Road Trip with the Best Man

by Sophie Pembroke

‘I didn’t—’ Cooper bit off whatever argument he was about to make, and Dawn hid her grin. Baiting Cooper was far more fun than learning about his secret marriage, anyway. ‘Fine. How far is Elko?’

  Dawn bounced a little in her seat as she consulted her phone. ‘About another hour and a half. We’ll be there right in time for lunch!’

  ‘Perfect.’ Cooper’s voice was bone-dry. ‘A picnic with a polar bear. Just what I always dreamt of.’

  ‘I knew you’d love it.’ Dawn settled back into her seat with a satisfied grin.

  Maybe this trip wouldn’t be so unbearable after all.

  * * *

  Cooper stared up at the giant, glass-encased polar bear. He had to admit, he’d never seen bigger. Not that he’d actually been looking.

  ‘Apparently, White King is ten feet four inches tall and weighs two thousand, two hundred pounds.’ Dawn straightened up from reading the plaque beside the bear.

  ‘I could have read that myself, you realise,’ Cooper said.

  Dawn gave a light shrug. ‘It’s more fun to learn these things together.’

  Fun. Last he recalled, that wasn’t what this road trip was about. Although, he had to admit, Dawn was a better travelling companion than he’d expected. She hadn’t complained about the long hours in the car, or demanded to stop for bathroom breaks every thirty minutes. And she hadn’t pressed too much to discover his secrets. It felt more as though she was using meaningless small talk—and polar bears—to distract herself from the end of the journey.

  Which was interesting in itself.

  ‘What I don’t get is why this creature is here.’ Cooper gestured around him at the casino and hotel that housed the giant bear, which seemed to have nothing to do with the Arctic Circle, as far as he could see.

  Dawn peered down at her leaflet again. ‘Apparently it was something to do with a competition to find the biggest polar bear, back in the fifties.’

  Of course it was. Didn’t everything come down to competition in the end? To proving you could be bigger or better or greater or richer than everyone else?

  Cooper turned away from White King and sought out the bar menu instead. Cheap and cheerful was what they were going for, apparently.

  ‘Hot dogs?’ he suggested, and Dawn hesitated for a moment before nodding.

  Then she grinned. ‘It says here they’ll bring your food to the slots, if you ask.’

  Cooper frowned. ‘So you’re a gambler? Did my brother know?’ Because that was exactly the sort of information that might have driven Justin away on his wedding day. A rich husband would certainly have solved the issue of any outstanding debts at the poker table...

  But Dawn just laughed, as if he had to be joking. ‘I’ve never actually been in a casino before. Not counting sleeping above one last night, of course. Justin and I talked about eloping to Vegas at one point, but...’ She shook her head as she trailed off.

  ‘But he wanted a proper family wedding, I assume.’ Justin wouldn’t have deprived their mother of the chance for a society event of the year, however stupidly in love he was.

  ‘Actually, it was me.’ Dawn flashed him a small smile. ‘I knew my parents and my sisters would never forgive me if I just showed up married one day. And, besides, I’d waited long enough for a big day of my own.’ She shrugged. ‘Why skimp on it, right?’

  ‘Especially when your fiancé has the money to give you your dream wedding,’ Cooper replied. Of course she’d want the spectacle. What was the point of marrying into money if she couldn’t show it off? Eloping would have defeated the object. If she was anything like Rachel—and, from Justin’s note, he had to assume she was, even if she didn’t always seem it—an elopement would have suggested a hasty mistake. She’d have wanted to show the world that she’d completely won Justin over, made him fall absurdly in love with her, before she dropped him and ran off, laughing all the way to the bank.

  Dawn’s smile stiffened. ‘Yeah, well, weddings are always a compromise, aren’t they? I mean, there’s so many people to keep happy.’

  Why would she care about that? That was the part that Cooper couldn’t figure out. Unless it was all part of the act, of course.

  Rachel had designed every aspect of their wedding, and had kept control of the reins with an iron grip. The day hadn’t been theirs, it had been hers, and everyone there had known it.

  But, now that he thought about it, he hadn’t seen much of the Dawn he’d come to know over the last three days in the arrangements for and Justin’s and her wedding. And the guest list had been easily three-quarters full of people he knew his mother must have invited.

  What he couldn’t figure out was whether that meant she was less good at screwing his family over than Rachel, or more. Because, from speaking to his family after Justin’s no-show, they’d seemed even more surprised—if not exactly disappointed—that the wedding hadn’t gone ahead than Dawn had been.

  ‘So, what do you think?’ Dawn asked, her smile still a little too forced. ‘Want to show me how to use these machines while we wait for our hot dogs? Perhaps White King here can be our lucky charm.’

  Cooper stared across at the ringing, beeping, irritating machines. It wasn’t exactly his idea of a fun time, but at least it was something different from staring at the interstate for hours on end. Salt Lake City, where they’d decided to stop for the night, was still another three hours or more away, even if the traffic was good.

  He rolled his eyes. ‘Fine. Let’s go get some change—as soon as I’ve ordered these hot dogs.’

  Dawn’s beaming smile was almost enough to make him forget why they were there in the first place, and the childish way she clapped her hands with glee was enough to make him doubt the only things he knew about her all over again.

  She was a liar. She was after Justin’s money.

  So why was he having so much fun travelling with her?

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  ‘I’M PAYING FOR the hotel tonight,’ Dawn reminded Cooper as the lights of Salt Lake City appeared on the horizon through the windscreen. Hopefully he’d take the hint and find somewhere affordable.

  Cooper looked up from the hotel app on his phone. ‘Planning on using your winnings from the historic commercial casino?’

  ‘Ha! You’d better hope not, or we’re sleeping on the streets tonight.’ White King had, sadly, proved to be less of a lucky charm than she’d hoped.

  ‘Yeah, I wouldn’t turn to a career in professional gambling any time soon.’ He scrolled through the pages of vacant hotel rooms on his phone, and Dawn tried to concentrate on the road rather than the prices on the screen. She’d have to check her card balance online when they stopped. Maybe she could up the credit limit...

  ‘Okay, I’ve got us two rooms at a motel on the outskirts,’ Cooper told her. ‘Nothing fancy, but I figured we’d grab dinner first anyway, then just show up in time to sleep.’

  Nothing fancy. In Cooper’s world, that could mean anything, but at least it sounded as though he hadn’t purposefully booked the most expensive place he could just to mess with her.

  He had to know that she wasn’t from the same sort of world as his brother and him—he’d met her family, after all. With five girls all at home, money had never exactly been abundant in the Featherington house—although, until she’d met Justin, Dawn had never felt badly off. Still, compared to the Edwards’ world of beach houses in the Hamptons, vineyards in California and the ability to fly first class everywhere, Dawn supposed most people would feel kind of broke.

  Of course, it was more her credit card bill that made her feel particularly poor these days. Because, while Justin had always been generous, he just hadn’t always got that keeping up with the Edwards cost money. He’d happily pay for flights, holidays and dinners, but it wouldn’t occur to him that the outfits he liked to show her off in, or the drink she needed to order at the fancy restaurant bar a
nd sip slowly until he showed up an hour late for dinner, blaming work, were rather more expensive than she was used to paying for. Apparently Top Shop and a bottle of cider were not the Edwards’ way.

  She’d tried explaining it to Justin once or twice, but embarrassment meant she’d bungled it, hinting around the edges of the problem but never fully articulating it. Justin had just patted her hand and said how nice it was to date a girl with an actual job for a change, one who wasn’t always looking for new ways to spend his money because she had her own.

  But Dawn’s job, good as it was, definitely hadn’t paid for the same sort of lifestyle Justin was used to.

  She just hoped Cooper was a bit more reasonable in his hotel expectations.

  ‘Take a left off here,’ Cooper said, glancing between the road and the map on his phone. ‘There’s a pancake house along here we can eat at, and the motel’s not far after that.’

  ‘Pancakes for dinner?’ Dawn asked as she signalled. ‘Aren’t they more of a breakfast thing?’

  Cooper shrugged. ‘Why limit ourselves?’

  ‘Fair point.’

  The thing was, Dawn mused as she tucked into her chicken and mushroom cream sauce pancake a short while later, that until this week she’d always been more of a salads girl. At least, since she’d come over to the States. Firstly because her sisters had teased her about American portion sizes, and joked that she’d be as big as the other four of them put together by the time she came home again, and she’d really wanted to prove them wrong. And then, of course, having spent all that money on expensive clothes of the sort Justin liked, she really couldn’t afford not to fit into them any more.

  Besides, Justin liked her in bikinis, and they took a certain amount of self-discipline to look good in. Especially given the fact that most of the other women he introduced her to had nothing else to do with their time but make sure they looked good in bikinis. Dawn couldn’t commit time or money to a personal trainer for three hours a day, plus nutritionally balanced meals delivered daily from a world-class chef, but she could order a plain salad when she ate out, and go for a run once in a while. So she had.

  Until this week. Since Justin had failed to show up at the altar, she’d eaten a burger, doughnuts, hot dogs and now pancakes.

  And she’d loved every delicious mouthful of them.

  One thing was for certain—whatever happened with Justin, she was never going back to limiting herself to boring, tasteless food again.

  They ate quickly, both tired and ready to get to the motel after a long day guiding Claudia across the country. Dawn drove the last mile or two to the motel, Cooper calling out directions from the satnav on his phone. As he guided her into the car park, Dawn let out a sigh of relief. The motel looked clean and respectable enough, but not as though it was going to break the bank. If they stuck to places like this, and she could get another five hundred dollars on her credit limit just in case, she should get away with paying for every other night’s accommodation.

  Of course, what she’d do after that was another worry entirely. One she’d deal with after she’d dealt with Justin.

  ‘Let’s go check in,’ she said, breathing easily for the first time since they’d left White King behind. ‘I’ve been dreaming of a bed to myself for the last hundred miles.’

  Which, she decided later, was probably what had jinxed the whole thing.

  * * *

  ‘Yes, I am absolutely sure that I booked two rooms.’ Cooper scraped a hand through his hair and glared at the teenager behind the motel desk who apparently had flunked maths every year since the first grade. ‘Two. Not one. It’s a fairly simple concept.’

  ‘Yeah, but see, the thing is—’ the boy started.

  ‘The thing is I need two rooms!’ Cooper roared, making the boy behind the desk jump. He’d feel guilty, except he was too exhausted to feel anything except tired. And maybe annoyed.

  Dawn’s hand on his arm caught his attention, and he turned to look at her.

  ‘Let me?’ she asked softly.

  Cooper sighed and stepped back. ‘By all means.’

  ‘Hi!’ Dawn beamed at the receptionist, looking perky and pleasant and nowhere near as tired as Cooper knew she had to be after driving all afternoon. ‘So, my friend here booked us two rooms for tonight. Can we have them, please?’

  ‘That’s the thing! He didn’t.’ The boy leant over the desk, obviously relieved to be dealing with someone who would actually let him finish a sentence. Something that Cooper was fairly sure was a mistake, as the end of the sentence was usually, ‘No,’ in his experience.

  ‘He absolutely did,’ Dawn said. ‘On your chain’s booking app.’

  The boy pulled a face. ‘Oh, man, we’ve been having all sorts of problems with that thing. See, what he booked was one room for two adults.’ He turned the computer screen so Dawn could see it, and Cooper watched her face fall. ‘And that’s the only room we have left.’

  ‘Of course it is,’ Dawn muttered, so low that Cooper had to strain to hear her. ‘Because my life is apparently cursed.’

  ‘So, uh, do you want the room?’ The boy looked between the two of them, room key in his shaky hand.

  This was ridiculous. Cooper reached across and plucked it from his hand. ‘Which room?’

  ‘Two-oh-two,’ the boy replied, smiling with obvious relief.

  Cooper grabbed his bag and motioned to Dawn. ‘Come on.’

  ‘So...we’re sharing a room?’ Dawn asked as they headed to room two hundred and two.

  ‘Apparently so,’ Cooper bit out.

  ‘Right.’ She did a quick double-step to catch him up, and Cooper realised he might be walking a little fast.

  He was just so damned annoyed with himself. Or at least with the stupid booking app.

  Spotting the number on a door, he halted suddenly, Dawn skidding a little beside him as she did the same.

  Please let there be two beds. Please.

  It was a long shot, he knew, given the quality of the motel, but Cooper had spent a long day in the car, and the few days before that hadn’t been exactly relaxed, plus he’d hardly slept the night before. All he wanted to do was crawl into a soft bed and sleep for twelve solid hours. Was that so much to ask?

  Apparently so.

  The door swung open to reveal one bed that could charitably be called a small double and an even smaller, lumpy-looking couch under the window.

  Perfect.

  Sighing, Cooper stepped in and flung his bag onto the floor by the couch. ‘You take the bed,’ he said, because he might be grumpy and exhausted but he was still a gentleman. ‘I’ll crash on the sofa.’

  He was about to sit down on it and loosen his shoes when Dawn said, ‘No.’

  ‘No?’ He looked up. Her expression was pure stubbornness, and he was just too tired for this.

  ‘I’ll take the sofa. I’m shorter—I’ll fit better. You take the bed.’ She folded her arms across her chest as if she was waiting for him to argue.

  He should argue. That was the gentlemanly thing to do.

  But he really wanted that bed...

  No. ‘Don’t be silly. I’ll take the couch.’

  ‘I am not being silly.’ Dawn’s eyes grew harder, and he realised he might have chosen his words poorly. ‘I’m being practical. The sofa is too short for you to sleep on, and it’s your turn to drive first in the morning, so you need the rest more than me. I can sleep in the car tomorrow before I have to drive.’

  When she put it like that, it did kind of make sense.

  ‘Fine, if you insist.’ Cooper gave her a tired smile. ‘Thank you.’

  Dawn nodded sharply. ‘But I’m using the bathroom first,’ she said, and flashed him a grin.

  Maybe tonight wouldn’t be too unbearable after all.

  * * *

  This was unbearable.

&nbs
p; Dawn shifted between the lumps in the sofa’s cushions, tugging the extra blanket they’d found in the wardrobe a little tighter around her. Just feet away, she could hear Cooper’s slow, even breaths. At least one of them was getting some sleep. The bed, she thought rationally, probably wasn’t all that comfortable either, given the general quality of the motel. But it had to be less awful than the sofa from hell.

  Maybe she shouldn’t have made such a fuss about giving him the bed. If she’d just let him play the gentleman, she could be curled up there asleep right now. Except then he’d have been grumpier than ever in the morning, and she didn’t want to subject Claudia to his aggressive driving. Or herself to his glowering looks and sharp comments, come to that.

  Sighing, Dawn turned over again, praying she’d find a comfortable position. She was being unfair to Cooper, she knew. So he wasn’t thrilled to be spending his holiday on a road trip with a woman he barely knew. That was understandable. And actually, over the last day or so, he’d started to lighten up. They’d even had a beer each with their pancakes when they’d stopped and, although they’d been too tired to talk much, there had at least been a weary comradeship building between them, she thought.

  Until the whole room debacle, anyway.

  There was, she realised now, a third option for sleeping arrangements—one that neither of them even seemed to have considered. It had only occurred to Dawn once she was settled on the sofa with a spring stuck in her back.

  They could have shared the bed.

  For one brief, blissful moment, Dawn let herself consider how it might feel to lie on an actual mattress, with enough space to stretch her legs out the whole way. With a real duvet, instead of this scratchy, itchy wool blanket. With Cooper’s arms wrapped warm around her and...

  Wait. No.

  Where the hell had that come from?

  A place of sleep deprivation, Dawn decided, as she turned her back on the bed and stared, wide-eyed, at the cushions of the sofa.

  She was not thinking about Justin’s brother that way. And, actually, she really wasn’t. What she was imagining was warmth, comfort and another person beside her who wasn’t just there because...