“Ta da!” Brandi said as she walked into Caitlyn’s room and twirled for her.

“Oh my God! Brandi you look so beautiful.”

Brandi held her skirts up and curtsied. “Why thank you Princess Caitlyn,” she said.

Caitlyn giggled. Brandi loved that sound and it made her eyes prick with tears that she valiantly tried to hold back from falling. Caitlyn didn’t have much to smile about and Brandi didn’t want to ruin it for her.

“Did you make this?”

“No,” Brandi shook her head as she fingered the yellow silk. “I have a dressmaker friend who makes all my costumes. So what do you think of the wig?”

The wig she wore was a glossy brown with big fat curls. She had pulled some of it back and secured it with a yellow bow that matched the dress she was wearing.

“I think you look just like Emma Watson,” Caitlyn said reverently.

“I’m supposed to look like Belle,” Brandi admonished and Caitlyn smiled.

“You do, but you look like the Emma Watson version of Belle, not the cartoon version.”

The new Beauty and the Beast movie had finally bumped Elsa from the top of the Disney princess pile. Brandi loved playing Elsa, but she had been to so many Frozen themed birthday parties over the last couple of years that she was beginning to hate Elsa just a tiny bit. It would be nice to have a new character to play.

“What activities have you got planned?” Caitlyn asked and there was a note of longing in her voice that broke Brandi’s heart.

“Well,” Brandi said, sitting delicately on the chair by the bed so as not to wrinkle her dress, “since Belle loved reading so much, I thought we’d have story time.”

Caitlyn smiled. “I love story time,” she said wistfully.

“I know,” Brandi said. “That’s why I brought you this.”

Brandi produced a dog-eared hardcover book and presented it to Caitlyn.

“What’s this?”

“Only the best book ever,” Brandi said with a grin.

“This is your book?”

“Was my book. I’m giving it to you. I first read it when I was about your age and I loved it so much. I thought you might love it too.”

“‘Harriet the Spy,’” Caitlyn read from the front cover. She ran her hand reverently across the well-worn cover.

“I also got you this,” Brandi said handing over a green spiral bound notebook.

“What’s this for?”

Brandi smiled. “You’ll understand when you read the book. Oh, I can’t forget this!” She pulled a long pen out of her bag that had a fuzzy pen-topper on the end and handed it to Caitlyn. “Can’t have a notebook without a pen.”

“Will you read a chapter to me?” Caitlyn asked. “Before you go to see the others?”

“Of course,” Brandi said, reaching for the book. “Now lie back and get comfortable.” Brandi cleared her throat dramatically and then opened the cover of the book. “Harriet the Spy. Chapter one. ‘Harriet was trying to explain to Sport how to play Town.’”

Brandi read the first chapter to Caitlyn and when she was finished and looked over at the sick little girl in the bed, Caitlyn had fallen asleep with a small smile on her face. Brandi blotted the tears from underneath her lashes. Caitlyn looked so small and vulnerable lying there with her eyes closed. Her breath was shallow and there were dark bruises under her eyes like thumbprints. Her skin was translucent and the network of blue veins were visible beneath the pale skin.

Someone stepped into the room and laid a hand on Brandi’s shoulder.

“She looks so peaceful, doesn’t she?”

Brandi looked up at Caitlyn’s mother and nodded. She didn’t agree with the statement, but she didn’t want to argue with a mother who was currently going through hell.

“How’re her treatments going?” Brandi asked, her voice barely above a whisper.

Caitlyn’s mum held a finger to her lips and then indicated that they should leave the room. Brandi got to her feet and laid the book on Caitlyn’s bedside before following the other woman out of the room. Tracey closed the door to her daughter’s room and when she looked at Brandi, the tears were running unchecked down her face.

“The doctors say there is nothing more they can do for her. They are trying to keep her as comfortable as possible, but the cancer is not responding to any of their treatments. It has spread and is in her lungs and other organs.”

“Oh God,” Brandi breathed, covering her mouth with her hand.

Brandi hugged Tracey and they stood like that, taking comfort from each other for a long moment. Brandi had lost patients before… not that they were her patients per se, she was just there to keep the spirits up of the little ones. But they each held a special place in her heart and she felt every loss keenly. Thankfully, the advances in medical technology meant that survival rates had improved over the years.

Brandi had been helping out at the hospital since she was a teenager. Her first experience with the children’s hospital was when she’d had appendicitis and had to spend a week in the ward with all the other kids. She discovered how boring it was and had decided to spend some of her weekends coming in to play with the children who were well enough. That had morphed into her dressing up and that had started her little side business that she worked while going to university to get her degree in computer programming. Now she worked in her family’s tech company, still visited the hospital, and did children’s parties on the side. She enjoyed it too much to give it up. She loved meeting and interacting with kids like Caitlyn, even if it meant losing them. She wouldn’t give up the opportunity to get to know these wonderful kids even though the pain of losing them sometimes felt unbearable. As much as she enlightened their lives, they enriched hers tenfold.

“Thank you,” Tracey said, holding on to Brandi’s hands tightly. “Thank you for spending time with her and being her friend.”

They hugged again and Tracey slipped into Caitlyn’s room, leaving Brandi staring after her.

The little white ball arced through the air and veered off the fairway and into the rough.

“Fuck my life,” Declan growled before turning to his friends and raising an eyebrow. “Why the fuck are we doing this again?”

“Because golf is supposed to be a gentleman’s game,” Hunter said, “and we’re gentleman.”

“And it’s the only place we can go where the girls won’t follow,” Jonathon said as he teed up his shot.

“What the fuck Ashby?” Brooks asked.

Jonathon shrugged and then took a couple of practise swings before stepping up to the ball. “I love the female additions to our brotherhood,” he said, sighting the ball and the green in the distance, “but sometimes it’s nice to just hang with the boys.” He pulled back his swing and let fly, connecting with the ball with a satisfying thwack and sending it sailing through the air towards the green.

“Nice shot,” Declan growled. He was still in a foul mood after having brunch with the family and his mother’s clumsy attempt at setting him up with a date. Not to mention being royally pissed off that he had no way of contacting Brandi and now he had to find her in order to convince her to pretend to be his girlfriend at the hospital benefit.

“What crawled up your arse and died?” Mason asked stepping forward with his ball.

Declan was not known for his mood swings. Of the five of them, he was the most constant in his outlook on life. He wanted to wring as much fun and pleasure out of it that he could and that meant he didn’t do dark moods or anger. He was a live and let live kinda guy; a make hay while the sun shines person. He always saw the glass as half full and never as half empty, but today he just wasn’t fit for human consumption.

“I had brunch with my family,” he said after Mason had teed off. “That is enough reason to put anyone in a bad mood.”

“Nope,” Brooks said, picking up his bag of clubs and striding towards where his ball sat on the fairway, “This is way more than a bad mood because of your mother. Spill.”

“What are we? ‘The Babysitter’s Club?’ You want me to tell you all my deepest darkest secrets and maybe cry a little?”

“Don’t be a shit head,” Hunter said, slapping him on the back. “We’re your friends who are concerned about you. Doesn’t mean you get to shit all over us because we care. Now tell Uncle Hunter what has you so fucking twisted up that you feel the need to be such an arsehole to everyone.”

“My mother ambushed me with a date at brunch. One of her perfect little Stepford-wife-wannabes.”

“So?” This from Jonathon. “This is not the first time she has done this and it certainly won’t be the last. Why did it get under your skin so much?”

Declan sighed and stopped, tilting his head to the sky. If he was honest, it wasn’t his mother’s stunt that him in such a temper. It was Brandi.

“I met this girl last night—”

“At Abby’s launch party?” Mason asked.

“No, not at the launch party. There was a school reunion happening in the other conference room and this woman was having some problems so I helped her out.”

“Helped her out of her clothes, no doubt,” Hunter said.

Declan shrugged. “Well, yeah, but before that I helped her with a little problem and now I need a return favour and I have no way of contacting her.”

“You didn’t even get her name?” Brooks asked as he slapped Declan over the back of the head. “You’re an arse.”

“I got her name, fuckwit,” he said, rubbing his head. “Her name is Brandi.”

“Brandi…” Mason made a rolling move with his hand to encourage Declan to cough up the rest of the name.

“Well, see, that’s the problem. I only got her first name.”

“I hope my daughter never meets a man like you,” Brooks said.

The others grunted in agreement.

“Like you lot were any better before you met your significant others. Don’t hate me just because you’re jealous.”

“No one is jealous of you,” Hunter said calmly. “I love Bailey and can’t imagine my life without her. Have you forgotten that we are getting married in three months?”

“How could any of us forget,” Jonathon said with a grimace. “I’m tempted to change my email address so I don’t get the almost daily wedding updates. Your fiancée is going a little bridezilla on all our arses.”

“Now come on,” Hunter said. “She may be a little intense, but I wouldn’t call her a Bridezilla. If anyone deserves that title, it’s her sister, Peyton.”

Declan rolled his eyes. He’d had his own dramas with Peyton. He’d employed her as his assistant for a very brief period of time and it had very nearly wrecked his friendship with Bailey and Hunter. Thankfully she had moved on to greener pastures and he’d learned a valuable lesson.

“Anyway,” Declan said, “back to me. How am I supposed to track this woman down?”

“Was the sex really that good?” Jonathon asked.

“Why does this have anything to do with sex?”

“Because that’s the only reason you’d want to track her down.”

“Well, it’s not, arsehole. As a matter of fact, I have a proposition for her.”

“Like in that movie ‘Indecent Proposal?’ Are you going to ask her to sleep with you for a million dollars?”

Declan punched Jonathon in the arm. “Piss off, wanker,” he growled. He took a breath. “No, here’s the thing. I might have told my mother that I had a girlfriend.”

The group of them stopped as one like it was some choreographed move and turned to him.

“You did what now?” Brooks asked.

Declan rolled his eyes. Why did everyone think this was such a big deal? So what if he just wanted to get his mother off his back for a while? Was it so terrible to pretend to have a girlfriend just to get some peace and quiet?

“Last night Brandi needed help. Her date stood her up and her friends at the reunion were giving her a hard time about it. I stepped in and pretended to be her boyfriend. We hit it off and it ended with spectacular sex. She left before I woke up and didn’t leave a forwarding address. I just want to find her so that she can return the favour and pretend to be my girlfriend for this hospital benefit.” He stopped and turned to Brooks. “You did book us a table right?” he asked. “Because I refuse to sit with my family.”

“Yeah, I booked a table,” Brooks replied with a somewhat stunned expression on his face.

“What?” he asked, exasperated as he took in the stunned faces of the four men standing around him.

“Is she hot?” Jonathon asked.

“Do you even have to ask?” Declan replied with a smirk. “Now I just have to find her.”

“Easy,” Mason said. “The school would have a list of the attendees. Contact them, tell them she left something behind and you need to find her to make sure she gets it back.”

Declan grinned, his bad mood lifting off him like fog burned off by the sun. He would find her, beg her to be his pretend girlfriend for the night and then they might even find themselves back at his suite for round two of the spectacular sex that he still couldn’t stop thinking about. His day was suddenly looking brighter.

Brandi sat in her car outside the wine bar where she was meeting her friend and took a deep breath. She flicked the interior light on and angled the sun visor down so she could use the vanity mirror to check her appearance. Her eyes were a little red-rimmed and the tip of her nose was pink. She practised a smile, but it didn’t reach her eyes and she gave up. The last thing she wanted to do right now was go into that bar and pretend to have a good time. Talking to Caitlyn’s mother had left her feeling wrung out and hollow. What she really wanted to do was buy a carton of expensive ice cream and go home to make herself several very large and indulgent cocktails using the ice cream combined with generous helpings of Irish cream, espresso vodka and chocolate milk. Instead she was here for the first meeting of the bridesmaids and she would have to settle for one espresso martini.

She dabbed at the last of her tears and sniffed in a big breath. Crying had been cathartic, but allowing the tears to fall unheeded while she drove to the bar was neither long enough to satisfy her, nor safe. She wanted to sob her heart out, to start the grieving process now so that when she had to say goodbye to Caitlyn, she could do so without falling apart. First, though, she needed to get through tonight and pretend to be happy for Bailey’s sake.

Brandi flicked off the interior light and pushed herself out of the car. She beeped it locked and walked confidently into the crowded bar. Fake it ’til you make it, she thought as she plastered on a smile and scanned the crowd for her friend. Bailey saw her first and jumped to her feet, waving frantically to get her attention. Brandi returned the wave and pushed through the bodies that were between her and the table where her friend sat with the rest of her bridesmaids.

“You’re here!” Bailey said brightly, and Brandi suspected that she’d already had quite a bit to drink. Hopefully her gorgeous fiancé would be on designated driver duty.

“I’m here,” she said equally brightly. Brandi hugged Bailey and kissed her cheek. Maybe being around girlfriends would be good for her tonight and get her mind off Caitlyn.

“Let me introduce you to everyone,” Bailey said turning back to the table where the others were gathered. “You already know my sister Peyton,” Bailey said pointing to the woman who was Brandi’s personal assistant. Brandi smiled and waved at Peyton who returned the hello. “This is Harper,” Bailey said, indicating a tiny brunette with a pixie-like face. “Her fiancé is Hunter’s best man. And this is Jessica, my cousin.” Jessica was a mousy-headed woman who seemed decidedly unhappy to be there. Brandi smiled brilliantly at her and mouthed hello. “And this is my new friend Abby. She’s engaged to Mason, one of Hunter’s groomsmen, and he will be your partner.”

“Hi,” Abby said, reaching across the table to shake her hand. “I’m not a bridesmaid,” she said with a shy smile, “I’m just here to make sure they all behave.”

“Hi everyone,” Brandi said, “I’m Brandi.”

Brandi slid into a seat beside Abby and Bailey remained standing trying to catch a waiter’s attention. “What are you drinking Brandi?” Bailey asked when a waiter began to move in their direction.

“Espresso martini,” she said.

The others gave their orders and Brandi surveyed the gathered ensemble. Bailey was in her element, her rose gold hair shining in the light as she tossed her head and laughed at something Harper said.

“How do you know Bailey?” Abby asked quietly beside her.

“We were roommates at university,” she replied, taking in the dark haired woman beside her. “We stayed roommates until she met Hunter and moved in with him.”

Abby nodded. “So you know the whole Nick saga?”

Brandi rolled her eyes. “I had a front row seat. I’m so glad she met Hunter. He’s so much better for her. What about you? How did you and Bailey meet?”

“Through Mason,” Abby replied, her cheeks going pink as she looked down at her empty glass and fiddled with her straw. “He’s one of Hunter’s best friends. Have you met them?”

Brandi shook her head. “No. I’ve only met Hunter. Any time we’ve tried to get together, something always comes up.”

Abby nodded thoughtfully. “Bailey said you work in tech? You might already know Mason. He owns Black Sheep Software and Games.”

Brandi shook her head. “I haven’t met him but I know the company. I work in databases mainly; management systems for hotels and event companies.”

“And she likes to dress up as Disney princesses,” Bailey called across the table.

“What?” Harper looked at her, appalled.

Brandi rolled her eyes. “I do children’s parties and some volunteer work at the children’s hospital.”

“You should get her to do Piper’s birthday party,” Bailey said with the enthusiasm that only comes when someone is entirely too drunk and thinks they’ve discovered some marvellous secret.

Harper narrowed her eyes at Brandi. “My daughter is obsessed with princesses at the moment,” she said. “Do you do Cinderella?”

“Of course,” Brandi replied with a professional smile. “Peyton can send you some information if you’re interested.”

Peyton smiled at Harper. “Just give me your email address and I can send you something tomorrow.”

“Peyton is my assistant,” Brandi said to the puzzled glances.

Thankfully the waiter arrived with their drinks and Brandi took hers gratefully. It was going to be a long night. Abby seemed lovely but the waves of distrust rolling off Harper set off alarm bells in Brandi’s head. The woman didn’t like her and she didn’t know why. Hopefully it wouldn’t be a problem and ruin Bailey’s wedding.