Page 11 of Iris Kelly Doesn't Date

“Yeah, but you know how to talk to strangers,” Stevie said. “Charm them. How to act like a person who knows how sex works.”

Ren laughed. “Okay, well, when two people like each other, sometimes, they’ll take off their clothes and—”

Stevie threw an empty straw wrapper at them. “You know what I mean. Come on, even my therapist thinks I need to do this,” she said.

“Keisha told you to go have a random hookup?”

“Not in so many words. She said I should take a friend with me and ask someone out in a bar. To, you know, get more comfortable in that atmosphere.”

Ren’s brows popped at that. “How long ago did she issue that prescription?”

Stevie winced. “Four months?”

“Jesus.” Ren sighed, looking at Stevie through narrowed eyes. “All right. I’ll help you. But let’s do it tonight before you lose your nerve. Knowing you, you’ll get a good night’s sleep and come to your senses.”

Stevie nodded, nerves sparkling through her belly. “Okay. Fine. Tonight.”

Ren lifted their glass to seal the deal. Stevie clinked Adri’s coffee cup against Ren’s but didn’t drink it. No way in hell was she toasting her impending one-night stand with her ex’s cold coffee.

CHAPTER THREE

BY THE TIMEIris escaped the birthday dinner from hell, it was nearly ten o’clock. The meal had dragged on and on, and her mother insisted that everyone play at least one round of Scrabble before leaving, which turned into three, because Aiden couldn’t handle the fact that Emma was incapable of losing a word game and kept calling for rematches.

Iris endured it all, particularly after hertheatrics, as Emma called them, had caused her mother to drink not one, but two glasses of Pinot Noir at dinner. Iris had never known her mother to consume more than a sip or two of alcohol in a single sitting, and the resulting hiccups were both comic and worrying.

Still, when Maeve brought up Grant’s impending wedding as soon as Emma’s final letter tile hit the triple word score, bringing game three to a merciful end, Iris had had just about enough.

“Yes, Mother, I got the invitation,” she said, scooping tiny wooden letters off the dining room table and into the velvet bag while her siblings gathered their sleeping children from the living room. She’d always known her ex, Grant, would get married eventually. He’ddreamed of a big family, wanted to grow old on a front porch, snapping peas at twilight surrounded by grandchildren, so it wasn’t like Iris was all that surprised to receive the thick ivory invitation in the mail a few weeks ago.

“Her name is Elora,” Maeve said, taking a sleeping Christopher in her arms so Emma and Charlie could collect the amalgam of shit needed to keep a baby alive for an evening. “What kind of name is that?”

“A nice one,” Iris said brusquely, packing everything away in the Scrabble box and jamming on the lid.

“Odd, if you ask me,” Maeve said. “Not as nice asIris.”

“Mom,” Iris said, pushing her fingers into her temples. “Please don’t.”

“I’m just saying, you two were great together,” Maeve said.

Iris pressed her mouth flat. More and more lately, coming over to her parents’ house felt like undergoing a root canal—she felt exposed, judged for her choices, and left with a fierce need for some self-medication.

“You talking about Grant?” Aiden said, a passed-out Ava propped on his hip and probably drooling on his shoulder. “God, I miss him.”

“We all do,” Maeve said. “I felt like I lost a son when he and Iris broke up.”

“Thanks, Mom,” Aiden said, rolling his eyes.

She swatted at his arm. “Oh, you know what I mean. He was a keeper, that one.”

Iris slipped the game into the sideboard, alongside several other board games, and tried not to scream.

“I wonder what his fiancée is like,” Aiden said. “Bet she’s hot.”

“Who’s hot?” Addison said, appearing in the doorway, holding Ainsley’s hand. The little girl was nearly asleep on her feet.

“Um,” Aiden said, and their mother grinned.

“Grant’s fiancée,” Iris said, smirking at Aiden’s betrayed look.