I looked up at him. “My sister and mother. I swear they were drooling.”

He grinned and I needed a cocktail napkin myself. “Warm enough?” he asked.

The club was air conditioned, even though it was rarely needed. The weather today was in the seventies.

“Yes, thanks.”

He nodded, then his gaze lowered to my chest. “It’s cooler here and I just wanted to make sure.”

I smacked him on the arm when he’d picked up on the fact that my nipples were hard. The blush alone warmed me up. So did his smile. What he didn’t know was they weren’t diamond points because of the cooler air at high altitude, but all due to him. As soon as he was near, they tried to reach out and get to him.

“Glad I’ve got an effect on you.”

Boy, did he ever.

“What exactly is a coed bachelor/bachelorette party?” he asked, thankfully changing the subject.

I scanned the room. The mahogany bar ran the length of the back wall. There were high-top tables in a row in front of it, then small tables with comfortable chairs spread out around the room. For the private event, there was a banquet table covered in hors d’oeuvres and snacks. I counted about thirty people mingling and chatting.

“I think it’s just a cocktail party.”

“So no male strippers or women popping out of a cake.”

My eyebrows went up and took a second to imagine that happening in this stodgy bar.

“Doubtful. Although most of them will be drunk by nine. Who knows what will happen then.” I pointed to a group of men most likely talking about their golf game based on their body motions. “You ready for this weekend’s lineup?”

“Go for it.”

“The one with the gray hair and green shirt is my dad.” As if he’d heard me talking about him, he looked our way, smiled and offered a little wave.

“You get along with him?”

I knew he asked because it was clear I only tolerated Amy and Mother.

“It’s hard to say when he’s worked sixty-hour weeks since 1985,” I replied, then looked up at him because my father had gone back to chatting with his friends. “I always wondered how he and my mother fell in love, or how he’d stayed with her all these years.”

“Why’s that?”

“At this point, I’d say it’s a marriage of convenience. He makes the money and she spends it. He works all the time or is here at the club. She shops.”

“Amy does too?”

“Absolutely. Fortunately for her, Michael’s rich.”

I remembered then that the Manning’s weren’t poor either. Their huge property was well known in The Bend. So were the three brothers. I knew Alice, their housekeeper, from the strawberry shortcake.

“Sorry, I sound petty.”

He shrugged. “Money does weird things to people,” he countered.