So Wrong It's Good

by Jenika Snow

  Evernight Publishing ®

  www.evernightpublishing.com

  Copyright© 2015 Jenika Snow

  ISBN: 978-1-77233-416-6

  Cover Artist: Jay Aheer

  Editor: Karyn White

  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

  WARNING: The unauthorized reproduction or distribution of this copyrighted work is illegal. No part of this book may be used or reproduced electronically or in print without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in reviews.

  This is a work of fiction. All names, characters, and places are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  DEDICATION

  Thank you to everyone for their support!

  SO WRONG IT’S GOOD

  Jenika Snow

  Copyright © 2015

  Chapter One

  The summer of 2013

  “I swear she’s marrying him because of his money.”

  At eighteen Lake was too old to be eavesdropping, but she couldn’t help listening to her stepmother speak on the phone. Then again she loved the gossip, and Ginny loved to talk, especially when it concerned Ginny’s older brother, Reese Jordan, and his soon-to-be wife.

  “No, I’m not telling him that. God, he’s my brother, not my son. If Reese wants to get strapped down with a money hungry wench then that’s on him,” Ginny said, and the scent of nail polish came through the crack in the door.

  Lake pushed the door open another inch, and saw her stepmother, a woman only ten years older than Lake herself, sitting on the bed painting her toenails. The woman was built like a freaking swimsuit model, and Lake grew annoyed that Ginny was gossiping about her brother when she might have been partially attracted to Lake’s father because of his money.

  “You’re such a snoop.” The deep voice came from behind her.

  Lake stood, straightened her back, and turned to face her dad. Calvin Heart, one of the leading attorneys in Denver, Colorado, and her father, looked at her with this disapproving scowl. In his early forties, he was the epitome of what a good man should be like. She looked up to him, and he was her role model.

  After her mother passed away when Lake was twelve, she and her dad had become closer. They had to just to get through the grief. That had been six years ago, and her father had remarried, which wasn’t a bad thing. Lake wanted him to be happy, and although he’d been married only a short time to Ginny, she knew his sometimes superficial new wife gave him the comfort he needed and deserved. As long as Ginny treated her father right, then Lake was happy with her.

  Lake pushed past her dad without saying anything, and went into her room. Her father shut the door behind him, and crossed his arms over his chest. He’d just come from working out, which was clear by his clothes and sweat dampening his hair.

  “What?” Lake said, not wanting to have to explain why she’d been listening to Ginny, or hear a lecture on why it was wrong. When her father didn’t say anything she breathed out and took her glasses off. Compared to Ginny, Lake was this chunky Plain Jane. She’d been called cute, but when a hot guy at school called a girl “cute” it certainly didn’t mean he was ready to do anything with her. Hell, she’d been called sweet and smart, but had an excess of baby fat.

  “Why are you listening to Ginny’s conversation?”

  “I wasn’t.” Her father scowled, and she shrugged. “Okay, I was, but I didn’t set out to listen to her bitching.”

  “Lake,” her father said in that parental voice. “I’m serious. I’ve told you not to listen to other people’s conversations. You’re too old for me to have to be telling you this.”

  “I walked by, heard her bitching about Reese, and well, I was curious. And you act like I listen to people all the time. This is only the second time I’ve overheard Ginny talking.”

  “That’s one too many times, Lake.”

  Lake stood, went over to her dresser, and started grabbing stacks of clothes that she’d folded the night before for the weekend trip everyone was taking for Reese’s wedding. “Maybe if she wasn’t on the phone constantly, gossiping and bitching about everything under the sun, I wouldn’t be in the position to listen to what she says.”

  Her father just scowled harder. He went over to her bed and sat down, patted the seat beside him, and waited until she moved closer before he started talking. “Ever since I married Ginny you seem upset. You don’t like her.” He stated without phrasing it as a question.

  “I like her just fine, Dad.”“She’ll never be your mother, Lake, and isn’t trying to replace her.”

  Okay, this conversation was going down a road she didn’t want to take. Exhaling roughly, Lake looked at her door and heard Ginny laughing loudly. “First off, I never, would never, think she was trying to replace Mom. But it’s hard to take her seriously, and hard to see her as some kind of adult figure in my life with the way she acts and the fact she’s only twenty-eight.” She stared at her father, saw that he was motionless, and didn’t even blink after she spoke.

  “I love her, Lake.”

  “I know, and I’m glad she makes you happy. I want you to be happy.” Why were they even talking about this? “Weren’t we talking about my eavesdropping? How did we get on this subject?” Which, if she was being honest, was a subject she wanted to be done with.

  “Okay, subject change then,” her father said. “Are you excited about the weekend?”

  She shook her head. “Not really. Going to a wedding that lasts all weekend, for a man I’ve never even met, is a little awkward.” She’d never minced her words, never held anything back with her dad. They had that kind of relationship where she could tell him everything, anything, and he’d always be there for her.

  “I know, but I want to say thanks for sucking it up,” her dad said sincerely. “I know this last year has been weird and tense, what with me marrying Ginny, you graduating and waiting for those colleges you applied for to contact you, but I want you to know that you’re strong. You’ve always been strong. Even after your mom died you kept it together.” Her dad smiled softly.

  “You were, too, Dad. You’re strong, and I’m happy for you. I’ll try and do better with the whole listening on Ginny’s conversations.” She gritted her teeth after she said that, because seriously, two times of overhearing Ginny talking didn’t constitute as actively eavesdropping, not in Lake’s eyes at least.

  “This weekend will be great. You won’t have to worry about school, and hey, maybe you’ll even meet a nice boy to hang out with while up there?” He started chuckling when she rolled her eyes. Yeah, like she really had issues with controlling herself around guys.

  He stood and gave her one more smile before leaving her alone in her room. He’d cracked the door open, and she heard him and Ginny talking. She did like her stepmother, but it was still strange, even a year later. Lake got up and finished packing, knowing that things would work out. They always did. Did she miss her mother even all these years later? Of course. There were even times Lake could picture her mom coming into her room as if no time had passed, as if no tragedy had struck. And it was those times that she clung onto, that she held close.

  Maybe she would find a guy up there, one she could finally just let loose with? There would be people she didn’t know at this wedding, people that didn’t know what a nerd she was in school. She could be anyone, could make herself act like one of those girls that knew what they were doing around a guy. Hell, that put a little extra bounce in her step as she finished packing, and had her thinking about exactly the kind of trouble she could get into by being someone else for the weekend.

  Chapter Two

  They’d driven two hours north to Colorado Springs for the wedding.
It was a beautiful day, and there were about one hundred people in attendance. It was ninety-eight more people than Lake knew. It was an outdoor wedding, and Lake sat toward the front with her father. The bridesmaids were just now walking down the aisle, Ginny one of them. Although she knew Ginny and the bride weren’t close, Ginny had still been made a bridesmaid, probably for the sole reason that she was the groom’s sister.

  Lake looked over at her father, saw the smile on his face as he stared at Ginny, and she knew he was probably thinking about their wedding day. Her dad loved Ginny, and Lake knew that she had to make a better effort to being closer to her stepmother. But even thinking about Ginny as a stepmother was weird. Pushing all of that to the back of her mind, Lake looked to the side when she saw movement. The groom and groomsmen were coming toward the altar. Once at the altar, the groom stood beside the pastor, and she took in the sight of him.

  She’d never met Reese, not even when her father and Ginny had gotten married. He’d been overseas in the military, but other than that she didn’t know much about the man. But as she stared at him, took in his imposing height, she saw that even with the tux on, he had an impressive, muscular body. His short dark hair was slightly disheveled, but not as though he didn’t care about his appearance, but in a way that was stylish. And then he grinned, and everyone turned in their seats as the bridal song started playing.

  Everyone stood, faced the bride, and of course she was gorgeous. She had long blonde hair that was curled and put into some kind of side twist, and a dress that molded to her perfect body. She was smiling, but she wasn’t looking at the groom, which Lake would have assumed would be her first reaction, like an instinct. Instead she was looking at everyone in the audience, smiling brightly, even posing for the cameras.

  Lake looked at the groom again, saw that he was standing straight, his attention focused on the bride. Once the bride was at the altar and handed off by her father to Reese, everyone took their seats. For the next twenty minutes they sat there and listened to the vows being taken, and watched the rings being exchanged. It was a nice ceremony, but a part of her, a part that she felt extremely uncomfortable with, kept staring at Reese, wondering why she couldn’t find a guy like that. He seemed so devoted to the bride, so enamored with her.

  Once the ceremony was over Lake sat there, ready to drink, ready to meet someone, and ready to pretend she was someone who didn’t have the reputation of being the geeky virgin that had no friends.

  ****

  Lake had no clue how long she’d been standing on the deck overlooking the mountains, or how many shots of liquor she’d snuck. Her father was too busy dancing with Ginny to notice that Lake had been slowly getting drunk, and everyone else that had seen her didn’t know who she was or that she was only eighteen. But it had also been easy to grab the drinks when she’d met a guy that was clearly twenty-one, and willing to bring her shots.

  Looking over her shoulder she stared at him as he got them another round. She felt bad because she didn’t even know if his name was Alex or Alan, but that was mainly because she was getting too wasted to wrap her mind around anything. Turning back toward the mountains she grabbed the glass of water she’d snagged before walking out here, and stared at the scenery. Although the sun was setting, and the lights from the country club they were at were intensely bright, the view was spectacular. The sun was dipping below the horizon, painting the sky pinks and oranges, and when she closed her eyes she wished she could stay in this moment for a little longer before reality came crashing back.

  “You’re Lake, right?” The deep voice came from behind her, and she opened her eyes and looked over her shoulder. It was the groom, Reese, holding a bottle of beer, his tie loosened, his white tux shirt undone at the collar, and his dark hair even more wild.

  “I am. You’re Ginny’s brother?” She knew this, of course, and although she had phrased it as a question, she mainly asked it to not have dead air between them.

  “I am,” he said and smiled, walked toward her, and leaned on the stone banister. For several seconds they just stood there, her drinking her water, him nursing his beer.

  “Pretty wild to know that your life has changed, and although you expected it, anticipated it, it doesn’t quite seem real.” He looked at her then, and she saw him out of the corner of her eye. Turning and facing him, he looked very thoughtful as if maybe he’d had too much to drink and was trying to be philosophical. But she had a feeling he wasn’t drunk, not at all, and that he didn’t have to try to be thoughtful or philosophical. “Know what I mean?”

  She nodded. “I do, actually.” She thought about her mom, turned back to the mountain scene, and wished that she’d had more time with her. She wished a lot of things, but wishing didn’t make anything different, and didn’t change reality.

  He turned and looked at the mountains, and the silence that stretched between them was nice, comfortable.

  “Well, I’ll leave you to it,” he said and chuckled to himself. “But I look forward to seeing more of you guys since we’re moving closer to you all.” He stood to his full height, and she realized he had to be at least a foot taller than her five-foot-four inches. “Try not to drink so much,” he said softly this time. “I don’t want your old man getting mad at me because I didn’t stop you from making use of the open bar.” He smiled again, and turned to leave her just as Alex/Alan showed up with another drink. He handed her the shot. She took it, looked at it, but set it aside.

  Looking at Reese again, she saw him pull his wife into an embrace, but the woman pushed him off, laughed a little tightly, and turned to finish speaking with the man she’d been talking with. Reese looked annoyed, but went over to the bar for another drink.

  “So, how about we take this party to my hotel room?” Alex/Alan said, but by this point Lake had her thoughts on the past, and that made for one major situation changer, as in it was like she’d been doused with cold water.

  She should have said no, but she was tired of always playing it safe. This was her chance to be wild, to just let go and not have to worry about what anyone thought or said. She was certainly feeling the buzz of the alcohol enough to not care.

  “Lead the way,” she said softly, and by the expression on his face it was clear he thought she’d turn him down, not agree to go have a one-night stand with him. She followed him out of the reception hall, feeling like, although this was foolish, she wanted to be someone else, even if for only one night.

  Chapter Three

  The sun was hot, like so damn hot it was almost unbearable for Lake to sit out by the pool. But she was in desperate need of a tan, because looking at her almost luminescent white skin any longer was going to be the death of her. Yeah, a little overdramatic, but wearing skirts that showed off her legs, which were as white as the paper she wrote her notes on, was not attractive to her in any sense.

  She pulled her sunglasses down and saw Ginny and her father in the pool. Her dad had Ginny in his arms, and the way the other woman giggled told her that whatever her dad was saying was not something Lake wanted to hear anyway.

  “You guys want something to drink?” Lake yelled out.

  “Yeah, thanks, sweetheart,” her father replied, but didn’t turn to look at her.

  Lake got up, grabbed her cover-up, and slipped it on. In the last several months she’d lost a little bit of weight, not much but enough that she felt healthier. Even going down a dress size had made her feel like she wasn’t just this oversized girl guys stayed away from. She was a size sixteen now, had been walking the neighborhood every other day, eating healthy, and drinking a lot of water. But she knew she’d never be a Ginny size two, and that was okay with her. She had her mother’s form, a curvy size that made Lake happy that she looked a lot like her mom.

  Stepping into the house, she made her way through the living room and stopped when she saw her reflection in the large mirror hanging across from her. The cover-up she wore was sheer, so it still showed off the fact she wore a tankini underneath. S
he had her glasses off and a pair of contacts in, and her long dark hair was in a messy bun. Even through the cover-up she saw her shoulders were turning red, and her cheeks were becoming the same shade.

  Turning away from her reflection she went into the kitchen, grabbed three bottles of water, and just as she was about to head back out to the pool she heard arguing. It was low, but definitely heated, and the woman currently bitching out the guy sounded extremely familiar. Moving toward the kitchen window, Lake leaned forward and saw Reese and his wife Brittany standing by the front door. His wife looked pissed, so mad that her face was red and she had her hands in tight fists by her sides.

  “I hate coming here, hate pretending like your sister isn’t a bitch, and that I give a shit about the other two.”

  That had Lake’s head cocking back and shock filling her. Brittany had been nice enough whenever she’d seen her over the last few months since they’d moved close to them after the wedding, so hearing Brittany say she didn’t like them was a surprise. It also pissed Lake off.

  “Stop talking like that, Brittany,” Reese said in a low, but hard voice. He sounded angry, looked annoyed as well, but he stayed still, wasn’t flushed from his annoyance, and kept collected.

  “The only reason I’m even here is because you all but demanded it. I had plans tonight, Reese, plans that didn’t revolve around hanging out with your family.”

  “I didn’t fucking demand. I asked my wife to come with me today. They’re your family, too, Brittany. Once you married me they became that,” he said harder this time. “I’m not fucking arguing about this with you, and you know what?” He pointed to the car. “If you don’t want to stay then just go. I’m not going to try and make you stay.”