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Anthony tilted his head. “No, that’s not it. You were very quick to turn us down because you had plans with Grace.”

“She’s busy tonight and isn’t in the mood for going out, and I wanted to celebrate, so I figured why not call you?”

“That way of talking makes us feel really special,” Beckett said. “So, what are we celebrating?”

“The owners of the ranch called me today. They want me to be the sole investor.”

“That’s great news. I know you really wanted that.”

I nodded. “I do.”

“So, how about Grace?” Anthony asked.

“Gaston said she isn’t in the running.”

“Right,” Beckett replied, then held up his glass. “Okay, let’s clink even though we’re all drunk.”

“Wait a second,” Anthony said. “What do you mean, she’s not in the running?”

I looked straight at him. “She probably decided not to go forward with it.”

“She told you that?” he asked.

“No.” I waved my hand. “We never talked about it. We always had better things to do. And honestly, Gaston took so long to reach out that I assumed he’d changed his mind about taking on an investor at all.”

Anthony looked at Beckett.

“What?” Beckett raised a brow at him.

“I’m thinking,” Anthony replied. He turned to look at me again, frowning. I wasn’t used to seeing my younger brother frowning.

“What’s bothering you?” I asked.

“The question is, why isn’t anything bothering you?”

I jerked my head back. “Sorry?”

“So, you were supposed to go with Grace tonight?”

“Yeah,” I replied, wondering why we were back to that.

“And then you talked to this owner of the ranch who told you that he’s moving forward with you.”

“Exactly.”

“And then Grace ditched you?”

I rolled my eyes. “She didn’t ditch me. She just said that she’s not in the mood to go out tonight and congratulated me on the investment. Then ‘I hope you understand.’”

Both of my brothers groaned.

“What?” I asked.

“Dude, come on,” Anthony said.

I replayed the messages in my mind, a visual reel of each text.

“Fuck,” I exclaimed. “I assumed that ‘I hope you understand’ just meant that she hoped I didn’t get mad for her bailing on our date.”