Vera finally turned around and stood up, stealing our actual breath. She was a goddess in her wedding dress. It had all the romantic vintage feels with a sheer lace overlay covered in floral appliques and layers of white beneath. The back was a wide, deep V, coming together in a long train of buttons that started at her lower back. The intricately detailed lace sleeves were held onto the very curve of her shoulders with clear tape. They were short sleeve and nearly bell-like, but so ridiculously flattering, I couldn’t help but be jealous of her. The front was a low-cut V too, ending at her sternum and remaining tasteful but eye-catching. Her dark hair was styled similarly to mine only with flowers interwoven instead of the wreath I wore. And her makeup was all soft pinks and expertly placed highlights and she looked like a magazine ad—even with the smallest swell of her belly.
She was everything a bride was supposed to be. The perfect picture of hope and anticipation and eternal bliss. My heart ached with the desire to live this out one day. To have what she had. To love like she loved. To hope for what she hoped for.
My mind flashed with drunken half-images of sleeping with Vann. God, what a mistake. I wanted everything, and yet my nights were spent alone. Except for last night. And I can’t even remember what happened.
At least not accurately.
Not that Vann was the usual brand of loser I managed to attract in the past. But he wasn’t exactly my perfect eHarmony match either. Nor was he broadcasting interested vibes my way.
At least not in the wedding bells and prenup kind of way.
I chewed my lip, wondering if I would be the kind of girl to demand a prenup when it came down to it. I had a vast enough fortune that it would be smart to include one. And I wanted to be smart.
And wise.
And mature.
And a prenup definitely seemed like something a smart, wise, mature woman would get.
But I knew Ezra wasn’t planning to get one with Molly. When I’d asked him about it, he’d told me that if he needed to worry about a prenup with his fiancée, he wouldn’t have fallen in love with her to begin with.
I believed my brother. There were plenty of women in his life before Molly. He’d learned a lot from his first marriage. And he’d finally found a woman up to the challenge of him.
“Dillon, are you okay?” Vera asked, breaking me out of deep thought. She fidgeted nervously and I realized I’d basically been glaring at her as my mind spun in a hundred different directions.
Thank you resting bitch face for making my friends feel so loved.
Also, thank you Vera for getting married and making me question everything in my entire life.
I smiled and brushed at strange, stray tears. “You’re gorgeous,” I whispered. “I’m sorry, you’re like this total vision of perfection and it just… got me thinking.” I waved a hand in the air. “Sorry, my thoughts are scattered today. I have got to stop letting Wyatt talk me into shots every time we go out.”
“Maybe we should start a petition,” Kaya grumbled.
“You’re stunning, Vera, seriously. Killian is going to die when he sees you,” I assured her.
“I’d settle for shocked silence,” she said, holding back tears. “Maybe a tear or two.”
The room filled up after that, the flower girls and ring bearer arrived and all the other attendants. Chefs and waiters were everywhere in the kitchen, preparing for the elegant reception. Champagne glasses were passed around and we toasted our friend and the nuptials about to take place. And then we toasted our friendship and love for Vera. And as the toasts went on, I let the liquid courage kill some of the strange butterflies flapping around inside me.
Not that it could kill everything. I realized I would have to go through Molly and Ezra’s wedding too. And probably Kaya and Wyatt’s before I even found a consistent date for the receptions.
I had basically army-crawled out of Vann’s apartment this morning because a lasting relationship was the last thing I wanted. The career, remember? The goals? And accomplishments? All that travel? And the general feeling of just needing to get my life together before I added anyone else to it.
But now I felt shockingly alone—glaringly single. Like everyone else in the world had this wonderful, beautiful, perfect relationship and I had… a lonely apartment and an uncertain future at Bianca.
Tears filled my eyes as I realized this wasn’t a new feeling. This wasn’t something I had just recently stumbled into now that my friends were all settling down.
This emptiness… this utterly depressing feeling of total isolation was something I had carried with me since I could remember.
This was why I’d gotten pulled along with the prep school crowd, trying whatever was put in front of me, sleeping with whoever was interested. This was why I’d hated going to my dad’s house where the lonely feelings I struggled with were only amplified. This was why it had been hard to be at home with my mom when the same feelings were reflected in her.
This was why I’d chased a culinary career—because I could see the sense of community there, because I wanted the friendships and relationships my brother had with his people.
And it was why I’d hooked up with Vann last night. He’d felt like part of that impossible dream I just wanted to taste. I wanted to hold and immerse myself in it for only a few minutes.
Only when I’d woken up there this morning, those romantic feelings of belonging and companionship were gone.
It was cold in his bed where I’d been drenched with reality. It was even lonelier there than in my own bed.
Because he didn’t want anything real or long term. He’d wanted to hook up.
We had wanted to hook up.
And once that was over, there was just him. And there was just me—same girl, same problems, same life.
I squeezed out of the office—it was getting hot in there with all the people—and escaped down the hallway toward the bathroom. If anyone asked where I was going, I planned to tell them I needed to freshen up, but no one stopped me.
Out of the corner of my eye I could see black tuxes interspersed between endless bouquets and floral decorations. The air smelled like honey and lavender and an early summer evening.
The bathroom door couldn’t have shut fast enough. I braced myself against the sink, everything new, gleaming and still smelling like fresh paint. I wanted to cry, but I refused to mess up my perfect makeup. Besides, I tried to reason, this wasn’t worth crying about.
Just because everyone in my orbit had found their happily ever after didn’t mean I wasn’t going to find mine. This wasn’t a competition to see who could be the happiest. This was life and it didn’t make sense—would never make sense. That didn’t mean it couldn’t be beautiful.
Or that I couldn’t be happy without a man.
I couldn’t control the timing of things. Life happened in its own sequence. And I would just have to wait for the right time and for the stars to align and for Mercury to get out of retrograde.
Or was I waiting for Mercury to go into retrograde?
“You don’t even believe in that stuff,” I told my reflection.
“Believe in what?”
I whirled around, bumping my hip against the thick concrete counter. “I don’t think you’re supposed to be in here,” I told Vann, completely shocked to see that he’d followed me in the women’s bathroom.
He leaned over, looking cool as a cucumber checking for feet beneath the stall. He didn’t bother arguing my point. His raised eyebrows said everything. We’re alone. What does it matter? When he was upright again, he folded his forearms over his chest, wrinkling his crisp white shirt and tuxedo jacket. “What are you, like the one-night stand fairy? I didn’t hear you leave this morning.”
Oh, so he was just going to lay it out. Like all of it. My cheeks instantly flushed, the blush so strong it spread across my chest to my shoulders like wildfire.
This wasn’t how I did things. I came from a world that turned passive aggressiveness into an artform. We didn’t
say what we thought. We said what you wanted to hear. And I would never bring up something like a one-night stand and put them on the spot.
God, Vann. What the hell?
I cleared my throat of the frogs that had taken up residence there and tilted my chin in the hopes that I looked as calm and collected as he did. “I, uh, have a hard time sleeping in any bed but my own.”
Lie.
And he knew it.
His eyebrows scrunched together over his nose, bringing attention to the perfect proportions of his face. God, he looked amazing in that tux with his hair styled back. An image flashed—his cut biceps caging me in, his broad, bare torso slick with sweat and rippled with muscle, his hips pressed against mine. I’m going to save you from those blind dates, Dillon.
I shivered, wondering if that was a real memory from last night or my horny imagination.
It was at that point I tripped over nothing.
Vann canted his head to the side and regarded me in my bridesmaid regalia. “I would have walked you out.”
I mimicked his pose, wrapping my arms around my body. But where he looked like a testosterone tightened tiger about to spring, I was the picture of hollowed out insecurity and self-doubt.
I struggled to swallow, contemplating how to explain my actions. “I knew we had a big day ahead of us, I didn’t want to bother you.”
“Is that what you think you would have done? Bother me?”
His words were wrapped in warmth and an intimacy he’d earned last night, but it was intimacy I didn’t feel since I could barely remember a damn thing. I shrugged, trying to play this cool. “You know what I mean.”
“No. I don’t.”
Laughing to break the tension, I said, “Listen, I realize we had a lot to drink last night and I just didn’t want you to… to feel awkward. It was a mistake and I was trying to save—”
“Last night was a mistake? You’re telling me you regret what happened?”
Obviously, yes. This was awkward as hell and I would have done anything to not have this conversation. So yes, I regretted sleeping with him, especially now that I realized he was going to give me the third degree about it.
But also no. No, I didn’t.
Another partial memory. This time he was positioned over me and I was clawing at his chest, my back arched in perfect submission as his magic rocked through me like a tidal wave.
Sharp and real, and oh my god, I needed to hit the pause button on these unwanted memories before I orgasmed right here on the spot.
Holy shit, I was in over my head.
“I don’t regret what happened,” I rushed to tell him. “Not at all.” I cleared my throat again. “What I’m trying to say is that we barely know each other. And you’re Vera’s brother, which complicates things. And basically, I had a great time last night, but I didn’t want to… prolong the inevitable.”
His chin jerked back a notch. “The inevitable?”
“We hooked up,” I explained, my shoulder lifting in that weak shrug again. “The end.”
His expression shuttered, a hard, impenetrable wall slamming over his eyes, tightening his jaw and locking his lips in place. After he’d stared at me so long and hard, I started to fidget, he shrugged too. “The end.”
Relief drilled through me, opening up entire springs of hope that this conversation was also coming to a close. I loosed a small smile. “Right. You get it. The end.”
His jaw ticked. My relief dried up with my sense of safety. He looked like a shiny new bullet, waiting in the chamber for the trigger to be pulled.
I shivered again, that same climax-filled memory pinging through my head. I was nervous. But I was also hella turned on.
He took a step forward, his lips twisting in a sideways smile. Only it wasn’t a pleasant smile. It was the equivalent of the safety being clicked off that gun. “Let me get this straight…” Another step forward. “We had a little too much to drink last night and hooked up.”
I bobbed my head back and forth. “I would say we had a little more than a little too much. My judgment was definitely impaired.” I tried to laugh again, but the sound hit the atmosphere like dust being sprinkled on the ground.
Taking another step forward, he nodded again. “What you’re saying is we made a reckless decision last night.”
“Reckless. That’s a good word for it.” My butt bumped against the counter. I’d started to retreat, but he wasn’t picking up the stay-away-from-me vibes.
Maybe because they were mixed up with the take-me-now ones?
He moved forward. “And because we didn’t use our most… sober thinking, we’ve now reached The End of whatever was between us.”
I tried laughing again, but it got me nowhere. “Isn’t that what you’re saying?”
He was in front of me now, close and warm and smelling like freaking heaven. His hands landed on either side of my waist. The smooth silk of his tuxedo brushed over my bare arms, sending shivers and tingles abuzz inside me.
“No,” he admitted openly—although that emotionless mask was still in place. “That is not at all what I’m saying.”
I couldn’t breathe. I couldn’t swallow. I was totally paralyzed by his words and what they could mean. Did he want to do it again? Sober this time? Drunk again? Did he just want a hookup? Did he want to run away together?
What the hell did any of this mean?
Instead of asking any of those questions, I managed a weak, strained, barely audible, “Oh.”
He nodded as if he expected that kind of response from me. “Yeah, oh.” He stood straight, putting inches between us, making me instantly cold. He turned and when he was at the door to the bathroom, he added, “There’s something about you, Baptiste.” His gray eyes turned silvery with heat, pinning me in place and stealing whatever response I was trying to spit out. “I don’t know what it is yet, but it’s enough that I know this isn’t The End. This is just the beginning.”
It took me a full five minutes after he’d left to collect myself. I leaned against the counter, hoping I wasn’t somehow ruining my dress, but not strong enough to care.
When I could finally trust my shaky legs to walk back to the office, my blush had turned to a ghostly whiteness that made me look like a corpse.
I could handle a one-night stand like a pro. He was right about me. I really was the one-night stand fairy. I took no prisoners. I left no witnesses. I got in. I got out. I got what I wanted. And I moved on with my life.
Or at least I used to. And I was determined to do that now.
That was what men liked anyway. At least all the men I had known. And not only the men I’d personally experienced in these situations.
My dad was the same way. My brother, until recently had been the same way. Every man I’d ever known had preferred one-night stands to the drama of bad relationships.
Tony, my mom’s husband, isn’t like that, my mind whispered to my battered, barely-beating heart. Killian isn’t like that. Wyatt’s not like that.
True, I had to admit. But they were the small minority compared to the rest of the male population I’d experienced.
And I hardly doubted—no offense Vera—that Vann was in the one percent of decent guys after last night’s shenanigans.
We’d had a good time. We’d had too much to drink. And then we’d had each other in a number of debauched and delicious ways.
But now it was time to go our separate directions. Besides, tonight was the last night I had open in all the foreseeable future and beyond. I was married to my restaurant after this.
And Vann… Vann had his life to return to.
He would always be a good, but fuzzy memory to me. And I would be the same to him. And hopefully, one day, in the future, I would settle into being okay with adding another fuzzy night with a man to my list.
The. End.
Fourteen
Despite my pep talk and firm resolve, I still had to walk down the aisle with Vann. If I thought it was going to be awkward before our l
ittle bathroom chat, I had no idea what was in store for me after.
In hindsight, I probably should have ditched the whole affair completely.
Was there such thing as a runaway bridesmaid?
I could be the first. I liked to blaze my own trail.
But instead of following that instinct, I’d gotten into line next to Vann and slipped my arm through his. He hadn’t held me especially close, but he hadn’t stood cumbersomely away either. I could feel the warmth of his body and the smooth tux fabric that did silly things to my head. And my resolve.
I caught another whiff of him—he smelled so amazing. And considering he likely didn’t use an arsenal of skin care products and army of makeup magicians to freshen his face, he managed to look the opposite of hungover.
God, he was a good-looking man.
Congrats to those Delane kids. They had good genes.
We were first up, having places on the outside of the bridal train. I liked to think of myself as closer to Vera than Kaya, but it also made sense for Kaya to walk down the aisle with her boyfriend and for the only two single people in the bridal party to walk next to each other.
Killian sat Jo in place of his mother, and I tried not to sniffle. It was easier to ignore Vann when I realized I would have to fight all my emotions to survive this wedding without sobbing uncontrollably.
Vann leaned in while I pretended to scratch the corner of my eye and ignored the wetness my fingertip came away with. “You ready for this?”
“We have the easy job,” I whispered back.
He turned his head, pulling my attention toward him. His eyes drifted over my formal attire. “No, you just make it look easy.” He leaned in, his lips brushing my earlobe. “You’re too beautiful, Dillon. I’m finding it hard to look directly at you.”
Before I could reply, the bluegrass quartet began the prelude music, and he was pulling me down the aisle. I struggled for a few seconds as his words seemed to trip up my feet and make me forget how to do simple things like walk… and breathe… and blink. But I recovered quickly.
Opposites Attract: The complete box set Page 107
