LITMIR.BIZ

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her head into her hands. “I wish I’d have let him ask his boss now,” she replied glumly. “I’d prefer paint-stained hands over those three any day.”

      Amy came over with another scent stick, a look of concentration on her face. Without even speaking she grabbed Emily’s arm and dabbed the new scent inside her wrist, on top of the first one. Amy sniffed. Frowned. Sniffed again. Then grinned.

      “I think I’ve got it,” she said.

      Emily sniffed. “Yeah, that’s nice,” she replied in a lackluster voice.

      “You don’t like it?” Amy asked.

      “It’s not that,” Jayne interrupted. “Emily met the groomsmen today.”

      Amy raised an eyebrow. “Oh? Daniel’s elusive friends?”

      Jayne grabbed Amy’s arm. “You’ll never guess. It was those three in the foyer!”

      Amy’s eyes widened. “The ones I almost unleashed all hell upon?”

      “The very same.”

      Amy looked at Emily then. “Oh, babe. I’m sorry.”

      Emily cringed again. Daniel’s friends were oafs, but she was revealing a very nasty side of both her and her friends’ personalities. She knew they were being judgmental and petty. But she couldn’t help it.

      “Look,” Amy said, taking charge of the situation as she was often wont to do. “Why don’t we finish up here now we’ve found the scent and head back to the inn? We can have some drinks, get everyone’s tongues loosened up a bit. Then we’ll get to the bottom of it for you. Find out the deal. Who they are, what they do. Find out any juicy gossip.”

      “It’s the juicy gossip I’m worried about,” Emily replied glumly. “I just don’t understand how Daniel can be who he is with this mysterious past and these strange friends. None of it matches up. There’s like young Daniel who hated his home life and was flunking school and almost ran away, the one who was friends with those three. Then there’s Tennessee Daniel, the one who fathered a kid and beat a guy to a bloody pulp. Neither of them are my Daniel. It just freaks me out.”

      Amy rubbed her shoulder. “You’re just getting wedding jitters. It’s fine. Everyone has pasts.”

      “But not everyone hides them like Daniel does.”

      “He’s just embarrassed,” Jayne said. “I would be if those were my friends!” She cackled.

      Emily wanted to let her friends lift her spirits but it just wasn’t helping. The idea of all of them sitting around a table conversing, not to mention with alcohol added to the mix, didn’t seem that appealing to her. But it was going to have to happen sooner or later. May as well get it over with.

      “Okay, fine,” Emily said. “Let’s just get it out of the way.”

      Amy paid for the fragrance, exchanging business cards with the girl behind the counter, and they left the store. Emily’s friends linked arms with her, supporting her, like always, through every step of her journey.

      “I don’t know what I’d do without you guys,” Emily said as they strolled together back to Amy’s car.

      “I do,” Amy said with a mischievous twinkle in her eye. “You’d smell a whole lot worse!”

      CHAPTER FIVE

      It was an awkward mix of people, to say the least. The only relief Emily could feel as she looked at the strange array of faces scattered around the porch table was that her father and Chantelle weren’t here, since they were too absorbed in their work in the greenhouse to participate.

      Conversation was stilted. Even a pitcher of beer didn’t seem to help.

      “How did you all meet, then?” Amy asked, evidently trying to be as friendly as possible.

      “I’m Daniel’s oldest friend,” Stuart said. “I met him at school, way back. Back when he was still called Dashiel!”

      “The less said about that the better, thanks,” Daniel replied. He’d changed his name from the one that matched his father’s at a young age.

      “I joined the gang in middle school,” Evan added. “We picked Clyde up in high school.”

      “We got into mischief from that point onward,” Clyde finished. “Then sort of went our separate ways.”

      “Daniel was the only one who left the state though,” Stuart added. “Maybe to get away from us.” He laughed.

      Emily wondered. Maybe Daniel had wanted a fresh start away from his past when he left for Tennessee.

      “There’s nothing like a wedding to bring old friends back together,” Clyde said.

      “And it’s great timing, Danny Boy,” Stuart said, grabbing Daniel roughly around the neck. “I’ve only just gotten out on parole.”

      Emily took a huge swig of her drink. She felt Amy and Jayne shift uncomfortably beside her.

      “What were you in for?” Jayne asked.

      Amy and Emily shot her daggers. Jayne was clearly just trying to make conversation and, never one to think more than a millisecond before speaking, had asked the question that was on everyone’s minds.

      “Just a DUI,” Stuart said, shrugging like it was absolutely nothing at all.

      Emily started to feel very hot. She tugged at the collar of her shirt.

      “Oh,” Jayne said, exhaling her relief. “I was worried you were going to say murder or something.”

      Clyde and Evan laughed loudly. Emily kicked Jayne sharply under the table.

      “He got off on that charge,” Clyde informed Jayne.

      Her eyes bulged in disbelief. “Really?”

      Clyde and Evan laughed even more loudly this time.

      “No!” Clyde exclaimed. “But you should have seen your face.”

      Jayne wasn’t the only one not able to take the joke. Stuart himself looked furious.

      “You’re one to talk, Clyde,” he said. “I’m not the only one sitting around this table who’s been inside!”

      Emily felt her whole body sag with deflation. These guys were coming across as completely unstable. So much for getting to the bottom of the mystery of these guys; the more they revealed the more she wished she didn’t know.

      “You guys must have some funny stories about Daniel,” Amy said, trying to calm the situation.

      Daniel went bright red. “Oh God no, let’s not.”

      But it was too late. His friends’ faces were immediately brightening.

      “I’m glad you asked,” Stuart said. “What would you ladies like to hear? The one where Daniel gets drunk for the first time ever and ends up ripping his pants climbing a chain-link fence or the one where he loses his virginity?”

      “Neither,” Emily said, shaking her head, feeling the panic begin to set in.

      Daniel, too, was looking petrified at the prospect of those two particular stories being relayed.

      Stuart nudged Emily. “Don’t tell me you haven’t told each other all your dirty secrets yet?”

      Emily’s embarrassment grew more and more. Maybe it was because her own past was so difficult and muddy that she hadn’t forced Daniel to open up more about his own, but she was beginning to regret that now. What if both stories were so horrific they put her off marrying him completely?

      “There was this girl, Astrid,” Stuart began.

      Daniel buried his face in his hands.

      “Their eyes met across the room,” Stuart continued. “It was love at first sight. She approached. Daniel couldn’t believe his luck. Then she said the words that struck fire into his heart. ‘Can I borrow your protractor?’”

      “Wait,”

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