Best Men


 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 BERKLEY ROMANCE
 Published by Berkley
 An imprint of Penguin Random House LLC
 penguinrandomhouse.com
 
 Copyright © 2023 by Sidney Karger
 Excerpt copyright © 2023 by Sidney Karger
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 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
 Names: Karger, Sidney, author.
 Title: Best men / Sidney Karger.
 Description: First edition. | New York: Berkley Romance, 2023.
 Identifiers: LCCN 2022033392 (print) | LCCN 2022033393 (ebook) | ISBN 9780593439487 (trade paperback) | ISBN 9780593439494 (ebook)
 Subjects: LCGFT: Romantic fiction. | Novels.
 Classification: LCC PS3611.A7824 Be 2023 (print) | LCC PS3611.A7824 (ebook) | DDC 813/.6—dc23/eng/20220815
 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022033392
 LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022033393
 First Edition: May 2023
 Cover design by Tal Goretsky
 Book design by Daniel Brount, adapted for ebook by Cora Wigen
 Interior art: Phone © kustomer/Shutterstock.com; record sleeve © Andrey_Kuzmin/Shutterstock.com; torn newspaper © STILLFX/Shutterstock.com
 This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
 pid_prh_6.0_143323452_c0_r0
 
 
 
 For my mom and dad.
 You somehow knew that one day I’d write a book.
 
 
 
 
 the new york times
 Vows
 Max Moody and Greg Levine
 Max Moody, the son of Phil and Joanne Moody of Plain Ridge, Ill., and Greg Levine, the son of William and Elaine Levine of Shaker Heights, Ohio, will not be married in New York City because if you ask me, Greg seriously screwed everything up. Jerk.
 
 
 
 Chapter ONE
 When They First Met, Love Was Afoot.” That was the New York Times wedding announcement headline my best friend Paige had jokingly imagined for Greg, my ex-boyfriend, the podiatrist, and me even though we were never engaged nor had we even remotely discussed getting married one day. Our actual wedding, in my head, wasn’t exactly planned out because I don’t really have that gay-wedding-planning gene, but it probably would’ve been a super-casual affair for three hundred and fifty of our closest friends and family on Pier Sixty overlooking the Hudson River, with Greg and me wearing tuxes while we had our first dance together as husbands to “This Charming Man” by the Smiths. Okay, maybe I thought about it a tiny bit.
 This increasingly distant memory pops into my mind right now because, like a tourist, I’m standing in the middle of a busy sidewalk on Twenty-Third and Eighth on a hot summer Thursday evening, grinning at a text from Greg. I feel a tiny warm tingle in my undercarriage as I reply, Yep.
 Oh, I didn’t tell you? I’m still seeing my ex for sex. Wait—is that a Rascal Flatts song? Right before entering the subway on my way home from work, Greg texted, Free before dinner? which is code for “hook up,” so maybe after we do the sex, we’ll grab a bite at Pepe Giallo, our once favorite Italian restaurant in West Chelsea that we’d been going to since we first met eight years ago. (In fact, it’s where we had our first date.) Then, over a bottle of red wine and plates of deliciously gooey chicken Parm, he’ll admit he misses us and say he desperately wants to get back together.
 Greg asks to meet at six thirty, in forty-five minutes, which means I’m early, so I slip into a diner called the Rail Line. It used to be called Moonstruck Diner, and I imagine they wanted to name it the High Line Diner, after the nearby High Line elevated park, but couldn’t get legal clearance, so they ended up with this weird, off-brand name.
 I take a seat at the counter and order an old-fashioned along with a basket of bread and butter. There’s nothing weirder—or more fun—than ordering a cocktail at a diner. It’s like the opposite of ordering chicken nuggets at some fancy French restaurant.
 Scanning the room full of silver-haired early birders, I spot an extremely handsome fella sitting alone in a booth, texting, waiting for either his food or a companion. Occasionally, he looks up from his phone and eyes me. Doesn’t he know I’m about to have complicated relations with my ex-boyfriend? I’m taken, sir.
 My seen-it-all Polish server makes me the strongest old-fashioned I’ve ever had, and I love it as I tear into the stale bread, butter a piece and look up again, noticing Cutie in a Booth is still staring at me. This time I really clock him. He seems slightly younger than me, definitely more chiseled and somehow more New Yorky. But then, that’s pretty much everyone in this city. I also notice he has a June–in–New York sun-kissed face and looks like the kind of sophisticated urbanite who wouldn’t be caught dead in a mediocre diner. Unlike me. Mediocre diners give me life.
 I decide to smile. I may be in an unhealthy relationship with my ex, but I’m not dead inside. Now he squints at me. Did I do the smile wrong? Was I creepy? A grizzled server probably named Margie or Bernice arrives at his booth and takes his order. Now they both look at me. Was I that obvious? A sudden thought occurs to me, so I look over my shoulder and realize he’d been reading the chalkboard of tonight’s specials the entire time. He was literally looking right through me. He probably didn’t think I looked as good as “Virginia Ham Steak,”