Across the dimly lit bar, it was hard to make out which one was the bride, but when one of them leaned forward on the bar, a tiara glittered under its lights. Her sash was white, and the rest were silver, and hers boldly proclaimed her to be the bride. Which was a pity, because she was the only one that pulled my attention from my now dismally watered-down drink.
Her blonde hair spilled over her shoulders, tendrils sliding in between her cleavage as she leaned over the bar, her ear toward the bartender as the bartender spoke. The angle of her head meant that her gaze absently found mine.
I nearly looked away but held it for a moment longer. Will used to tell me I had the type of stare that intimidated; that made someone else turn away first. But the bride, or the soon-to-be-bride, locked eyes with me and then her rosy lips did the most unexpected thing—they smiled. Slowly. Confidently.
For the first time in as long as I could remember, I turned away first, tapping the condensation blots on my napkin. Out of the corner of my eye, I looked toward the group again.
The bartender loaded up the counter in front of her with drinks in all colors and sizes and then came back down my way. “Another?”
I pushed my half-empty glass in front of me. “No, thanks. The check, please.”
“You got it.” She took the glass and efficiently checked me out on the computer. I watched her closely, because I could feel a different pair of eyes on me. Burning into me. Maybe that was crazy. Maybe it was all my imagination. Maybe those greyhounds were stronger than I realized.
But after I signed the check and stood to leave, I chanced another look across the bar. Sure enough, the blonde was still looking at me, smiling over the rim of her glass. She was beautiful—in the kind of way that would intimidate if it weren’t for her welcoming smile. I hesitated, nearly moving toward her. To get her name, to hear anything fall off her perfectly rosy lips.
I shook my head. She was the bride. Maybe she wanted one last liaison before committing to wedded bliss—but she’d have to find it elsewhere. I hadn’t come to this bar to pick up any women—especially a committed one—so I’d go back to my room alone.
Once out in the hallway, away from the soon-to-be-bride’s gaze, I felt like I could take a deep breath. I stared down at my phone, ignoring the missed texts and phone calls from tonight and focused instead on the voicemails.
Without thinking, I tapped the first one and put the phone to my ear, hearing my best friend’s last message to me.
It was like listening to a script I knew by heart. Maybe because I did.
“Hey, Liam. You’re not answering, so I assume you’re not coming. It’s fucking cold, so you’re probably better off.” He laughed and the sound of wind around him obscured some of what he was saying. “Your balls would probably shrivel off anyway. What little is left of them after your winter in Canada.” A moment of silence as he made a sound like he was shivering. Then, blurting in his loud, Will way, “Hey, after this, let’s get together. I’ll come to you. Let me know when your work isn’t sending you to the other side of the country and we’ll paint the town red. One night. Like old times.”
The voicemail ended, but I held the phone a moment longer. Hearing his voice like that nearly made me believe he wasn’t gone. That any moment now, he’d call me to make plans and this time I wouldn’t bail on him. This time I’d answer. And we’d sort out our fucking shit and be the duo we’d always been.
But reality came back in like the bastard it was, reminding me that Will was gone. There wouldn’t be any opportunities to paint the town red, no visits to hash things out. Will had called me one final time a day before he died, and I’d purposefully hit ignore on my phone—too busy with work to give him five minutes of my time. After I’d fucking bailed on him.
I didn’t think it was possible to regret something so much.
3
“You have your eye on someone?” Lauren asked, nudging me with her elbow.
“Whoa,” I said, turning my attention from the dark stranger across the bar back to the group. “You can’t elbow the drink hand, Lauren. That’s alcohol abuse.” Luckily, my beer had only sloshed a bit over my wrist. Unashamed, I slurped it up and straightened the crown I wore.
Lauren laughed. “Remember in high school, when I dropped my drink on your lap?”
“How could I forget?” I asked drily, readjusting Lauren’s hand so she wouldn’t repeat her mistake of years before. Of the ladies in this small bridal party, I’d known Lauren the longest—in fact, I’d been the one to introduce her to Bekka when I’d realized how in need Bekka was of people who wouldn’t mow her over, like her sister had been doing this entire bachelorette weekend.
“It’s your turn,” I reminded Bekka. “Truth or dare?”
Bekka blushed. She pre-gamed so hard she’d fallen asleep in the hotel room—which, if you asked me, was her plan all along. Bless her, Bekka was a very, very shy soon-to-be-bride. Which was why I’d accepted her dare to wear her tiara and bride sash this weekend. Brides usually got more attention than someone shy like Bekka would be comfortable with anyway. And, like old times, the night had been games of truth or dares, but so far, I’d been the only person to take a single dare.
“Truth…” Bekka said, and I suppressed a sigh.
“Okay,” Lauren blurted, swaying a bit beside me. “Is Thom’s dick really big?”
“Oh.” Bekka hiccuped and her pale skin reddened even more. “Um. What’s big?”
“I think you know what’s big, Beks,” her big sister Katy chimed in. “Like is it dinner plate length or is it saucer sized?”
“Yeah. Is it a meal or is it a snack?” Lauren asked.
Normally, I’d be down for this kind of girl chat. But this was Bekka’s weekend to let loose and with each probing question from her bachelorette party, I could see Bekka shrinking inwardly. Vegas hadn’t even been her bachelorette plans. That was Katy’s doing. Bekka wanted a quiet weekend at her parents’ cabin in the Idahoan forest. But Katy wanted Vegas. And after peer pressuring Bekka to do a Vegas bachelorette weekend, Bekka had reluctantly agreed.
Katy wasn’t my favorite person, to put it mildly. She liked to make a lot of comments about things Bekka was doing wrong for her wedding and took it upon herself to plan things that simply didn’t suit Bekka’s tastes. If I hadn’t been suspicious before of the reason for my inclusion as a member of Bekka’s bridal party, I knew for sure that I was included to help bring her sister to heel.
Katy flipped her hair over her shoulder and eyed her sister like she couldn’t wait to humiliate her. Bitch.
“Oh, come on. You guys can come up with a better question,” I said. Bekka’s eyes shifted to me and I saw her gratitude echoed in their blue depths. “Okay, Bekka. Have you ever sexted Thom?” It was relatively tame, but good enough to satiate Lauren.
A small smile spread Bekka’s lips.
Lauren burst out laughing. “Really? Read it out loud. In a British accent.”
“Hey, that’s a dare and a truth combined,” Katy complained. “I don’t really want to hear what sexy shit my sister says to her fiancé.”
“But you wanted to know if his dick could stretch the length of a dinner plate?” I asked, an eyebrow raised.
“It was just curiosity.”
“I don’t mind,” Bekka piped up. “I can read it aloud. Not sure I can pull off the British accent, though.”
“You totally can,” I said, wrapping my arm around her. “Come on, let’s hear it.”
“Okay.” She took a drink, finishing her glass, and closed her eyes briefly. “Let’s try titty fucking tonight.”
“Bekka!” Lauren squealed as I held up a hand for a high-five.
“I’m not drunk enough for this,” Katy complained, turning back toward the bar. I looked across it, looking at the man who was speaking to the bartender—the one I’d made long, delicious eye contact with as soon as I’d walked in. Though it was dark, I could make him out enough to know that he was hot—like the broody kind, a
s if he’d walked off the set of Pride and Prejudice and had found himself in a bar he didn’t want to be in and looked through everyone else like they were invisible. Like he could crush you with one look, break you into tiny pieces with his words. Why did I find that hot, anyway?
“It’s Tori’s turn for a dare,” Katy said, dragging my attention away from the hot piece at the bar. “Lauren, you want to dare her?”
“Yeah,” Lauren said, her dark eyes dancing. “Tell someone you love them.”
“What?” I deflated a little. Dares were my thing—the bigger, the better. This felt like third grade. “Uh… okay. Bekka, I love you.”
“No.” Lauren elbowed me, making my beer slosh over my arm again. “Not like that—that’s boring. Go up to someone—a stranger—in this bar and confess your love for them.”
“Really?” I asked.
“What, are you too afraid?” Lauren asked, teasing me. “You’re not going to turn down a dare, are you?”
I rolled my eyes. “I never turn down a dare. So, tell someone I love them? That’s it?”
“On second thought, yeah, that’s kind of boring,” Katy said.
Lauren’s smile fell and I could see she was second-guessing herself. Well, fuck it. I wasn’t going to give Katy the satisfaction of making someone else feel like shit this weekend.
“No, it’s not. Tell someone I love them? I can do that. Do I get to pick who?”
Lauren shrugged. “I don’t see why not.”
“Cool.” My eyes traveled to the dark stranger across the bar, who was no longer in eyesight. Did he leave? Shit. He was my plan. After a quick scan across the bar, I didn’t see anyone else I wanted to confess undying love for. “Does it count if he's outside of the bar?”
“You’ll have to hurry up if he’s already left,” Katy said.
I hooked my arm around Bekka and nodded at Lauren. “Come on, watch me make an ass of myself. Katy, stay by the bar so they don’t think we’ve left.” Ignoring Katy’s frown, I dragged the girls out the door we’d come in minutes before and scanned the hallway for Mr. Handsomepants. He was staring down at his phone in his hands, about fifteen feet away.
“Hey, you,” I said.
His head lifted, surprise registering on his face. “Hey yourself.” His lips flattened in a line, but they were beautifully full lips. The kind that made me think dirty things.
Oh shit. Nerves flitted through me, making my mouth go dry and my legs quiver. “I just wanted to tell you,” I began, and then paused. I wasn’t really going to chicken out on this, was I? Why was I nervous? I supposed seeing him in the brightly lit hallway, it was a little harder to just tell this Mr. Seriously Handsomepants that I loved him. And it didn’t help that Lauren and Bekka were giggling messes behind me.
“What did you want to tell me?” He stowed his phone in his pocket and turned to face me fully. He had the most incredibly symmetrical face—with cheekbones that created dark hollows in his cheeks and dark, full eyebrows that framed his darker eyes so perfectly it wasn’t fucking fair. Some of us had to work for hard for eyebrows that were more sisters than twins. His full lips smiled slightly, politely. And his strong jaw rounded out his resemblance to a Regency-era tasty morsel. He had the face that a Jane Austen heroine might moon over, I decided.
“I’m Tori,” I said.
“Hi Tori.” He tucked his hands in his pockets. It felt weird being a dozen feet apart and neither of us moving, but when his gaze darted to the uncontrollably giggly ladies behind me, I figured the distance was probably for the best.
“What’s your name?”
“Why?” he asked. His eyes narrowed, giving him such a moody, stormy vibe. Why did I like that so much?
Because it was a challenge.
“Well, I have something to tell you, and I think I should probably know your name before I say it.”
His eyes narrowed slightly, and he pursed his lips. “Okay. It’s Liam.”
Mmm. It fit him. A sexy name to match his sexy, deep voice. “Hi Liam.”
A smile curled his lips, slightly softening all his sharp edges and doing dangerous things to his eyes. “Hi Tori.”
“Hi Liam.”
Lauren elbowed me. “You already said that,” she hissed in a voice that was probably intended to be a whisper, but I was pretty sure that everyone in the hotel could hear what she said.
I elbowed her back, sending her further behind me and faced Liam more fully. “Cool.” I took a deep breath, filling my lungs with stale hotel air. “Liam. I just have to tell you that I love you. I know it’s a little soon, but I hope you’ll accept it with an open heart.”
You could hear a pin drop—which was impressive for the lobby of a Vegas hotel at night. I could tell by the expression on his face that what I’d said was the very last thing he expected from me. Which was fair.
After a pause, he said, “You… love me.”
“Yep.” I nodded. “Like I said, I know it’s kind of soon—”
“Just a bit,” he conceded. He was so hard to read. Did he find it funny? Had I offended him? He was a stranger, so why did I care that much one way or another how he received it?
“It was a dare,” Lauren squealed from beside me. “Sorry, we’re having a bachelorette party and I dared her. It’s all my fault.”
“Ah.” Liam folded his hands in front of his body and took us in. “So, Tori’s the soon-to-be bride. Which makes you her bachelorettes?”
“Oh.” I adjusted my tiara unsuccessfully. I knew it was cockeyed on my head and the glowing penises were having a real rager around my neck as their battery began to drain. “No, this was a dare.” I nodded toward where Bekka lurked behind me. “She’s the bride. I’m just a sucker for dares.”
His smile grew wider, as if this information pleased him, and my stomach did a little flip at the sudden flash of white teeth. “Which is why you followed me out here to confess your love.”
“Exactly.”
“Well, Tori.” He paused and tapped his chin in a hot college professor kind of way. “It is a little soon. So, please forgive me if I take a little longer to say the words back.”
I sighed dramatically. “I suppose I can be patient.”
“Good.”
I was smiling like an idiot.
He took one step toward me. “Do you live here?”
“In this hotel?” I asked.
He laughed, and oh—it was a rich, deep sound. Enough to make the warmth in my belly bloom into my chest. “No, do you live in Vegas?”
“No. I live in Idaho. Do you live here?”
“In this hotel?” he asked with a grin, echoing me. Oh, he was playful. I liked that.
“Yeah, in this hotel.”
“Sadly, no. But I live nearby and not in Idaho. So, I guess that means we are ill-fated lovers.”
I nodded, grinning. “Well, at least it was a great five minutes.”
“Must’ve been, since you confessed your love two minutes into those five minutes.”
“What can I say? When I feel something, I say it.”
“It’s true,” Lauren butted in. “She doesn’t shut up.”
I didn’t want to stop talking to him. But Katy was waiting for us and this was supposed to be Bekka’s weekend. I couldn’t very well abandon her to chat with this Liam guy some more. But I didn’t know how to say goodbye to him.
“This is where we part then,” he said, as if reading my mind. He placed his arm across his stomach and mimed a slight bow.
Fuck. Me.
“It was a pleasure, Tori,” he added.
Ugh. Why did 'pleasure’ sound so sexy rolling off his lips? “It was, Liam.” He gave me one last smile before he turned and started walking away. My heart pinched a teeny, tiny bit. I’d only spoken to him for a few minutes, but surprisingly, I was invested. And there he went, effectively destroying all of my inappropriate thoughts.
Against my better judgement, I opened my mouth again. “I hope I see you again,” I called after him.
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He stopped and turned slowly. God, even his slow-motion spin did things to me that should’ve been illegal in the other forty-nine states. After a beat and another small smile, he said, “I hope so, too.”
It was then that I realized Bekka and Lauren had already returned to the bar, leaving me alone in the hallway. Liam tipped his head toward me and then moved toward the elevators.
I waited, waited, waited, for him to turn around one final time. And when he entered the elevator, I was rewarded with one final smile before the doors closed.
If this was a movie, I’d have clutched my chest and melted into a puddle of goo right there. But this wasn’t my night, I reminded myself. And this five-minute interlude was just that. I’d never see Liam again and I was okay with that.
Really, I was.
In fact, if I told myself I was okay with it enough, I’d soon start to believe it.
It was only five minutes.
It wasn’t like we had some epic cosmic love that ended abruptly.
So then why did it feel like I was closing the book to a story that had only just begun?
After a shake of my shoulders, I returned to the bar.
When I entered through the door, Katy was messing with Bekka’s hair—trying to convince her once again to wear her strawberry blonde locks up for the wedding.
“She actually did it,” Lauren said as I saddled up to them. “Have you ever even said I love you before?”
The fact that I had to think about it was telling. “I mean, I have loved guys before.” Like my guy best friend, Keane. Who had once been my boyfriend before the romantic feelings between us had dissolved. But love as in an earth-shattering, Celine Dion ballad kind of way? Nope, couldn’t relate. At all. Which was probably why it’d been easy to tell that dark smokeshow of a man that I loved him.
I’d meant what I’d said—I hoped to see him again. But this was Vegas and the hotel we were in wasn’t exactly small. And I hadn’t even gotten his last name.
“Whose turn is it for a truth or dare?” Bekka asked, interrupting my thoughts from the stranger and turning my attention back to the bridal party.
One Little Dare Page 3
