The Worst Wedding Date

The last time my life was normal, I was on an airplane, blissfully ignorant of exactly how many complications my best friend’s dream wedding week would bring.

And I should be happy for her—for them—finally being here.

I should be.

But I can’t quite dig deep enough to force it right now.

Emma’s beaming. She’s glowing. I’m not sure I’ve ever seen her so happy as she hugs family and friends on the tiki-torch-lined lanai while she and Chandler make the rounds of greeting everyone.

She was born to be a bride.

And she’ll do great as a wife and a mother too. Having a big family is basically all she’s ever wanted for as long as I’ve known her.

But I wish I didn’t know what Theo just told me.

I can’t believe Theo went to jail for Chandler.

My mind is blown.

It’s blown over something both men—and my best friends—have known for over a decade. Something they all got over—mostly—a long time ago. I need to let it go.

It would be easier, though, if Chandler didn’t look like he’s carrying the weight of a thousand moons, which isn’t something I’ve noticed about him before, but now I’m wondering if weddings stress him out, like Theo said, or if he’s always been like this and I had blinders on because I knew how much Emma adored him.

And he’s never made me mad the way Theo did.

I know Emma’s complained about him more this past year, but that felt pretty normal. Don’t all couples fight more when they’re planning a wedding?

I’ve been on enough phone calls at work with happily engaged couples breaking down over misplaced expectations with their custom orders to have a firm belief that planning a wedding is the true test of a couple’s commitment to each other.

But should I have looked closer?

I’m struggling to smile through hugging Emma and Chandler as they reach us when I’d rather be hugging Theo and telling him that he’s not a bad person, and that I’m sorry for every time I acted like a stuck-up snot-bucket to him, that I wish I could’ve removed my good people do good things and bad people do bad things black-and-white opinions years ago.

Decades ago.

“Could’ve saved a lot of money if we just hugged everyone every time we saw them back home,” Chandler says to Emma, who laughs and hushes him.

Theo’s cheek twitches.

The two men don’t hug.

Or shake hands.

Or acknowledge each other at all, which is frankly weird.

Theo’s smiled at everyone this week. Me. Sabrina. Claire. His dad and uncle. The triplets. The resort staff.

He even smiled at Aunt Brenda while he was taking her down a notch last night.

“Any hints on what’s at the end of the scavenger hunt?” I ask Emma, hoping to distract her from the tension between her fiancé and her brother.

“I don’t even know,” she tells me. “It was an option from the resort. They put it all together. Oh, honey, look—Cecelia made it!”

They dash off to greet their newest arrival, and I look at Theo.

Not because Emma was clearly trying to find any excuse to not have the two men stand together a minute longer, but because the resort put it together.

“Do you have a bad feeling about this?” I whisper.

“It’s fine.”

He doesn’t elaborate while he scans the room.

I look around too, wondering exactly what he’s looking for.

“Theo, I don’t know if you’ve noticed this, but—”

“I noticed. Took care of it.”

“You—”

“Scavenger hunt’s set.”

“It—”

“I checked.”

I stare at him.

He lifts his brows.

“You know I kinda have a thing about fixing problems,” I say.

He grins. “Kinda noticed.”

“It’s really…attractive…when other people do it first.”

He holds eye contact for a solid fourteen years while I silently beg him not to mock me for calling him attractive.

This is hard.

It’s so hard.

But he is. He’s attractive. And if I don’t tell him so, he’ll flirt with other women and wink at them and make me feel like a frumpy, jealous asshole again.

Or maybe he’ll still flirt with other women.

Maybe he doesn’t care that I think he’s attractive.

But I need to take this leap.

I need to be brave. I need to be bold. I need to be fun.

His mouth twitches up in one corner, and I want to kiss it.

Oh, god, do I want to kiss it.

He angles closer to me, that grin morphing into a smoldery smile. “Laney Kingston, are you admitting that my secret competence might turn you on?”

“Yes,” I whisper.

His grin gets bigger.

But then it freezes.

“Be right back,” he murmurs.

“But—”

“Laney. Oh my god, Laney Kingston?” Addison Hunter steps in front of me and smothers me in a hug while I gape at Theo’s retreating back. “I can’t believe it’s you! I haven’t seen you since high school.”

Freaking Theo.

Where is he going?

Why is he leaving now?

We were having a moment. Weren’t we?

“I heard you’re taking over for your parents as one of the youngest next CEOs in the country,” Addison gushes. “That’s so crazy. I remember when they just printed shirts for our soccer teams. And now they practically own the photo gift industry.”

“Yeah. It’s pretty cool.” Where did he go? There’s Sabrina. Does she know where he went?

Nope. She’s not paying attention to me or Theo.

Not that Theo’s anywhere that someone could pay attention to him. He has totally and completely disappeared.

“Laney?” Addison says.

“I’m so sorry,” I say quickly. “I think I just started my period and I need to find the bathroom.”

Liar, I yell at myself internally.

My mother’s cringing back home, and she doesn’t know why. But I know she is.

I can feel it.

We don’t talk about periods. They are private matters and we all pretend for my father’s sake that they don’t exist.

But it’s the perfect excuse to dash away from the lanai and see where Theo went.

Yes. Yes, I’m that woman, running after a guy who ran away when I told him I thought he was attractive.

Doesn’t take me long to realize it’s futile.

Of course I can’t find him.

It’s Theo.

His brain works in ways I can’t possibly understand.

No matter how much I want to.

But I still look all over. The gift shop. The alcove where I keep pulling him aside to talk. The beach. Our bungalow.

I do it all quickly, fully aware that I’m chasing a man who just disappeared because I awkwardly told him he was attractive.

And I should just face the fact that this isn’t where I’m supposed to aim my attraction.

Spending time with Theo is giving me the courage to leap out of my box. But I shouldn’t consider it a long-term thing or anything.

That would probably end poorly for me.

How fast would he get bored?

So fast.

I head back toward the lanai, feeling like a total and complete idiot, and freaking Theo is waiting for me there.

Not just waiting for me.

Slipping an arm around my waist like we’re dating or something.

“Where were you?” I whisper. God, this feels good to have him holding me against him. And the view under his open shirt—hello, chest tattoos. Oh, look. That’s a mountain lion peeking over the summit of the mountain we can see from Marmot Cliff back home amidst the landscape of his other tattoos. And it’s gorgeous.

Whoever did his ink did an amazing job.

I’m no longer tempted to ask him why he doesn’t button his shirts.

I don’t want to button his shirt.

“Checking the catering,” he replies.

“Catering’s fine. I stopped by the front desk this afternoon and confirmed it myself.”

He smiles and shakes his head. “Heard you got your period.”

Ocean, swallow me now. Hi, you’re attractive. Let me tell you about how I’m bleeding out of my no-no box. “Oh, god. I forgot. I forgot.”

“You forgot you got your period?”

“I forgot Addison’s as big of a gossip as Sabrina except Sabrina knows when to just gather the gossip and not share it.”

“You need a painkiller or anything? Heating pad? Shoulder to cry on? Axes to throw?”

Is he serious?

He shrugs at my expression. “Mom wasn’t around when Em started hers, and Dad didn’t know what to do, so I figured I might as well do something right as a big brother.”

Yep.

I totally and completely have a crush on this man. “I remember that,” I whisper. Then I shake my head. “But I did not start my period. I used it as an excuse to look for you.”

“Nobody else here knows it was an excuse,” he assures me. “We could beg off. Say you’re not feeling well. At least two-thirds of the groom’s family is already uncomfortable being in the same room as a woman who would dare to bleed out of her no-no box.”

I choke on air.

Is he reading my mind? Does he know I literally just thought that?

Are we on a wavelength?

Oh my god.

The only reason he’d say no-no box is if…is if…is if my mother said it to him.

She’s the only person in all of the Tooth who calls vaginas no-no boxes.

“We are not leaving one more wedding event,” I say like the frumpy, flat-bottomed hag that I’m trying so desperately to not be.

He grins and presses a kiss to my temple like he’s actually my date.

And I kinda like it.

Until I remember my parents are arriving tomorrow and this is not what they need to see.

Not yet.

Shut the fuck up, Laney, I order myself.

Yes, with the fuck and all.

Theo’s a decent guy. I shouldn’t have judged him, and my parents shouldn’t either. And even if he did place an order with us a few years ago for a blanket with boobs on it to use as a cape, I don’t think that should define him. And definitely not as the miscreant my parents have always labeled him as.

“Did my mother ever talk to you about no-no boxes?” I ask.

“I like being stuck on the subject of your no-no box. And the word vagina doesn’t bother me either.”

I can’t tell if I’m turned on or embarrassed, but I know which one I want to be. “Are you making fun of me?” I whisper.

He squeezes me tighter. “I’m trying to have fun with you, but if it’s making you uncomfortable, I’ll stop.”

“I want to have fun.”

“All different kinds of fun. Don’t have to like them all.”

I peer up at him.

He’s watching the room around us like he’s waiting for something, but I don’t get the feeling he’s unengaged.

Is he too engaged?

Is he trying to play it cool with offering to show me fun?

Addison isn’t watching us. She’s chatting with Theo’s dad and uncle and cousin. Sabrina and Decker are whispering furiously. Most of Chandler’s family is fawning over Emma.

Everything seems pretty normal.

Lucky stands and clinks a spoon against his glass before I can figure out the answers to all of my questions. “Ladies and gentlemen, thank you all for coming to Chandler and Emma’s bachelor-bachelorette party. In just a minute here, we’re gonna be handing out clues for you to scurry off into the night on a scavenger hunt to find the world’s most epic bridal shower gift. You don’t get to keep it, but you do get to give it to the happy couple. You ready for this?”

There are probably sixty people here now, and they all erupt in cheers.

“A’right! That’s what I love to hear. Party people finding the presents! Yeah! Let’s do this! My brothers, roll out the clues.”

Theo adjusts himself so he’s looping his arm around my shoulders, his hand hanging casually over my collarbone.

And it’s a thrill.

A serious, a sexy man is touching me thrill.

I know this is just Theo. He flirts with anything that moves. He puts fun above all else. And this is fun.

But it’s also making me warm and fuzzy and more than a little turned on inside.

I tell myself it’s because I’m basically playing besties with the baddest bad boy to ever bad boy in the Tooth. That it’s the thrill of rebelling against the idea that he’s off-limits to a woman from a proper upper-middle-class family running, as Addison said, the biggest photo gift business in the country.

But thinking about him being not good enough for me makes me want to hit something at the same time.

He’s not a bad guy. Sabrina’s right. Since he discovered legal boundaries, he’s mostly harmless fun.

Who apparently solved an issue with the scavenger hunt before I ever thought to wonder if there was a problem with it. “When you say you fixed this,” I say quietly as Jack approaches us with a basket full of clues, “what exactly do you mean?”

“In the interest of your innocence when everything goes to shit, as it inevitably will since I have done a good deed, I’m not telling. But before everything goes to shit, you should know that I did the best I could with what I had when the resort didn’t do what they’re fucking being paid to do.”

Jack stops in front of us. He looks at Theo, then at me, and then at Theo’s arm. “Ooooh, somebody’s parents are gonna have a shit fit,” he says.

“I know,” Theo says. “Dad was hoping I’d go for a chick with a motorcycle and more tats than me, maybe a longer rap sheet too, but here we are.”

Jack chortles. “Here, Laney. Bet you figure this out faster than he does. Good luck and don’t cheat.” He points two fingers to his own eyes, then at Theo, then back to his own eyes. “I’m watching you.”

“Not as close as I’m watching you.”

They both grin and do a complicated handshake, then Jack moves on to the next couple.

“Doesn’t that bother you?” I ask Theo.

“That Jack, Lucky, and Decker think you’re worth protecting?”

“That they have to tear you down to say something nice about someone else.”

“I’ve dragged all of their asses out of the bar one too many nights for me to take any of them seriously. And the day any of those dudes finds a classy-ass woman who takes him down a billion pegs will be the day I’m standing in line to say the same, then beat the shit out of anyone else who insults him the way I get to.”

We’re following everyone else off the lanai, even though Theo and I both apparently know where all of the clues will take us. The staff is supposed to lay out food while we’re scavenger hunting, and then we’ll have fun again.

“You sound like you’re their brother,” I say.

“Brothers of the heart. Sullivan triplets are fun.” He grins, then takes the clue, holds it up, and reads it. “You will be very lucky tonight. In bed.”

“That is not what our clue says. Hey. You’re holding it upside down. And backwards.”

“You sure?”

“Theo.”

“Wanna do something bad, Laney?”

A thrill zings through me from my nose to my vagina. “It’s Emma’s wedding week,” I whisper.

He steers me off the path behind the cute little resort bistro on the beach where Sabrina, Emma, and I had a very, very long brunch today—all fun, most of it waiting longer than I’ve ever waited for a pastry before in my life—and then he does something that makes me squeak in horror.

He twists the handle on the back door, the door marked staff only, and pulls me inside.

“Oh my god, we can’t be here,” I whisper in the dark.

“You know what this is?”

“It’s the bistro kitchen. We’re not staff. We can’t—shut up. I know what you’re thinking. Rule-following Plainy-Laney can’t have any fun. But this will get us kicked out, Theo. We’re not supposed to be here.”

“You know who is supposed to be here?”

“Not. Us.”

“The staff making dinner for Emma’s bachelorette party.”

“What?”

He flicks on a light.

I wince.

“The staff, Laney. The kitchen staff. The wait staff. The staff that the front desk told you would be here? They’re not here.”

Oh, no. Oh, no no no.

“So. You wanna have some fun and help me solve another problem, or you wanna stand here talking about how we’re not supposed to be here?”

My brain is breaking even as it’s lighting up at the idea of solving a problem.

Pretty sure he knows this is like talking dirty to me.

“Why isn’t the staff here?”

“Not the most immediate concern, princess.”

“Okay. Okay.” I blow out a slow breath. “Right. Problem. Let’s fix this. Is there food? I can’t cook. I mean, I can cook, but I can’t cook for—”

“Were those tacos good last night?” he asks.

I blink at him.

“Laney. Were the tacos good last night?”

“They were until they made us hit a wild pig.”

He grins. “That’s the spirit. You in? Or are you gonna let Emma freak out when there’s no food for her guests in an hour?”

When he puts it that way, is there any other choice for a solution?

I fling my arms around him and impulsively kiss his cheek. “Are you kidding? You know I’m in. Let’s do this.”