Turnabout's Fair Play by Kaye Dacus Read Free Book Online

a second before joining in the laughter. “Three musicians—and y’all act like that’s all I ever date. I’d like to see someone who grew up in Nashville who’s never dated a wannabe singer or musician.”
    Caylor raised her hand.
    Flannery shook her head. “Doesn’t count—you sing in at least four different groups, not including your church choir, Caylor.”
    Even Zarah, who’d reverted back to quiet and pensive after exerting her social skills and having fun during the photo scavenger hunt bachelorette party downtown, laughed this time.
    After sorting out the scores—with Caylor’s and Zarah’s teams tying and Flannery’s winning by one point—Caylor and Flannery called it a night, though barely nine o’clock. The other women understood and departed with well-wishes and well-intentioned advice from the married gals on how to sleep the night before the wedding.
    As soon as the last one left, Flannery turned off the porch light and joined her two best friends on the sofa.
    Caylor’s phone chirped. She looked at it, smiled, and then dropped it into her purse sitting on the floor beside her feet. “That was Dylan. They’re just finishing and should be headed back to Nashville shortly. No injuries, and no one got lost in the woods.”
    “Good.” Though Zarah didn’t look as relieved as she sounded. “At least I won’t have to worry about Beth losing it tomorrow if one of the guys had to cancel with a sprained ankle or something.”
    “So…has Bobby told you yet where you’re going on your honeymoon?” Caylor waggled her eyebrows. Zarah went from pale to full-on blush in under one second. Had to be a new land-speed record. “We’re going to New Mexico—Las Cruces first, to revisit all the places we went when we were dating the first time, just for a couple of days. And then we’ll be spending a week at a resort in Santa Fe—somewhere we talked about visiting back then.”
    “Aw, that’s too sweet.” Caylor’s eyes took on a dreamy quality.
    Flannery sighed. Here they went—now Caylor would speculate on where she and Dylan might go on their honeymoon—
    “Flan—are you okay with this?”
    The concern in Zarah’s voice blasted through Flannery’s annoyance. What had she missed? Been volunteered for? “Okay with what?”
    “With me getting married. With Caylor’s being engaged. With…well, with having other people in our lives now. You’ve been acting kind of…different lately. Withdrawn.”
    “I’d almost call it sulking”—Caylor turned to sit with her back against the plush arm of the sofa, her feet tucked up under her—“except I’ve seen you sulk many times over the past thirty-odd years, and that usually lasts only a couple of hours, not a few weeks or months.”
    A cold hand of sorrow linked with a hot hand of embarrassment and wrapped around Flannery’s throat and squeezed, making even shallow breaths difficult.
    Zarah reached over and took Flannery’s hand in both of hers. “You know that you’re not going to lose us, right? That we’re not going to drop you in favor of the guys the way your sisters did, right?”
    Here they were, the night before Zarah’s wedding, when Flannery and Caylor should be scraping Zarah off the ceiling, and instead, Zarah and Caylor were trying to comfort Flannery.
    She burst into tears and flung her arms around Zarah. “I am so, so sorry. I’ve been narcissistic, making this whole thing about me, when I should have been focusing on you.”
    As usual, she’d been unable to clarify her feelings in her own mind until the words tumbled out of her mouth. “I’ve been a horrible best friend, thinking only of myself and my fears of how your engagements and weddings are going to change everything for me. I’ve forgotten to be happy for you—and for Bobby. I have to remember that I’m not losing a friend; I’m regaining a high school classmate.”
    The statement came out just as ridiculous as it’d sounded in her head, and she sat