by Jess Bryant
“You should probably slow down there, dollface.” A deep voice slid over her, down her spine and made her shudder. With revulsion, she told herself. It was definitely revulsion. “Wouldn’t want to get drunk and admit you’re in love with the groom, would ya?”
The taunt sent a red-hot surge of anger boiling beneath her skin, turning her cheeks pink and the ice in her veins to lava as she spun to face the man intruding on her pity party. She felt a little light headed when she noticed how close he was standing but she attributed that to the alcohol in her bloodstream. It only pissed her off more that it proved he was right. She needed to slow down on the drinks or risk making a scene before the bridal party even arrived.
God, she hated when he was right.
Connor Shaw was an arrogant, know-it-all bastard. He always had some smartass remark for her. Always. He’d been Derek’s sidekick since the sandbox days but Lulu did not consider him a friend. He was more of a nuisance, an ache in her head that never quite went away. Case in point, he was here now, standing far too close to her, wearing some sort of cologne that invaded her personal space and made her stomach twist; looking smug as hell because he knew, knew, that every woman in the room was looking at him now that he had her attention.
She hated him. Despised him even. But she couldn’t blame the women in the room for staring.
He looked like an angel, all golden and gorgeous and he had an obnoxious habit of always managing to stand directly in the path of the sun. Even now, in the low light of evening, a spotlight of glowing orange beamed through the windows above, highlighting his dark blond hair and making it look as if he were wearing a halo. Sometimes it seemed like the sun literally revolved around him.
It was annoying as hell.
So was that knowing twinkle in his dazzling blue eyes. Because he wasn’t just ridiculously good looking, he also knew he was ridiculously good looking which made him just about the biggest kind of asshole on the planet in her estimation. He knew the effect he had on 99% of women and the fact that she fell into the 1% that didn’t go ga-ga over him seemed to give him some weird sort of enjoyment, which only made him more infuriating.
“I mean, unless that’s your plan.” He leaned an elbow against the bar beside her, edging even closer so that she had to force herself not to pull away, to put more space between them, because she knew he’d take her retreat as a win in their never-ending game of dare. “Liquid courage?”
“Go away, Shaw.”
His head tilted slightly as if he’d expected a different response, “Drowning your sorrows then? Have you finally admitted to yourself that you and Dare were never meant to be?”
Her jaw clenched because, as per usual, his assumption hit far too close to home. She attributed Connor knowing so much about her to the fact that they’d grown up together. He’d always been there, on the edges of her friendship with Derek, watching. Judging. He saw parts of her that she’d thought were well hidden from everyone, even Derek, especially Derek, but somehow Connor had seen her infatuation with their friend and he seemed to take absolute joy in calling her out on the stupidity of it.
“I said, go away.” She slipped her hand around the glass in front of her without looking at him but a big, warm, roughly masculine hand closed over hers, stopping her short.
Her breath caught at the contact and she silently cursed herself for the physical reaction. It had been too long since anyone touched her. Anyone. It didn’t have anything to do with this man no matter how gorgeous he was. It was the alcohol and the moroseness that had overtaken her at the thought of Derek getting married.
Derek. Married. To someone else.
Her blood chilled and she pulled her hand away from Connor, carefully, so as not to spill the liquid in her glass. She glared at him when he frowned and his eyebrows drew together. He was looking at her strangely, in a way she couldn’t place and she glanced away before he saw something else she didn’t want him to see.
“Just… slow down on the drinks, okay doll?”
“Don’t call me that.” She instantly flinched.
“Tell me you’ll slow down, at least until dinner is served and you put some food in your system and I won’t call you that again.” His blue eyes were serious and she felt something inside of her begin to splinter.
Was he actually trying to take care of her? This man that taunted her constantly? That set her every nerve ending on edge? Was he trying to make nice for once? Because he knew this must be hard on her?
She nodded, “Okay.”
He gave her a small, cautious smile, “Okay.”
“Okay.” She tipped her drink at him.
“Okay.” He said again and she rolled her eyes because she knew he’d do this all night if she let him get away with it.
“You can go now.” She shooed him away, “Go find someone else to play your mind games with, Shaw.”
“But playing with you is so much fun.”
She groaned, “If you stick around, I’m definitely going to need another drink.”
That made him chuckle slightly, “Do one more thing for me and I’ll go find someone else to play my mind games with, as you so eloquently put it.”
“What?”
“Call me by my first name.”
She raised an eyebrow at that, “What?”
A big shoulder rose slightly, “Your brother calls me Shaw. Down at the station, all the guys call me Shaw. It’s weird hearing it from you too. I don’t like it. We’ve known each other a long time. Long before I became Deputy Shaw. Call me Connor.”
Lulu squinted up at him, trying to figure out what game he was playing now. Everything he did had a purpose. He was always screwing with her and trying to throw her off balance. But for the life of her, she couldn’t figure out why he suddenly cared that she use his first name instead of his last.
She’d been calling him Shaw for as long as he’d worked with her older brother, Lance, down at the Fate Sheriff’s Department. Lance didn’t like Connor much either and used his last name as a curse more often than not. She’d picked up the habit mostly by accident but then kept it up when she realized it annoyed Connor. But if calling him by his first name would get him to go away right now, that was all Lulu cared about.
“Okay… Connor.” She licked her lips, the name feeling strange on her tongue after so many years, “You’ve got yourself a deal.”
“For the whole week.” He smirked and she groaned again.
“I should’ve known it wouldn’t be that easy, not with you. It never is.” She twirled a finger, “Fine. I’ll call you Connor… all week… just so long as you keep your thoughts on me and Derek to yourself.”
“Sure.” He pushed up from the bar to his full height, looming over her. He moved so fast that she didn’t even have time to think of pulling away when he raised his hand. He tucked her hair behind her ear softly and then tilted her face up, forcing her to look him in the eye before he spoke again in a low, husky voice, “Not much left to say, is there? You’ve got to let him go, Lu. He chose her and you deserve better. You deserve a man that sees you and only you in a room full of people. You deserve to come first.”
Lulu stared up into hypnotizing blue eyes. Ocean eyes, one of her girlfriends had called them, because they looked a stormy blue-green up close. She’d already started to drown in them when his words hit her like a punch to the gut. Her world shifted slightly and her stomach turned as she realized what that strange look she hadn’t been able to place was.
Pity.
She felt sick suddenly. It was the alcohol. It was the alcohol and the wrongness of this whole thing.
Being in Mexico. Derek marrying Aubrey. Connor Shaw of all people standing here in front of her, touching her so gently, and telling her so earnestly that she deserved better. It was all wrong.
Lulu smacked his hand away with an outraged growl, “Don’t tell me what I deserve.”
“Lu…” He sighed but she cut him off, not wanting to hear another word he had to say.
Connor scowled but stepped back, away from her, as if he sensed not doing so might lead to bodily harm. He was smarter than he looked. She breathed in the fresh air. She needed air that didn’t smell like him. Like man and musk and millions of mistakes.
She didn’t trust him. She hated him. She hated his words and she hated how much they affected her.
She and Connor always bantered. Back and forth, dig for dig. It was what they did. It was simply the game they played but he hadn’t just hit her in a soft spot this time. He’d sliced her wide open and it hurt. His words hurt. They made her ache. It was a low blow, even for him, especially right now when her emotions were so close to the surface.
Before she could blink, she felt tears well up behind her eyes and she shoved off her chair. She wobbled slightly on her heels but she shoved Connor away when he reached out to help steady her. She wouldn’t cry. Not here. Not now. Not because of a stupid man that didn’t understand anything.
He didn’t understand that you couldn’t just stop loving someone because they didn’t love you back. If it were that easy, she’d have forgotten about Derek Harper years ago. She would have moved on, if only it were that simple.
Lulu rushed out of the bar, heading towards the bathroom and praying that she didn’t run into anyone else in the wedding party before she had a chance to get herself under control. She was already losing a lot this week. Her hopes and dreams for the future. Derek. But she refused to lose her dignity too.
Chapter Two
Connor Shaw wasn’t normally an asshole. Really, he wasn’t. He just couldn’t seem to help himself when it came to Lulu.
The woman got on his nerves. Every damn one of them. She set him on edge and it didn’t matter if he had the best of intentions, nothing he said ever came out right when it came to her. He couldn’t remember the last time they’d had a conversation that hadn’t ended with one of them storming off but this was the first time he’d ever seen her come even close to tears and that tore at his insides.
He hadn’t wanted that. Not at all. Just the opposite actually.
He’d only been trying to help when he approached her. As the best man, the real best man since Lulu’s title was merely honorary, he’d been given the all important mission of keeping an eye on the guests most likely to cause a scene. Okay, so maybe he’d given himself that mission but it was an important task and he felt like he owed it to Derek to make sure his big day, or week as it may be, ran smoothly. And the one person, in his opinion, most likely to ruin things was Lulu Nichols.
He knew her.
She might not think he did. She might not like that he did. But he knew her and he knew that this was killing her.
He’d seen her face last Thanksgiving when Derek had proposed to Aubrey in front of all of their family and friends. He’d watched as Lulu’s face went ashen and he’d known then that getting her through this was going to be his mission. He’d known all of the wedding prep and festivities were going to be hard on her. He’d known what nobody else seemed to be paying enough attention to understand.
Because Derek, God love him, was oblivious to the fact his best gal pal was in love with him.
Connor didn’t know how that was possible. Didn’t know how Derek had missed all of the clues over the years. At times he’d honestly thought Derek was purposefully ignoring it in the hopes he wouldn’t have to address the issue but as time went on he’d come to the only conclusion he could. His friend was just an oblivious idiot.
Lulu had been madly in love with Derek since they were little kids but Derek had made it clear he only saw Lulu as a friend. Over the years, Lulu had gotten better at hiding her feelings for him. She didn’t bat her lashes every time Derek walked into a room anymore and she didn’t spend all her time writing his last name on her notebooks. But she was still in love with him and he was marrying another woman.
Of course Derek marrying Aubrey was going to be hard on Lulu so Connor had decided right then and there, at the engagement dinner, that it would be his job to look after her. Make sure she didn’t completely lose her shit. Distract her when possible, which had seemed like the easiest way to handle her since they usually ended up sparring whenever they so much as exchanged more than five words.
When he’d seen her sitting at the bar all alone, drinking, he’d gone over to check on her. To make sure she was okay. But clearly she wasn’t okay so he’d gone with the only thing he’d had on the tip of his tongue. Teasing. Taunting. Verbal jabs. And it had been working.
Getting her to play along was never difficult. She always had a comeback for anything he threw at her. It was one of the things he liked about her so much. He hadn’t been lying at all when he said she was his favorite person to play with. She was.
But then she’d smiled at him, an actual smile, not one of those fake ones she’d been using since the engagement and not one of the sneering ones she usually shot at him when she thought she had the upper hand in an argument. It had been a real smile, broad and open and happy. That smile, pointed at him, had thrown him off balance, thrown him off his game.
Because as crazy as she might be, as obsessive and delusional and ridiculous as she was, she was so goddamn gorgeous it made him ache.
When they’d been younger, Derek had called her dollface because she’d looked like a little doll. One of those perfectly proportioned little beauties with the chiseled cheekbones and the slightly too big for their face eyes. The rosy red lips that were always full and lush. Her hair was dark and silky and curled around and over her shoulders when she didn’t have it twisted up in a bun. She’d always looked like one of those perfect little dancing dolls spinning magical circles in a jewelry box. Connor had called her that tonight because all done up for the event with her pretty red lips and big dark eyes and sleek black dress, she’d looked like a beautiful doll.
A beautiful, fragile, breakable doll.
It had kicked him right in the gut how beautiful she was. For just a second there he’d wanted to tell her instead of ignoring the urge like he usually did. He’d forgotten to keep up the facade of sparring partners, and for just a minute, he’d let himself forget how fragile she was when it came to Derek. He’d forgotten to keep it light and he’d told her the truth, his truth, the one that she would have already figured out if she could see herself the way he saw her.
She deserved better than someone that didn’t realize how lucky they were to be the man she wanted. She deserved someone that could keep up with her fire and her spirit instead of putting it out. She deserved more than a man that had never looked past his own wants and needs to put her feelings first.
Connor had told her the truth and then he’d had to watch as the beautiful, breakable doll shattered.
Dammit. He cursed his own stupidity under his breath and contemplated going after her. He never should have said those things. Even if they were true, she was right. She didn’t need his pity or his judgment. She didn’t need him telling her what to do. She didn’t need him at all and she’d made it more than clear that she didn’t want anything from him.
Hell, who was he to give relationship advice anyway?
The woman he wanted was in love with someone else. Had always been in love with someone else and might always be in love with him even though he was marrying another woman. Connor was as bad as she was, wanting someone that didn’t want him.
But what made his situation even worse was that he was fairly certain she hated his guts.
Why wouldn’t she? He teased and taunted her like a little boy pulling the pigtails of the girl he liked on the playground. He couldn’t remember the last time they’d had a conversation that didn’t end with one of them cursing or yelling at the other. And as much as Derek getting married was going to change things,
for all of them, it clearly hadn’t changed that.
Lulu’s retreat from him, from the room, from the truth, more than proved that she still wasn’t ready to truly hear what he had to say.
“I take it you are the reason the lady requested a never ending supply of drinks this evening?” A voice with an accent had Connor turning to face a glaring bartender.
“Excuse me?”
“The pretty lady? She requested her cup never go empty tonight. She said I would know why soon enough.” Dark eyes narrowed on him, as if sizing him up, “And here you are, driving her from the bar in a fit of tears. You make the pretty lady cry.”
Connor growled when the dark-skinned man made a disapproving sound, “She wasn’t crying.”
“No?”
“No.” He pushed back up to the bar, “Lulu isn’t a crier. She didn’t cry when her best friend pushed her off her bike at age ten and she broke her wrist and she didn’t cry when the man she loves broke her heart at seventeen. Trust me, if she was going to cry it would be over him, not me.”
“Ah, I see.” The bartender polished a glass, “It is a lovers quarrel then?”
“No. I’m not… She’s not…” Connor slammed a hand through his hair in frustration and then wondered why the hell he was talking to this guy at all, “Just pour the drinks and keep the therapy sessions to a minimum tonight, huh?”
“As you wish.” The guy shrugged and put the glass on the counter, “What can I get you, sir?”
“Bullet on the rocks.” Connor watched the bartender nod and turn to retrieve the liquor. He drummed his fingers against the bar-top but couldn’t keep his eyes from returning again and again to the doorway. When she didn’t come back through it he finally forced himself to turn his back to it and that was when he noticed the glass Lulu had left behind. “What was she drinking?”
