“You slept with the stripper?”

I stared in horror at my sister. Lindsey overturned her margarita goblet and slurped the last few droplets of the frozen concoction. Pretty sure it was just pink-tinted tequila at this point, and she had reached her limit about three drinks ago.

I tangled my hands in my hair. “But I only left you alone for ten minutes?”

Lindsey couldn’t speak without slurring, but she could still chastise me with a wagging finger.

“I didn’t sleep with him now. I wouldn’t fuck that curvy cock again! I gots my new man! Getting married!”

The bachelorette party whooped in excitement as Lindsey danced, stumbled, and nearly clocked herself off the bar in an attempt to showcase the ring for the fourteenth time that night.

I wasn’t as amused as the other girls—or drunk, obviously. They hollered at the stripper clad in a particularly shiny g-string and bow tie. Lindsey shouted the loudest.

“Curvy cock! Curvy cock!” My sister swiped for the stripper’s red sequined thong. “That boy don’t know if he’s going or coming, but Imma tell you…he’ll get there quick.”

Oh god. The stripper stopped dancing to cover his package.

Only Lindsey had the ability to revert a sexy man with a greased six-pack back to the studious kid I recognized as her class’s salutatorian.

“Christopher Curvy Cock! Slap his ass, Mandy! Make that dingle dangle!”

I was in no condition to dangle anyone. Lindsey ordered another drink. The bartender mercifully watered it down.

“Maybe you ought to stay quiet and let the nice man dance?” I smiled at the stripper as he protected the elastic on his g-string from the bridesmaids’ wandering hands.

“I haven’t seen that slanted shlong since prom.” Lindsey giggled to herself. “I got on my knees, and that love stick bent into a boomerang! It looped into his belly button!”

As far as I remembered, Lindsey went to prom with Bryce. It was the third drunken revelation I vowed to forget after tonight. I hid my face as the stripper greeted Lindsey with an awkward smile and asked her to use his stage name—Firechild.

Lindsey refused. “That cock still bent? Let’s see! I wanna see!”

Fortunately, the bar hosting us didn’t permit complete nudity.

Unfortunately, that didn’t stop my sister.

The music cranked louder, compliments of the bridal party. Drowning in her tenth margarita, Lindsey sloshed to her feet. She gave Christopher a lecherous grin before pitching the glass across the bar and awkwardly leaping at the professional erotic dancer.

I reached for her and missed. Lindsey dove headfirst into his tushy and…

He shouted. The girls cheered.

Christopher whirled around and covered his behind. “She bit me!”

God, I hoped strippers could earn worker’s comp. Was my sister up-to-date on her vaccinations? This wasn’t happening.

He stood, shocked, as Lindsey fumbled at his waist. She gripped his thong and tugged, ripping the material off. She fisted it over her head with a triumphant roar.

The stripper was, in fact, distinctly…curved. Awkwardly so. I tilted my head.

How did he even get it to—

“There it is!” Lindsey celebrated her victory by wearing the thong instead of her tiara and nearly puking on the bar. “I found that wavy wang!”

I peeled fifty bucks from my wallet and shoved it in the stripper’s hand.

“I’m so sorry about my sister. Please know that this bridal party respects penises of all shapes, sizes, colors, and religious expressions.”

He shook his head. I was so relieved he didn’t also wiggle below. “I—”

“Save yourself,” I said. “Run.”

He didn’t bother to grab his clothes. Christopher bolted bare-assed out of the party. The bridesmaids snapped pictures they were sure to regret later.

“Aw! Where’d that shlock go?” Lindsey slammed her drink on the bar. It spilled. “Lighten up, Mandy! Maybe you need a little dick in you, sloosen you up!”

That was the last thing I needed. “Maybe we ought to get a little coffee in you?”

“You’re not even drinking!”

“I’m driving us tonight, remember?”

Lindsey tried to blow a raspberry at me. She forgot to swallow the margarita first. The drink went everywhere, and I stopped her before she licked it off the bar.

I had drunk-sat my sister before, but she’d never gotten this bad. Lindsey giggled, whined, and nearly wet herself like a toddler.

Well, hell, if this was what having a baby was like, I could handle it. Especially since babies usually didn’t run up ridiculous bar tabs.

“You’re. No. Fun.” Lindsey pointed at me. “That’s what you are. No fun. No funny funny fanny.” She waved me close. “Know what’s fun?”

“I’m afraid to ask.”

“Fucking a curved cock.” She laughed a little too loud. “Don’t tell Bryce!”

“Oh, believe me.” I ordered another ginger ale. “No one is going to know what happened tonight.”

I certainly wasn’t telling a soul about the nightmare that was Lindsey’s first of three bachelorette parties.

No one would know how Lindsey insulted all of Taiwan during our mani/pedis.

Nor would I tell the story of the limo’s broken window and combustible two liter bottle of soda.

And I hoped I could get the video off YouTube of Lindsey performing karaoke on the restaurant’s hibachi. It was a good Beyoncé impression until they turned on the grill.

My sister never handled alcohol well. She took criticism of her drinking habits worse. My newest mission was forcing her to drink water before her head exploded, and we weren’t even in phase two of the bachelorette party.

Because Lindsey’s party wasn’t just one night.

Oh no.

This was only the beginning.

“If we want to get to the cabin, we should head out now.” I guided the bottle of water to her lips. She cheered, splashed, and spilled on me. At least she was excited about the weekend excursion to Bryce’s family’s lake house. “It’s a long trip—”

“God, Mandy. Can’t you just relax for once?” Lindsey belched, and that did nothing for the nausea swirling in my stomach. “You’re all…go here, go there, eat your noodles, go to the cabin, don’t steal the traffic cone, stop groping the policeman—”

“It’s your schedule,” I said. “You said to stick to the itinerary, no matter how many bars we crawled.”

“But I wanna dance!”

Lindsey attempted to take off her bra before removing her shirt. The shoulder strap snapped off, and she collapsed in a fit of giggles. She headed for her panties instead.

Of course, in classic Lindsey style, those were lost somewhere between the mani/pedis and dinner.

Lindsey whipped half of her bra out of her sleeve and over her head. The other half tangled around the piercings she still had to hide from Mom.

“Someone start the music!” She howled.

The music was already blaring. I covered my eyes as my sister lifted her skirt and flashed the bar.

Oh sweet Mary and Joseph—

Now was not the time of the month for her to be expressing herself!

The tampon string was just the fuse that would blow this party from drunken fun to jail time.

I grabbed Lindsey and dove over her skirt before the world saw everything she was giving away for the wedding.

“Okay, we’re leaving for the cabin now. We need our rest, right?” I shook Lindsey to gain her attention. She toppled onto the bar. “The cabin’s gonna be just as fun. We’ll get to work on the wedding dances.”

“Dances!” Lindsey slouched a bit. “Can’t wait to nae nae.”

I could. Oh, Lord, what I wouldn’t do to avoid the rest of the weekend. But we only had six weeks until the wedding, and Lindsey’s choreographed dance routines didn’t learn themselves.

The only thing that horrified me more than an unplanned pregnancy was shimmying onto the dance floor with my fellow bridesmaids just to reveal that I was the only black woman in the tristate area with no rhythm. At least it was only my closest friends and the entirety of my family that would witness this disaster.

And Nate.

Of course Nate would see me awkward, jerky, and combusting in shame. Then again…it wouldn’t be much different from when I usually spoke to him, except this time I was expected to shake my booty.

I couldn’t even hand jive, and Lindsey sure as hell expected more than the twist. I was boned.

“Time to go!” I helped Lindsey to her feet. “Know what’s better than dancing? Sobriety!”

“And curvy cocks.”

“Of course.” I handed Lindsey to the other bridesmaids, and they helped me out the door. “I’m sure genital deformities are just as fun as getting a big cup of coffee and sitting quietly!”

Our limo returned the party to Mom’s house, but I’d borrowed Dad’s SUV to haul all seven of us to the Washington’s cabin for Lindsey’s bridal-dance boot-camp. Not that I didn’t trust a limo to off-road it along the cabin’s dirt path, but I wasn’t getting stranded without four wheel drive anywhere Lindsey couldn’t access Pinterest.

“Road trip!” Lindsey’s excitement was short-lived. She tripped trying to hop into the SUV, and her butt sprawled onto the gravel.

Her howl woke the neighborhood. Worse, it woke Mom.

“Oh no! My hand!” Lindsey shrieked. “I hurt my hand!”

The bridesmaids tumbled out of the SUV, spilling onto the driveway in a pile of tiaras, feather boas, and vodka. I raced to my sister, avoiding a slap as she thrust her hands towards me.

I groaned. She had a little scrape over her fingers. It rubbed raw where the engagement ring rested, but Lindsey screamed like she amputated it with a bayonet on a World War I battlefield.

Mom’s front door opened.

This wasn’t going to be good.

Our larger-than-life mother raced outside in a robe and nothing else. I loved my mom for taking pride in the natural endowment the Lord saw fit to give her, but those ta-tas thundered every which way but symmetrically as she raced to Lindsey.

“Oh Jesus have mercy. Look at your hands!” Mom tied her robe closed, but not everything tucked inside.

My sister and I stared in shared horror at our mother’s heaving bosom.

When and why did she get a tattoo of a snake wearing a helmet?

And why was it curled so obscenely around Mom’s nipple?

Lindsey yelped first. Oh god. The tattoo wasn’t a snake.

It wasn’t a snake at all…

“Mandy, how could you?” Mom snapped at me.

I couldn’t look away from the slithery penis tattoo curled to engulf what was once a chocolate chip before two babies flattened it into a pancake.

“What did I do?” I covered my eyes.

“Why didn’t you help your sister into the car?”

“Because she’s twenty-eight years old?”

“You have a responsibility to her! She’s tipsy!”

She wasn’t tipsy, she was one shot away from black-out. I knew better than to correct Mom. The last thing she needed to hear was stories about her daughter, a Vice officer, and a very crude rendition of Let It Go in reference to her bladder.

“Mom, what about my pictures?” Lindsey hiccupped. “I’m supposed to take pictures with my ring on Monday!”

It was one in the morning, and the baby drained every last bit of energy from me. I was sick, hungry, tired, and my head hurt. God forbid we saved two hundred dollars by not commissioning pictures specifically for her engagement ring.

“Now you don’t have to shove your hand in strangers’ faces.” I grabbed a bottle of water from the hatch and poured it over my sister’s hands. She was barely scratched and would live…unless a weekend with her finally broke me. I herded the drunken bridesmaids into the SUV. “Get in the car, Linds. We have an hour and a half trip.”

“How dare you?” Lindsey appealed to Mom. “Did you hear her?”

“Mandy, show some compassion,” Mom scolded. “And after Lindsey stood up for you this week!”

I shouldn’t have asked. “Now what did I do?”

“You cut your hair without asking Lindsey!”

“Without…” I tugged on my shorter locks. Here I thought I’d look cute, something to take my mind off of the wedding, Nate, and the baby. Instead I caused some sort of inter-family drama for a twenty dollar cut. “Why would I ask Lindsey?”

Lindsey stomped a foot. “For the wedding, freakface!”

Too much. “Get in the car.”

“You didn’t even ask if you could cut off what…seven inches of hair?”

“Four. It’s no big deal.”

“It is a big deal!” Lindsey sniffled. “You have no respect for me, for this wedding, for the beauty we’re trying to create. You are the worst sister. Just once I want you to think of me first!”

Right. Because keeping the secret of my lifetime to spare the family any drama during the wedding wasn’t enough. If she only knew how much I needed her, how I wished my big sister would tell me everything was okay and that we’d get through it.

But I didn’t fight her. We had two days planned at the cabin, and the bridesmaids couldn’t remember why they were drinking. I had to drive, and I had to get us there in one piece.

“I’m sorry, Lindsey.”

“That’s all I wanted!” My sister wrapped me in a tight hug. “You do care about me.”

“Of course I do.”

“And you know how much I love you!”

Oh man.

I knew I was wrong to doubt her. Stress and the spotlight just went to her head.

“I love you too, Linds.”

“And this will work out for the best.” She brushed away tears. “With your new haircut, I’ll definitely be the prettiest at the altar.”

Son of a—

I grunted. “Get in the damn car.”

Lindsey obeyed, squeezing in the back with her friends Tweedle-Dee and Tweedle-Dum, also known as her college roommates Carmen and Amy. They rooted through the first-aid kit and applied whatever medication they could find to Lindsey’s scrape.

That was how we lost our only tube of calamine lotion. Nothing bad could possibly come from that.

I had about two hours until I got them to the cabin, tossed them in beds, and had a few minutes of sober quiet.

Of course it didn’t work that way.

I pulled off the highway an hour later as Dad’s check engine light flicked on.

Lindsey mumbled from the back seat. “Why are you slowing down? What’s wrong?”

I knew as much about cars as I did pregnancy—and I learned too late what would happen if I let Nate’s dipstick check my lubrication.

“Um…” The car clunked. That probably wasn’t good. “I think it’s breaking down.”

Lindsey’s supersonic scream awakened the passed out bridesmaids. I doubted her shrieking would push the SUV the remaining twenty miles to the cabin.

“What do you mean we’re breaking down? We’re in the middle of nowhere! There could be bears outside!”

“Bears?”

“Or murderers!”

I eased off the highway. “Maybe they’ll kill the bears.”

“Haha. You’re always so funny. Well I’ll be the one laughing when you’re skinned alive first!”

“Jesus, Lindsey. You’re a friendly drunk, but you’re a monster with a hangover.”

“Don’t start, Rapunzel. This is your fault.”

“How can you be mad at me?”

“I’m mad because every single time you have some responsibility for the wedding, we end up with indigo invitations or no flowers or broken down on the side of the road!” Lindsey kicked her bridesmaids to free herself from the mass of purses, luggage, and bottles. She crawled into the passenger seat and grimaced as her skirt hiked up to just under her bra. “Save the apologies for the cabin. I don’t want to hear them now.”

“Good, cause I wasn’t giving you any!”

“Don’t make me call Mom.”

“Go on. Call her.” I bluffed. “We’re in our twenties. Even she’ll tell you to grow up.”

“You grow up.”

Lindsey stole my water and chugged it. She made a face, grabbed for the car door, and barely opened it in time to throw up.

The splash against the asphalt twisted my stomach.

And I had done so well battling the morning sickness tonight. The baby didn’t like his or her aunt tossing her bouquet.

I opened my door and threw up too.

“Oh you little faker.” Lindsey ripped her cell from her pocket. “I can’t believe you’re so desperate for attention you’d fake vomiting.”

I reached for my water. Lindsey stole it and drank the rest.

“Who are you calling?” I asked.

“Bryce.” She pointed the phone at me. “I’m getting us out of here. Someone has to be responsible.”

“I’m not trying to start a fight—”

Lindsey thrust a finger in my face to silence me as Bryce answered the call. She put him on speaker-phone and called his name until he groggily awoke from a dead-sleep.

“Yeah, sugarplum?” He grumbled. “What time is—”

“I need help. Dad’s worthless SUV broke down. Of course he didn’t check to make sure it’d get us to the cabin. I can’t believe he’s so careless.”

I bristled. “He let us borrow it, Linds. And he loaned it to us with a full tank.”

“I don’t see Dad out here, pushing the car for us.” Lindsey grunted. “No wonder Mom left him.”

The irritation swelled inside me. Baby or no baby, I’d walk home if she was going to be that ugly.

“You have no right to talk about Dad like that,” I said.

“Oh, I forgot.” Lindsey rolled her eyes at her bridesmaids. “Mandy takes Dad’s side.”

“I’m not on anyone’s side!”

Bryce’s connection crackled. “Angelkiss, where are you—”

Lindsey ignored him. “You are too on a side. You’ve always believed Dad over Mom.”

“What’s there to believe? They hate each other!”

“For good reason.”

“No. There’s no reason. I don’t know why we’re supposed to be happy they separated.”

Tears welled in my eyes. Great. Now I was crying over my parents’ divorce like I was a ten year old latchkey kid caught in a custody battle.

Lindsey groaned. “Oh, Mandy, grow up. Dad’s worthless and Mom kicked him out. Just be glad the holidays will be less insane.” She flicked her phone. “Bryce, we’re on the highway somewhere. Drive until you find us.”

He preemptively apologized. “But, tootsie, I’m not at home…”

“What?”

“I told you. You were going to the cabin, so I went with Rick to—”

“That lecture? In Ironfield?”

“He wanted company, and since he’s still hung up on Jada—”

“You’re leaving me stranded?”

“Call AAA.”

“I have a better idea. What if I just get eaten by bears?”

“There aren’t any bears near the cabin—”

I sighed. “Don’t bother, Bryce. Lindsey thinks we’re gonna get Texas Chainsawed up here because every serial killer in a hundred-mile radius wants to ruin the wedding.”

Lindsey sneered. “You are such a little brat.”

Bryce cleared his throat. “Look, I’ll call Nate.”

My stomach dropped.

Lindsey sighed. “Fine.”

“No!” I didn’t mean to shout. “We’ll be fine. Don’t call Nate.”

“I am not going to sit here alone for some skeevy tow-truck driver,” Lindsey said. “It’s dangerous. We’re too pretty to get trafficked, and I am not above trading one of you—” She pointed to the blitzed bridesmaids. “—So I can escape and get married.”

“Really, we’ll be fine without Nate.”

My sister took the phone off speaker. “We’re like twenty minutes from the exit. Tell him to hurry.”

She ended the call. I said nothing.

“What?” Lindsey crossed her arms. “What? Just say it.”

“We could have handled it ourselves.”

She glanced at the bridesmaids. I didn’t trust her smile. “I know what this is.”

My stomach twisted. Could I get sick without her noticing? “What what is?”

“Nate.”

“There’s nothing about Nate.”

“Of course there is. I’m not blind, Mandy.”

I swallowed, but nothing made it past the rock in my throat. Instantly my body broke out in a cold sweat, and the morning sickness surged in the middle of the night.

“Lindsey, it’s not what you think it is.”

“I’ve known for a long time.”

“You have?”

“Everyone knows. And, quite frankly, we’re too nice to say anything. But not now. I think it’s completely inappropriate.”

I hadn’t had a single drink, but I felt like I got smacked by the empty whiskey bottle. I stared ahead at the dark highway, struggling with a breath that hurt to take.

“You hate Nate,” she said.

My eyes widened. Lindsey crossed her arms, smug.

“I hate him?”

“Of course you do. You always have. You’ve been nothing but a bitch to him these past few months, even when he’s trying to be nice. You’ve resented that he’s so involved in the wedding, and it’s selfish.”

Well, that was a freebie. “You’re right. That’s it. I hate Nate.”

“I can’t believe you’d just agree like that.”

“What can I say? I hate the both player and his game.”

“Do you want this wedding to fail?”

I gritted my teeth. “I have done nothing but support you.”

“You don’t support me. You never have.” She shook her head. “If it wouldn’t destroy Mom, I’d kick you out of the wedding.”

“Because of Nate?”

“Yes!”

I laughed. “You have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“Fine. You’re out of the wedding!”

The SUV silenced. I should have argued. I should have told my sister she was stressed, tired, and drunk, and that she didn’t mean it.

But after spending three hundred dollars of my own money on her bachelorette party, I was done. I didn’t have the alcohol to blame on my rage, but I had a baby twisting my hormones. I was pretty sure the kid was on my side in this.

“Sounds good.” I tore the seatbelt off me. “You’re on your own.”

“And I’ll do a better job than you.”

“Fine.”

“Fine!” Lindsey crossed her arms. “Hogface.”

Childhood insults now? I kicked the door open. “Feetmuncher!”

“Douche Canoe!”

I slammed the door before I said the real insult on my mind. Lindsey couldn’t roll the window down without the keys.

She screamed instead.

“Twatwaffle!”

“I’m out of the car!”

“Get in here before you’re eaten by a bear!”

“Oh my God, Lindsey, there are no bears!”

I sat on the guardrail and ignored her insults. After ten minutes she gave up and yelled at her bridesmaids. They lowered their seats and tried to sleep.

Not a soul passed us on the highway. The wind whistled through the wetlands below the guardrail. I swallowed. Whatever lurked in the grasses and shrubs rustled a lot and got too close. I smacked at imaginary bugs and pretended I didn’t have to go to the bathroom.

A long hour passed before headlights pulled up. Nate parked and got out of his car. That cocky smile was saved just for me and my desperation.

“You look like you need a rescue,” he said.

After an hour in the damp and chill, simmering in rage, and planning how best to turn my maid-of-honor dress into rags for waxing my car, I didn’t have the energy to argue with a man I was supposed to hate.

Except I didn’t hate him.

I didn’t hate his cocky smile.

I never hated the intense and perfect green of his eyes.

And there was no way I’d ever hate the feel of his body pressed against mine, either between the sheets or sitting at my side on the guardrail.

“Rough night?” he asked.

I couldn’t look at him, but I could enjoy how warm he felt next to me. “Can you take us to the cabin, please?”

“I’ll do you one better.” He kicked a bag of tools at his feet. “I’ll fix your car.”

“Think you can?”

“Only one way to find out.” That confidence amazed me. “I’m not going to leave you stranded out here all night…not without someone to cuddle at least.”

“If you fix the car, you’ll get a lot more than cuddles.”

“Is that a promise?”

“Better get under that hood.”

I didn’t regret my words. After twenty minutes, the SUV’s engine purred like a kitten. Nate tossed me the keys. The bridesmaids and Lindsey thanked him and begged me to drive. I walked him to his car.

“You girls should be more careful.” He crossed his arms, and I could only imagine what fantasy twisted his lips into a smile. “Never know what kind of creep might want to take advantage of a stranded, beautiful woman.”

“I’m well-aware.” I bit my lip. “You’re not going home, are you?”

“Where else would I go?”

“To the cabin?”

Nate narrowed his eyes. “You sure?”

No, but I had a bad enough night. “Someone should be there to protect me from any creeps following us in the woods.”

“No one would bother you if I were around.”

I stared at his lips. “Then you better follow close.”

“Mandy—”

“I’ll meet you there.”

I knew he watched me walk to the car. And I knew where he stared, what he wanted, just where his thoughts wandered because mine was already there.

Nate once thrilled me with a night of simple pleasures and dark fantasies.

And tonight, we’d do it again.