

He didn’t mind in the slightest.

“Yes, well, I don’t know what to say,” she kept going. “I’m sorry about that. I just liked you a lot and it hurt to break it off, so I didn’t take your calls because, well, it hurt.”

Axl quit laughing.

“Yes, I would have known that if I took your calls, but…I’m so sorry to say this, Flynn, I didn’t, and I moved on and now I’m with Axl and this thing I have with him is really going somewhere. So you were honest with me. And even if it hurt, it was a nice way for you to be. So now I have to be honest with you and say there isn’t really any chance of that.” Pause then, “Yes. It would have been good to know then.” Pause and finally, “Yes, you too. It was…it was good between us. And I’ll always remember that.”

Ouch.

“Yes, ’bye.” She beeped to disconnect and put her phone down.

“I don’t wanna hear it,” she said.

He didn’t care.

“Did he break up with them?” he asked.

She grabbed her margarita in an effort to look anywhere but at him.

But she answered, “No. Though he said he was prepared to.”