He hadn’t thought his offhand joke would be featured in that article in any way, but there it was. In all its splashy, gossip-inducing glory.

“Eric, really, I’ll speak to the blogger about removing it,” he’d tried to assure his friend.

“Too late, K.” Eric’s sigh had been long. “It was a shitty joke to begin with. You’re going to have to apologize to Cherisse somehow. Do it before our thing later tonight. That’s all I ask. Ava has her own lime with the ladies tonight, and I’m pretty sure you’d be wise to get in your sorry before then.”

He’d forgotten all about the guys’ get-together. Eric wanted to celebrate his engagement with his boys. The engagement party had been for his parents and family, but tonight they would grab drinks and rib Eric about his last few months of bachelor life. Keiran had been so deep in the beats as soon as he’d gotten up, basically holed up in the studio since this morning, that it had slipped his mind. Then this whole article debacle. Eric was right; the joke was terrible, to begin with, and shouldn’t have made it past his lips.

Dale had joined him a few hours ago too. They’d been going hard, trying to put the finishing touches on this one track. Dale had been alerted to the article fiasco at the same time Keiran was, tossing him an I told you so glare before getting a call on his phone and disappearing upstairs, leaving Keiran to Eric’s chiding.

He stared at his phone. He should call Cherisse, get the apology done with. They’d grudgingly exchanged numbers to arrange a meet-up to discuss this joint bachelor/bachelorette party business. Neither had used it. The wedding was in June, a little less than four months out, so they didn’t have a lot of time. The short timeframe had gotten the rumor mill cranking, wondering if Ava was pregnant, but as Eric had told him, they’d been together so long, why draw out the engagement?

He was about to reach for his phone when Dale came clomping back down the stairs into the studio, hands full with three boxes. Boxes Keiran squinted at as he recognized the Sweethand logo, with the golden whisk and piping bag icons popping against the pink boxes.

“Sugar Queen came through!” Dale said, placing the boxes on the table. He picked one up. “Her PA dropped these off. My name’s on this one. Oh. One for mummy, too, and...huh.” He peered down at the last pink box. “This one’s got your name on it.”

Keiran signaled to the trumpet player to take five as he inspected the box. “You sure?” There was no way Cherisse had sent him anything good after that article mess, and Keiran knew she knew about it. So what game was she playing?

Dale held the box out to him while Keiran eyed it suspiciously. “Maybe you should vet it first.”

Dale rolled his eyes, resting the box with Keiran’s name on it off to the side. He peered into his own box. “Holy shit, these look good.” He took a whiff of whatever was inside. “And damn, smells like heaven. Mango, I think. Mango macarons, hell yessss.” He nudged his lid closed, then moved over to Keiran’s box. “Let’s see what she sent for—” Dale’s snort made Keiran jump. It was so unexpected. Then Dale dissolved into loud cackles. “Dude!” He snort-laughed, pushing the box over for Keiran to have a look.