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“Did you see him?”

“See who?” Quinnesa “Quinn” Crawford was looking around her friend to see who she meant.

Andie Daniels had just entered the bar and was now sitting at Quinn’s table. “You mean to tell me you’ve been here waiting all this time and you don’t see him?”

“See who, Ann? Who? It would help if you told me who I’m supposed to have seen.”

“Teddy child.” Andie slung her long blonde hair behind her back. “Teddy is in this bar. That’s who!”

“Teddy? What’s he doing here? Is Nikki with him?”

Ann gave Quinn a hard look. “Why would I be so concerned about Teddy being in this place if Nikki was with him? What’s wrong with you, Quinn?”

“I’m tired for one thing. I had a long day. Are you trying to say Teddy’s here with another woman? Is that what you mean?”

“Finally she gets it!”

Now Quinn was intrigued. “Where girl?” She was looking around everywhere.

Ann nodded her head in a direction that was across the restaurant. When Quinn saw Teddy seated at a table with a woman standing beside him, and they seemed in a deep conversation, her eyes stretched. “I don’t know her. You know her?”

“No I don’t know that heifer.”

“Stop being so rude. Maybe Nikki knows her,” Quinn said.

“I doubt that. And look at how cozy they are with one another. Nikki don’t know that woman.”

But Teddy knew her. He knew her well. He even waved his bodyguard off and stood up to greet her, another point that Quinn and Ann noticed too. “He never stood up for us,” Ann said.

“He stands up for Nikki though.”

“That’s his wife. He’s supposed to stand up for her. But who’s that chick?”

Her name was Caitlan Downs and Teddy was so surprised to see her that before he knew it they were hugging, which caused Quinn and Ann to stare even harder.

Teddy couldn’t believe how little she had changed. “Haven’t changed a bit,” he said to her.

“But you have,” she said to him. “Looking even more burdened down than you used to. I don’t know why you let your father work you so hard.”

She thought he was a shipping magnate who worked his father’s massive import/export business. She had no idea, just like many of the previous women he dated, what he truly did for a living.

“Mind if I sit down?”

He did mind, because he needed to leave, but they had split on good terms. He wanted to keep it cordial with her. And it actually felt good to see her again. “Sure.”

Although he didn’t assist her with her chair the way she was accustomed to, she was at least glad he allowed her a few minutes of what was obviously his busy schedule. “What’s with the bodyguard?” she asked him as they sat down and the bodyguard went back to his own table.

“Nothing at all. Just work. How have you been, Cait?”

“Good.” Then her forced smile left and her hard blue eyes turned sad. “Not so good.”

“Is it Bruno?”

“Bruno? Please. We divorced before that year was out.”

Teddy hadn’t heard that part. All he knew was that she had gotten married. When he left a woman, he left for good. Wasn’t interested in her backstory. Although he did, just once, inquire about Cait. “Sorry to hear that.”

“I’m not sorry. He was a world-class cheater. Worse than you.”

Teddy took a swig of his whiskey. He actually was never a cheater, because he was never in any exclusive relationships with anybody but Nikki. But he always got accused of being one after he stopped fooling around with his lady friends.

Caitlan smiled at him as if she didn’t mean to shade him. Because she really did need him. Because Teddy had that special sauce. He was no perfect little pretty boy by any means, but he had that rugged man-ness, that gorgeous sexiness in such a muscular, masculine way, that men dreamed of being like him and women dreamed of being with him. Teddy was a protector. A strong man. She missed that. She needed that.

“If Bruno’s not the problem,” Teddy said, “then what’s the problem?”

“Not Bruno, but another man. Which is the story of my life. But I’m worried about this one, Teddy.”

Teddy stared at her. He already knew her sudden appearance in his life could be staged. His antennae was already up. But Caitlan, like Nikki, had always been a straight shooter. Then he caught himself for comparing her to Nikki. “What’s his problem? Why are you so worried about him?”

“His violent outbursts used to be so infrequent that it was manageable. I mean, at least I could manage it.”

“But?”

“But now that shit’s happening every week.” She looked Teddy dead in the eyes. “He’s gonna kill me, Teddy, if I don’t do something.”

“Then leave his ass. What’s the problem?”

A look of distress crossed her pretty face. “May I?”

Teddy thought it unusual, but he slid his mug over to her and she took a long swig of his whiskey. Nikki’s friends at the table further over were beside themselves. If drinking behind somebody wasn’t an intimate move, they didn’t know what was.

Teddy would have agreed with them as he watched her swig it down. Cait was always a tough broad too. Like Nikki. Then he caught himself. There he go again!

“I need your help,” she said. “I need you, Teddy.”

She said it in a way that was so heartfelt that Teddy felt it. But he was Teddy Sinatra, not Joe Blow. He knew she could have changed from the girl he remembered, and it could all be a con.

But they split on decent terms. He used to like her a lot. He still was digging her vibe. “Text me his name and address. Will he be at home tonight?”

Her eyes lit up. “Yes. All night. He never wants to go anywhere. Does that mean you’re going to take care of it?”

“Me? No. But I’ll send a couple guys over. Give him a taste of his own medicine. When they finish with him, you won’t have any more trouble out of him.”

It wasn’t what she had hoped to hear. She wanted him to handle it. But it got her back on his radar. She was back in the game.

That was why she placed her hand on his hand and leaned toward him. “Thank you so much, Teddy. Thank you.”

Before Teddy realized it, she had leaned in so far that she had kissed him on the lips. He quickly removed his hand from beneath hers and frowned. “Cut that shit out,” he said to her. “Your ass may be divorced, but I’m still a married man.”

Caitlan hadn’t expected him to still be going hard for Nikki Tarver. He never went hard for her like that! But most married men pretended to be all in love with their wives the first time she came onto them. Because they knew that was expected of them. But they’d rarely met anybody as great looking and as great in bed as she was. And they always remembered that particular trait of hers. They always caved.

“Sorry,” she said. Then she smiled. “Not sorry.”

Teddy smiled as well. She was always good for a laugh too. But he wasn’t playing with her ass. He stood up.

“You still have the same number?” she asked him, although she knew he had.

“It’s the same number.”

“I’ll text you his information.”

“You do that.” Then she saw him look down her body. “Stay out the rest of the night. Don’t go home till morning. Give him a chance to sober up after they kick his ass.”

But she saw his gorgeously green eyes peruse her body, which she knew meant he was remembering just how good it used to be. Which was exactly the reaction she was after. “See you around, Teddy,” she said as if she was dismissing him.

Since he wanted to be dismissed, he didn’t give a shit. He left. His bodyguard gave her a glance. She was just that beautiful. And he left too.

But Quinn and Ann were beside themselves. “I’m a white woman,” said Ann, “and I’ll be honest with you: I don’t like seeing all these white men with all these black women all of a sudden when you used to hardly ever see that.”

“I’m a black woman,” said Quinn, “and I used to hate seeing all those white women with all our black men. But I’m sure you had no problem with that particular scenario.”

“None whatsoever,” said Ann as if that way was the normal order of things. “But now every time you turn around you see black women with white men as if that way is trying to become as common as black men with white women. But even somebody like me don’t like seeing that white chick with Teddy. That’s Nikki’s man. I’m not down with that.”

“Well damn, Ann, I hope not. Since Nikki is supposed to be your friend too.”

But Ann looked at Quinn. “One of us have got to tell her. They kissed, Quinn.”

“I know what they did.”

“I can’t believe it, but he actually kissed that bitch.”

“I said I know that, Ann, why you keep beating that dead horse? I know it.”

Quinn was distressed by what she witnessed and the fact that she was the only logical one of the two to tell Nikki. Especially since diplomacy and tact were not particular traits of Ann’s.

“But we have to tell her,” said Ann. “Just like we would want her to tell us if she discovered that our men were no good too.”

“There you go making a mountain out of a molehill.”

“He kissed her on the lips, Quinn! What molehill?”

Quinn knew it too. But if any couple in their friend group was going to make it, she had her money on Ted and Nikki. This was no joke for her. This was no opportunity to gossip for her. It hurt.

“I’ll tell her,” Quinn said, but she said it as if it was the last thing on earth she wanted to do.