Linc narrowed his gaze. “What about you?”
Her brother wasn’t stupid and he knew her well. No doubt he saw the wheels in her mind spinning.
“You sublet your apartment and moved out. The boxes are in storage because you were supposed to live with Owen after your honeymoon.” He winced at the mention of more plans that wouldn’t be happening.
Plans she had no intention of thinking about yet.
Chloe drew a deep breath. “I have the honeymoon suite booked in the hotel tonight. I’ll stay here. After my friends and I take advantage of the party that’s already paid for. I’ll just call it my non-wedding party.” She let out a champagne-induced laugh and spun around, grabbing for the counter before she fell over.
“Chloe,” Linc said in his stern, big-brother voice.
Ignoring him, she sat down, hiked up her gown, and unhooked the straps on her too-high-heeled, glittering sandals. “I can’t dance in these,” she said, kicking them across the room.
Her brother, who always had an answer and a solution, appeared concerned and at a loss. Before Chloe could reassure him, he strode to the door, pulled it open, and yelled for his fiancée. “Jordan! Get in here!”
“Reinforcements won’t help,” Chloe warned him, letting out another laugh, this one more of a giggle. Apparently she’d had more to drink than she’d realized, and she’d always been a lightweight.
Jordan, a gorgeous woman with jet-black hair, wearing an exquisite emerald-green gown, which Chloe knew had had to be let out to accommodate her early-pregnancy belly, rushed inside. “Is everything okay?”
“Chloe thinks she’s going to party with her friends tonight. She wants her family to leave. Tell her she needs to go home with Mom and let us all take care of her,” Linc ordered.
His frown would scare off most people, but Chloe had grown up with him. He’d do his best to exert his command, but she’d made up her mind. And he’d never been able to intimidate Jordan, who glanced at Chloe.
A silent understanding passed between them, woman to woman.
Jordan had grown up the daughter of the Kingston family’s housekeeper, yet she and Linc had been best friends for years, and she’d been his personal assistant since he’d joined Kingston Enterprises after earning his MBA. Of everyone, Jordan knew how to handle him best. She always had.
And Jordan also understood the need to make her own choices. Chloe had faith her soon-to-be sister-in-law would support her.
“Linc,” Jordan said, walking up to him and wrapping an arm around his waist. “I think Chloe knows what she needs. You can’t just order her around and expect her to listen.”
He blinked in shock. “You think her getting drunk is the answer to what happened here?” he asked.
“I think,” Jordan said slowly, “it couldn’t hurt. Let her do what she wants, and you can step in and play big brother tomorrow.” She ran her hand over Linc’s back. “I know you want to make it all better, but you can’t. Not right now.”
Chloe shot Jordan a grateful glance. “I owe you,” she mouthed to her.
Chloe wished Jordan had taken her up on her offer to be a bridesmaid after she’d gotten engaged to Linc. But Jordan had issues with feeling like an outsider thanks to their very different backgrounds, and she felt she’d be coming in late and hadn’t wanted to rock the boat. Chloe intended to make Jordan feel more like family than the closest family member. She still would do that after she celebrated her un-wedding.
“I don’t like this,” Linc muttered.
“You don’t have to.” Jordan tugged on his hand. “Let’s go talk to the family.” She glanced at Chloe. “Who do you want me to send in to be with you?”
Chloe forced a smile. “Send my bridesmaids in, please. And tell anyone who isn’t family that wants to stay and party to stick around.” She would enjoy tonight if it killed her.
“Chloe, why don’t you let us stay, too?” Linc asked, attempting to handle things one last time.
“Because you’d all kill my fun. You’d sit around with concerned looks, waiting for me to fall apart. And I’d be worried about all of you, and that would defeat the purpose of a party.” The explanation made sense to her.
“Linc, come.” Jordan tugged at his hand, and soon she’d led him out of the room.
But not before he stopped, walked over to Chloe, and pulled her into a brotherly hug. “You deserve the very best, and I promise you the right person is out there. I love you, Chlo.”
She tightened her arms around him, accepting the love she’d never gotten from her father. “I love you, too. Just let me have this night. Tomorrow is soon enough to face things.”
Linc groaned. “Okay, Scarlett O’Hara. But we will talk then.”
Of that, Chloe had no doubt.
In the morning, Linc would do his best to take over, and she’d just have to deal with him then. God, she adored her family. Her love life might suck, but she had a support system not many people could claim. The problem was, come tomorrow, she’d be smothered in worry by well-meaning relatives.
But tonight was for her.
After watching Linc and Jordan walk out, Chloe rose and dug for the ballet flats she’d planned to wear once her feet began to hurt. She slipped them on so she could dance. After all, they’d paid for a high-priced DJ, and she intended to enjoy every moment until she crashed. There might come a time when she cried, but she refused to think about her pain.
Just then, her friends piled into the room, and she braced herself to explain her plans for the evening one more time.
Then they’d have fun.
* * *
“Happy birthday to you. Happy birthday to you. Happy birthday, dear Dad, happy birthday to you.” Beckett Daniels’s family finished singing to their father and followed the lyrics with a round of applause.
“Make a wish, Kurt,” Audrey, Beck’s mom, said to her husband.
He looked around at his wife, Beck, and his other two sons, Drew and Tripp, and smiled, the gratitude in his expression obvious. Then he paused and blew out the candles.
Beck wondered, as he did every year, if his father wished for everyone sitting at this table’s health and well-being. God knows that was Beck’s annual birthday prayer. They’d all learned years ago how fragile life could be after losing Tripp’s twin, Whitney, when they were teens.
The server reached over and lifted the cake. “We’ll slice it and be right back. I’ll take your coffee orders then,” he said and walked away.
“I don’t know about you but that cake looked delicious,” his mother said. “And that frosting? Mmm. I can’t wait.”
Tripp, a pediatrician, grinned. “I’ll take a big chunk, myself.”
Andrew glanced at their father. “You look like you could use a slice, Dad. Have you lost weight?”
Beck shifted his gaze back to his father, noting the more drawn look in his lower face. “Now that Drew’s mentioned it, you do look thinner.”
His father waved a hand through the air. “I’m fine, boys. Don’t worry about me.”
Beck always worried. But tonight they were at his father’s favorite steak restaurant. There might have been a time the Daniels family couldn’t afford a restaurant this fancy or expensive, and Beck and his brothers had put themselves through school on loans, but they’d always had love. And now Beck, Tripp, or Drew could more than cover the cost of taking their parents out for an extravagant dinner.