Cherisse clicked the link Ava sent. The address turned out to be the same country club where they’d held the wedding shower. Why would Ava want them to meet her there, and what was with the secrecy? It obviously involved something wedding-related, but Cherisse couldn’t begin to know what. She returned to Keiran’s chat.

Keiran: so Eric dropped a weird meet me at this location text and a link to that country club. Weird.

Cherisse: Same here with Ava. What are they up to?

Keiran: No clue but he said to dress nice. What you wearing??

Cherisse: goodbye

Keiran: so mean

Cherisse: you like me this way

She pressed send on that before she thought better of it. Fuck. Would he take that as flirting? She hadn’t meant to. It just seemed to come easily with Keiran, which, no. This flirting banter with him was a terrible idea and possibly sent mixed messages.

She switched back to the chat with Remi and Julia, where the conversation was still ongoing minus Ava, who’d dropped her summons and vanished.

Julia: it’s the country club. That means we should dress fancy

Remi: I got that one dress that shows a lot of leg

Julia: anything you wear shows a lot of leg Madame Gazelle

This was safer territory. God, she was making this worse for herself.

It was so easy to let the banter fly when it wasn’t face-to-face, but it wasn’t helping to keep things casual. She realized she’d looked forward to his annoying meme messages, which weren’t so annoying at all. Funny. Cute, even. Which was bad. So very bad. And he’d been so sweet bringing her the soup when she’d been sick, even if in the moment, she’d acted put-off about it.

End this.

She tossed her phone on the couch. She had too many things to get done before meeting Ava at the country club for whatever mysterious reason. Cackling at memes was nowhere on that list. Thinking about how sweet Keiran had been and how maybe he wasn’t as terrible as she’d thought was going into a danger zone.

She ignored her phone while she finally typed up the list of names of persons who’d given Ava gifts at the wedding shower. Ava needed those for her thank you cards. But the constant pling of her phone kept beckoning, and finally, she sighed and picked it up, swiping to check the chats, but mostly Keiran’s reply to her ill-advised message.

Keiran: you know I do

Her heart, pounding in her chest, startled her. God. Why had she checked that? Should she reply? He’d know she read it, but what could she even say that wouldn’t make things more awkward when they met up at the club later? The country club. Where they’d had sex in a supply closet.

Congratulations, you definitely played yourself.

By the time Remi came home, showered, and got ready to head to the country club, Cherisse had worked herself into a tizzy. She’d popped on her sunglasses inside in preparation for stepping into the afternoon sunlight. After a week of confinement, the sun was sure to feel too bright. She’d also hoped to hide her growing anxiousness from Remi long enough that the drive would soothe her.