For the Love of Friends(63)

“Caroline showed me the email and the text messages, Lily. You can cut the crap.”

“What text messages?”

“She texted asking where you were and you said you thought it was at three.”

I was stunned into silence. “And the messages were from me?” I asked quietly.

“Unless she’s got another Lily Weiss in her phone who was supposed to be at my shower.” She crossed her arms.

Caroline was better than I had given her credit for. She must have changed someone else’s contact in her phone to say my name and gotten them to send a fake text from me. And there was a zero percent chance that Caryn was going to believe that was what happened because what kind of crazy person does something like that?

You’ve got this, Alex had said. I nodded to myself.

“We must have crossed wires at some point,” I said.

“How’s that?”

“I emailed her when she was talking about shower stuff and asked what time it was, and she told me three.”

“She showed me the email—”

“There was another email. And I don’t know what happened, maybe autocorrect added the one and the two for the twelve and said three but . . .” I pulled up the email on my phone and showed it to her. “And if you scroll, you can see that that was in response to my question of what time the shower was.”

“So why didn’t you ask, if there were two different time emails?”

“I must have missed the one that said twelve. Caryn, I’m really sorry, but it was an honest mistake.” She looked unsure. “I got there at two thirty to help set up and they were already cleaning up. I was devastated. I bought a Lilly Pulitzer dress to wear to it and everything. So I’d fit in.”

This finally elicited the ghost of a smile. “You? In Lilly Pulitzer?” I gestured for her to give me my phone back, and I pulled up the selfie I had taken in front of the mirror before leaving for the shower.

“Is that vintage?”

“Look, the point is I really did try and I’m so sorry that I screwed it up. I have a present for you, too, but it’s too big to bring on the Metro.”

“It was really awkward trying to explain to everyone why one of my bridesmaids was MIA.”

“I know. I’ll make it up to you, I promise. I don’t know how yet, but I will.”

“Will you wear the Lilly dress to work?”

“Will that make you feel better?”

She shrugged slightly. “Maybe a little. It’ll be funny either way.”

“Then I’ll do it.” I got up to leave. “Thank you for being so understanding.”

“Just don’t screw up the time for the actual wedding. I know you’ve got a lot on your plate, but I should matter too.”

“Unless it’s wrong on the invitation, we’re good,” I promised and went back to my office.



I wrote a blog about Caroline before I did any work. The fake text messages were a whole new level of psychotic. But one thing she had said kept coming back to me. She said Caryn didn’t need me now because she had her. Was that what this whole thing was about? She just needed to be number one in Caryn’s life? Was she making her brother’s life miserable too? Or did she sense that Caryn had been trying to impress her for most of their lives and didn’t want to lose her little minion to a less fawning friend?

After I hit “Publish,” I leaned back in my chair. It was just after ten thirty and I hadn’t done anything remotely productive. Who had time to work with all of this pettiness? But before I dug into my work emails, I texted Alex. Thanks for the coffee. Drinks after work? You won’t BELIEVE the story I have for you.





CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT


Not that I had time to dwell on Caroline’s backstabbing. As much as she claimed she wasn’t thinking about me, I truly didn’t have time to waste on her after I got it out of my system by blogging. Jake and Madison’s wedding was the following weekend and I needed to get ready for Mexico.

I was briefly jealous of my parents, who were spending four days there before the wedding and three days after—they were getting an actual vacation. I, on the other hand, would fly down on Friday, go to the wedding on Saturday, and then go home on Sunday. According to Amy, I wouldn’t even have time to lie by the pool while a bronzed cabana boy brought me drinks.

“You should stay a few more days,” she said. “Tyler and I are making it a mini pre-honeymoon.”

“Didn’t you already get one of those when you went to check out the resort with Jake?”

She shrugged. “I mean, Mom and Dad are paying, so I wasn’t going to say no. Plus I can get a little color, so the yellow dress won’t be as bad.”

My mouth dropped open. They had said they would pay for my trip if I brought Grandma. Amy was getting a free vacation with her fiancé and didn’t have to do anything but show up and not get sunburned before her wedding?

Sputtering with the unfairness of it, I called my mother.

“You should have told us you wanted to stay longer,” she said. “I don’t think your grandma would mind, but I thought you would need to get back to work. Amy’s job isn’t exactly essential.”

“Well, I want to stay longer.”