“You guys should be travel agents, you make it sound so good,” Julia said. “I’ll write you a postcard and let you know how it goes.”

And then they were full of plans for her, where she should go and what she absolutely had to see. Except Blake, who simply told her it was a good idea and then kept quiet for the rest of the night.

Julia wouldn’t even let herself look over at him. She didn’t know what had changed from Mister I-want-to-be-with-you-for-the-time-that-we’re-here to this new, too cool, I’ve-got-plans-so-you-should-be-on-your-way attitude, but she didn’t care.

He didn’t want to go to Rio with her?

Well fuck him.

At least she’d gotten her favorite underwear back.

Chapter Nine

Blake cut the cards and dealt another round. They couldn’t play Five Hundred with two players, so they’d switched to Ups and Downs, only they kept forgetting the rules.

“No, man, we’re in ups now. It has to go up,” Jamie said, flicking Blake’s three of clubs back toward him.

“I thought the last eight changed it to downs,” Blake said. It had been ages since he’d played Crazy Eights, especially with this variation, and he couldn’t keep track of what was up and what was down and when his turn was being skipped. Like now, when Jamie played queen after queen on top of his ten.

Or maybe that was the cachaça talking. They’d stayed drinking caipirinhas until every last morsel of food was gone, and then Chris had produced a half empty bottle of Brazilian Old Eight Whisky. Brazilian whisky seemed like it should be a contradiction, but they claimed to import their malt directly from Scotland. It had a dank, woody taste like something left too long in the rain.

More likely, Blake couldn’t tell what was up and what was down in the game because, as in his own life, the rules kept changing. Julia had headed straight to bed without giving him so much as a good-bye. Not that he deserved one. But still.

He’d been amazed at how quickly she’d picked up his hint to go to Rio without him. He’d been afraid she might read too much into their situation and start assuming things from him, but he’d been wrong. If his disappearing act bothered her, the only evidence she showed was how quickly she’d frozen him out.

That mask was so subtle, though, and the shift so minute that Blake doubted anyone else realized what was wrong.

Or at least Jamie didn’t. It was one of the things that made it easy to trust him and their growing friendship. Unlike Liam, Jamie was way too oblivious to be conniving.

“You think the girls are asleep in there?” Jamie asked, playing an eight and switching to downs again. Blake thought he was lucky with his three, but Jamie was ready with a two to beat him. He groaned and added four cards to his hand before coming up with one he could put down.

“What, you think they’re up gabbing or something?” Blake tried to picture Julia and Chris staying up late and talking about him—or more likely tearing him apart. But it was unlikely. Julia proclaimed she was going to Rio by herself like she was fine with their twenty-four hour escapade coming to an abrupt close. She’d never admit otherwise.

“Chris doesn’t gab,” Jamie said, playing his card. “She bellows.”

“She likes to make sure she’s heard,” Blake agreed, but not unkindly. He thought of the two as complementing each other, the quieter Jamie supporting the more outgoing Chris as they hit the open road together. They had been scuba diving all over the Australian reefs, traveled by boat down the Amazon, climbed Mt. Fuji when they were still at university. Sure, now they worked in real estate and law in Australia. But they had put it all on hold to take a six-month trip around the world before they finally settled down and got married. Blake might have had his doubts about whether two people could date for ten years and still have a good time together, but here they were. Living proof.

Once he might have imagined that his relationship with Kelley was like that. They’d made a point to get along well alone and in groups. Too late Blake saw the cracks in the façade. The way they spent time in a group so they didn’t have to be alone. The way the friends they hung out with captured Kelley’s attention to a degree he never could. The way, at the end of the day, there was really nothing left for them at all.

But Jamie and Chris weren’t like that. They didn’t seem to tire of each other. Blake didn’t know if he’d ever trust anyone enough to be in a relationship again, but it helped knowing that togetherness was out there, even if it wasn’t his.

It helped knowing, too, that there were friends who had his back, who wouldn’t let women come between them.

“Hey, how did you and Chris meet?” Blake asked, frowning over his cards.

Jamie laughed. “I woke up in her bed—”

“Well that was easy.”

“—with my trousers on.”

“Wait—what?”

Jamie shrugged. “I think we’d been at some party. My memory’s a little fuzzy on the details, but I definitely remember talking to some mate of hers.”

“But you went home with Chris instead?”

Jamie gave him a helpless look. “What can I say? I wake up in a stranger’s bed, ready to congratulate myself for a job well done, when I realize my clothes are on, her clothes are on, and I’ve never seen her before in my life.”

“So then you got together?” Blake was thoroughly confused.

“So then she said that if we didn’t get to enjoy our night, we might as well have brunch and try again.”

“Sounds like true love.”

“It took a little while.” Jamie grinned. “I kept calling her—you know, keeping it casual. Asking if she wanted to pile on all our clothes and lie side by side for the night. That sort of thing. Eventually I wore her down.”

“Something tells me this would be a more interesting story from Chris’s perspective,” Blake mused.

“She said she wasn’t sure about me at the beginning,” Jamie admitted.

Blake raised an eyebrow. “Why’s that?”

“I had holes in my socks. She called it unbecoming, but said she decided to take the risk anyway.”

“The risk?”

“You know, in going out with me. Calling me. Seeing me again. It’s always a chance.”

“Well, either it works out or it doesn’t,” Blake said, and then wondered if all his months on the road were reducing him to such a pile of platitudes that he’d never be able to write a decent script again.

“The only thing you can do is try.” Jamie raised his glass and swallowed the whisky down, making a face. “Or maybe it’s better to stick with what you’re good at, like making cachaça instead of whisky. Yikes.”

Blake laughed, shuddering as the alcohol burned down his throat. Jamie made it sound so easy, but it wasn’t. Jamie and Chris were the kind of people who took risks. Blake wasn’t. It was as simple as that. He’d planned out his whole trip and now he was sticking to it. No more distractions. No more deviations. Argentina was calling to him.

“Rio’s a great city,” Jamie said after a pause. “Julia’s going to have a great time.”

“Sure,” Blake said. He tried to keep his face impassive as he picked up cards from the deck. Jamie was creaming him and now Blake didn’t have a single diamond to play. “So’s Buenos Aires,” he added.

“You’re sure there isn’t anything you’ll miss in Argentina?”

“Not pretty girls, I can promise you that.” Blake flashed a grin.

“I was thinking more about one girl in particular.”

Jamie threw down his last card: six of diamonds. Damn. Blake should have changed suits when he could. He swept up the pile of cards to shuffle.

“I’ve got other plans.”

“What, get drunk by yourself in Patagonia? You’ve got no plans.”

“Travel by myself, then go back to Sydney. Emphasis on the by myself, you know?”