He hit the button that started the roof retracting, and she tilted her head up. He was right. The sky was almost the same turquoise as their car, and there wasn’t a cloud in it.
As the roof did its thing, she pulled a scarf out of her purse and tied it over her head. “Our destination is a giant pink hotel, did you know that? It’s nicknamed the Pink Palace.”
“Even better.”
They both slid on their sunglasses, and she couldn’t help but mirror his grin.
He held his hand up for her to high-five. She raised hers and slapped it.
He caught it before she could take it back, drew it to his mouth, and kissed her palm.
She snatched her hand back like he’d burned it.
Say it.
Undisturbed, he started the car and gunned it, still smiling like he didn’t have a care in the world.
And then it was too late. Too loud. The wind whishing at them and the little engine struggling to keep up with his lead foot made it impossible to talk.
Or that was her excuse, anyway.
Chapter Thirteen
It was sort of blowing Bennett’s mind that mere days ago he’d been snowed in in New York, barking at his staff and as estranged from his parents as ever. Look at him now: pulling up to a pink hotel in a turquoise mini car with an amazing woman next to him, and said woman’s friends, having been texted about their imminent arrival, jumping up and down and screaming like it was 1964 and they were witnessing the arrival of the Beatles.
What had he called it earlier? The Gia effect.
“Happy birthday, Ladybug!” one of them—must be Elise, since she was the only one he didn’t recognize—shouted.
“Look at you!” Gia exclaimed as she hustled out of the car and threw her arms around Elise. She then transferred her attention to Elise’s belly, which Bennett hadn’t initially noticed was of the pregnant variety.
“Hi, baby!” Gia rubbed her friend’s gently protruding tummy. “How’s it cooking in there?”
Jane and Wendy were there, too, and a full-on frenzied group hug commenced, everyone jumping up and down and admiring Gia’s blue hair.
They were ignoring him. Everyone only had eyes for Gia, which, frankly, he could understand. He had half a mind to steal her camera and take another picture of her. He patted the pocket where he’d stashed the one he’d taken of her at the salad bar. She’d been so alive, so lit up, as she’d been talking to that employee, he couldn’t help it.
But then Noah approached, a smile on his face. “Hey. You finally made it.”
Noah enveloped him in a hug, and Bennett forgot about his photographic urges. He was once again surprised by the force of his feeling for his missing friend, whom he hadn’t seen since the ring-shopping trip last summer. Noah, as both a friend and a neighbor, had gone a long way toward filling the void in Bennett’s life caused by his being essentially an orphan.
They parted, and their attention was inevitably drawn to the women, who were still talking a mile a minute about spa appointments and beaches but clearly preparing to depart—Jane had Gia’s suitcase and Wendy had her shoulder bag. Gia herself was pulling some trash out of the car to throw away.
Noah made a move like he was going to try to introduce Bennett, but no one noticed. Bennett cracked up and waved Noah off. “Hey, I know my place in the pecking order.”
Noah shook his head in disagreement and cleared his throat loudly, which drew the women’s attention.
“Oh my gosh! I’m sorry!” Wendy came over and patted Bennett on the shoulder—Wendy wasn’t a hugger, so that was a gesture of affection from her. “Bennett.” She drew his name out and looked at him…Well, she looked at him like she knew what had happened between him and Gia, which was a distinct possibility. Whatever. He wasn’t embarrassed. “I think you know everyone except Elise.” Wendy introduced them, and Elise made polite inquiries about the trip while Jane greeted him warmly, but they were clearly preoccupied by Gia’s appearance.
After the introductions, a bit of awkwardness settled on the group. The women clearly wanted to leave. Gia in particular was looking at him funny, almost like she’d never seen him before.
“Should we all…have lunch or something?” Jane asked.
“Nah.” Bennett waved them off with a smile. “You go. You’re excused.” Gia, who had an arm slung around Elise’s shoulders, flashed him an apologetic look. He winked at her, in part to cover the swell of emotion in his chest at seeing her so happy, so supported. It wasn’t like any of her problems would magically evaporate simply because she was with her friends, but seeing the strength of those friendships firsthand made him happy and grateful.
But then they started walking away, and it hit him that their trip was over. They’d made it. No more forced proximity. No more meandering conversations on the highway. No more late-night confessions.
Gia looked over her shoulder at him, her face completely unreadable as she got farther and farther away.
He switched from feeling grateful to feeling…fucking bereft.
What the hell?
He turned and caught Noah staring at him. His friend’s mouth opened like he was going to ask a question.
Bennett went ahead and answered it preemptively, vocalizing in real time the truth bomb that had just detonated inside him.
“I’m in love with her.”
* * *
Gia always experienced such a sense of relief when she saw her friends. When she flew to Toronto for a visit, one or more of them always picked her up at the airport, and they’d all get together.
Relief. That was the only way she could think to describe it. Profound relief. The cessation of effort. Part of it was, of course, that when she saw them, she’d usually just come from working, so there was a literal cessation of effort, but it was more than that. It was a giving over of herself to the care of her friends. To the people who would do right by her. See her. Fill her back up.
Sometimes she got a little jealous that since they all lived in Toronto, they got to see each other all the time. She missed stuff. But she never doubted their devotion to her. Their friendship always clicked immediately back into place, no matter how long she’d been away. And it weathered everything: Elise’s bridezilla phase in the lead-up to her wedding, Wendy’s crisis when her aunt—and only surviving family member—nearly died. They were a sisterhood, and there was nothing they couldn’t handle. Plus they had a ridiculous amount of fun.
So yes. Relief. That was the feeling a reunion with her friends always brought.
As they enveloped her in hugs, she waited for it to hit, warm and sedating, like a drug.
And there it was, but…it wasn’t as strong as usual. It wasn’t as happily overwhelming. That was because there was also something else in there, tempering the usual reaction.
As they bore her away on a sea of chatter and smiles, she realized what it was. Regret.
The very thing Bennett had told her not to do anymore.
Reflexively she looked over her shoulder at him, wanting some sign that they were still connected, that he hadn’t forgotten all that had passed between them.
He looked back at her, his face completely unreadable.
* * *
When Noah managed to pick his jaw up off the ground, he started laughing.
Not exactly the reaction Bennett was looking for. He waited it out. It wasn’t like there was anything to add to his unexpected declaration, and to be honest, he was still reeling from it himself.
When Noah got control of himself, he said, “Yeah, good luck with that.”
“I know.”
Noah would know. As Jane’s brother and as Wendy’s fiancé, he had an insider’s view of Gia’s band of friends.
And for fuck’s sake, Gia had outright told Bennett that the surest way for a guy to get her to bolt was to declare genuine feelings. He started to panic. “You can’t tell her.”
What was he? Thirteen?
“Or Wendy.”
Yes, he was o
fficially thirteen. It was just that…“If she finds out, that’ll be it. She’ll never speak to me again.”
“If she finds out, she’ll probably raise an Amazonian army and tear you limb from limb,” Noah said.
“So you won’t tell?”
Noah cracked up again. “No. I won’t tell. But dude. How did this happen?”
Good question. A week ago, he’d been completely in control of his life, his future. Now everything was turned upside down.
“Because it sort of seems to me like you can’t fall in love with someone in a matter of days,” Noah added. “Lust, maybe. Infatuation.”
Bennett rolled his eyes. “We can’t all marry our childhood crushes.” Noah and Wendy had been fated since their teens, basically, but they’d both been too pig-headed to see it.
“So explain it to me. You’re in love with Gia? Why?”
“Because…” He had to think of a way to articulate it rationally. Noah was a lawyer. He dealt in facts. And Bennett had surprised himself as much as Noah just then. He’d blurted out that news in real time as the realization came over him, the moment he was able to name the confusing swirl of emotions cresting inside him as he watched Gia walk away.
“Because she solved all my problems.”
Shit. That sounded lame. And vague. He tried to be more specific. “We stopped in Charleston. I saw my parents. My dad apologized.”
“What?”
Bennett chuckled. He’d shocked his friend. “None of that would have happened without her. She also solved this nagging problem with the restaurant. And she had this great idea for the community restaurant, if I can ever manage to get it off the ground.”
“You make it sound like she’s a combination of a therapist and a management consultant.”
Bennett shook his head, frustrated at the inadequacy of that assessment and of his own ability to articulate what was in his heart. He tried once more. “I love her because she’s the most amazing person I’ve ever met, and I hate how much she doesn’t realize that.”
That sobered Noah right up, probably because he’d never heard such a serious declaration from Bennett before—and he’d met Bennett’s last few girlfriends.
“Okay, then,” Noah said. “My initial reaction is to say, ‘You, my friend, are fucked.’ But on the other hand, if it’s possible to crack Gia—and I’m not saying it is—maybe you’re the man to do it.”
“So what do I do?”
“Well, to start with, don’t tell her any of this shit you just told me.”
“Obviously.”
“I think maybe with Gia, you have to show her, you know? Extremely incrementally. It has to be a stealth campaign.”
Bennett nodded. That accorded with his take on the situation. Gia, by her own admission, didn’t respond to declarations of love. He suddenly remembered her saying, in the Baltimore airport, that she admired men of action.
Time to shut up and become one of those. But first…
He dug in his pocket and produced the little velvet bag that contained the rings. “Take these. I was starting to fear that I wouldn’t get them here on time.”
“Thanks, man. Sorry the trip was so…” Noah looked in the direction in which the women had gone. “Stressful.”
“I’m not sure stressful is really the right word.” He followed Noah’s gaze. “Actually, maybe it is. But it was also…Shit. I don’t know.” Gia had apparently robbed him of the ability to form coherent sentences.
“Confusing?” Noah supplied. “Exhilarating? Life changing?”
“Pretty much.”
Noah clapped him on the back and answered the unspoken question. “Welcome to the club, my friend.” He nodded at the door Gia and her friends had disappeared through. “Those women will do that to you.”
“But it’s worth it, right?” Bennett was alarmed at how uncertain his voice sounded.
And even more so when Noah just threw his head back and laughed.
* * *
“I think everyone knows each other except for Tobias,” Wendy said as she stood at the head of the table at dinner that night in the hotel’s restaurant. She gestured at a tall blond guy wearing a blue blazer with gold buttons. He reminded Bennett of a cruise ship captain.
“Tobias is Noah’s friend from NYU, but he lives in London now.”
“Yes, hopped across the pond after law school.” Tobias gave the table a lame little salute. “Salutations to all.”
Bennett had to actively concentrate on not rolling his eyes.
Wendy went around the table and introduced everyone to Tobias. “Bennett’s from New York, too,” she said when she got to him.
“Ah! Upper East Side born and bred. You?”
Bennett couldn’t pretend to be some kind of salt of the earth guy from modest beginnings, but he sure wished he was in that moment, because damn, the entitlement that radiated off this dude was not something he wanted to be associated with. If there was one thing his rough past made him grateful for, it was shifting his views about money. Money was great. You could do things with it, as he hoped to, once he got some more of it. But it wasn’t something you deserved simply because you were born with a lot of it. It wasn’t an inherent personality trait, like kindness or humor.
“Born in Charleston,” he said, schooling his tone to neutrality. “I live in Washington Heights now.”
“Oh,” said Tobias, who had probably never been above Central Park. “How…enterprising of you.”
When Wendy got to Gia, who was sitting on the other side of the table and down one spot from Bennett, Captain Cruise Ship responded by saying, “Ah, the only single lady among us.” Then he made a show of looking at Bennett and saying, with jokey, exaggerated theatricality, “I guess it’s down to the two of us single gents to compete for the favor of this fair maiden.”
Gia’s eyebrows shot up, and she exchanged a look with Wendy.
What Bennett wanted to say was, “Well, Tobias, I’ve made the ‘fair maiden’ scream with pleasure several times now, and in fact, the ‘fair maiden’ informs me that my dick was made for her, but sure, go ahead and give it your best shot, asshole.”
What he actually said was, “Since it’s the twenty-first century, I’m thinking the fair maiden is probably fine without anyone competing for her favor.”
His retort inspired a muttered “Amen” from Elise, who was seated next to Bennett. Across the table, Gia’s eyes widened.
After that, dinner was uneventful. When it was over, a server arrived with a tray of tiny pie-like things, one of them with a lit candle stuck in it.
Elise said to Gia, “I brought them from Toronto! And there’s a whole other box for you in your room.” She turned to Bennett. “Gia loves butter tarts.”
“Should I be embarrassed that I’m a chef who has no idea what a butter tart is?”
“Nope,” Noah said. “I’ve never seen them outside of Canada. They’re basically mini pecan pies without the pecans.”
They actually sounded—and tasted—southern. Caramelized sugar and pastry. He was down with it.
Gia, he noticed, was not. She only had a bite of hers after blowing out her candle.
As the evening wound down, he turned the conversation to the picnic lunch he’d offered to make to follow Saturday’s beachside wedding ceremony.
“I was thinking we’d build it around local seafood. Crab cakes, Gulf snapper.” He cleared his throat and added, “Oysters,” his gaze flickering to Gia as his mind flashed the image of her slurping oysters and “Oh my God”-ing in his kitchen.
“I didn’t know you were cooking for the wedding,” Gia said.
“He offered to do a picnic for on the beach after the ceremony, and how could I say no?” Wendy turned to him with a stern look. “But you’re only cooking, remember? We have staff to serve and clean up. You’re literally going to make everything, then do a mic drop and walk away.”
Bennett chuckled. He’d been tickled when they’d taken him up on his offer. He loved feeding
people generally, and feeding people he loved—he sneaked another glance at Gia—was the best thing in the world.
“Understood. I’m meeting with a friend tomorrow who has a restaurant down the beach. So if I have your blessing on the menu, he’ll hook me up with suppliers, and we’ll be good. You’ve got, what? You two and the wedding party, which makes eight. Plus…” He scanned the table, doing a head count. “Jay?” As Elise’s husband, Jay was attending, but he wasn’t actually in the wedding—he and Noah didn’t really know each other. Which was unfortunate, because if Jay had been in the wedding, perhaps he could have displaced Tobias, the other “single gent.”
“Yep,” Noah said. “And my mom and her boyfriend and Wendy’s aunt—those are the only other guests.”
“We should probably feed the officiant, too,” Wendy said. “So that brings us to lucky thirteen. And seafood is great. Anything you make will be great. You don’t need my blessing.” She made a dismissive gesture with her hand. “Consider any menu you come up with approved.”
“Wow.” Jane giggled. “You are the chillest bride I’ve ever seen.”
Both Wendy and Jane looked at Elise, who rolled her eyes and said, “Whatever. You love me.”
“Who’s this friend of yours with a beachside restaurant?” Gia asked.
“A friend of a friend,” Bennett said. “A guy Lalande knows. He’s going to let me use his kitchen.”
“Best present you could give us.” Wendy beamed.
“Oh, I brought you another present,” he said, thinking of the Toronto Blue Jays tickets he had in his bag for the baseball-loving couple who would be settling in Toronto permanently after the wedding.
“Damn right you did.” Elise slung an arm around Gia, who was next to her. “You brought our girl.”
Our girl.
If only.
Chapter Fourteen
TWO DAYS BEFORE THE WEDDING
Gia had done few things in her life she was as proud of as delivering Wendy’s wedding dress to Florida.
She had surrendered the dress to Wendy last night, just after they arrived, of course. They’d hung it up in the room they were sharing. But as she waited for Wendy to come out of the bathroom the next morning, she got a little emotional. She was so happy for Wendy. They’d both had long journeys here, Gia with the dress and Wendy with…everything. To think she’d been in love with Noah since she was a teenager. And now she was marrying him.
Three Little Words Page 20
