by Emma Hart
I cleared my throat.
He jerked his head up and smirked at me, shrugging innocently.
Tori looked between us. “Okay, I’m gonna go, because this—” she pointed between us. “—is weird, and I don’t know what’s going on.” She got up, sliding her chair out from the table. “Oh, Holley, we’re having dinner at Bronco’s tomorrow. You’re coming.”
I shook my head. I was most certainly not.
A smile stretched across her face as she nodded, then disappeared into the dancing crowd.
Seb looked from her to me. “What’s that all about? Dinner?”
I picked up my drink, sipped, and said, “She wants to talk about you.”
“Used to that.” He took another sip of his beer. “She’ll have to take a number.”
“All right, Mr. Bigshot.”
He laughed, leaning back in his chair. “It’s part of the job description. But I am thankful I can live a relatively private life without being stalked by a bunch of people.”
“That, and in a week’s time nobody will be able to get to White Peak unless it stops snowing?”
“And now you see why I came home for my rehab.”
I couldn’t help but smile at that. If I were him, I’d have come home, too.
We sat for a while and watched as people danced and his grandfather continued to evade his mother’s clutches. It didn’t take long for her to catch him, though, and we both laughed as Amos was led from the room by both May and Ben.
By the time he’d returned for the father-daughter dance, we’d fielded two different sets of questions about our relationship that had ended with Seb putting his arm around my shoulder to please some distant relative of his new brother-in-law and me sinking the rest of my drink far too quickly.
Kate was stunning in her dress. Her large train was clipped to the back of her dress for dancing purposes, but the lace bodice fit her to perfection and showed off all her best features. For a venue that was, essentially, so extravagant, her lace dress was simple yet still fit for a princess.
I smiled as she laughed at something her dad said in her ear as they danced. “She looks so lovely.”
“Yeah. She really does.”
I did a double-take at him.
He wasn’t looking at her.
Seb was looking at me.
I blushed and looked down.
I felt his smile rather than saw it. I’d always thought that was a weird thing to say, but I really did feel it.
I felt it in the way his fingers pressed into my upper arm just the lightest amount. In the way he pulled me ever so slightly closer to him, and in the way his cheek pressed against mine as he whispered, “Our turn.”
“Wait, what?”
The music changed to another song that was a bit more romantic, and when I looked up, I saw that Ben had passed Kate off to Spencer. The newlyweds were beaming at each other, lost in their own little bubble. Ben now had May in his arms, and Spencer’s parents took to the dancefloor, too.
Another two couples I recognized as Spencer’s siblings and their partners joined the floor, and Sebastian’s words clicked into place.
“Ohhhh no,” I breathed. “I don’t dance.”
With his lips curved up into a half-smile, he took my glass from me and put it on the table, then took both of my hands in his. “You do with me.”
“I can assure you that I do—ahh!”
He pulled me up to my feet, releasing one of my hands while tightening his grip on the other so I had no chance of escaping.
Did I really want to?
The question flitted through my mind like a whisper, but I had no chance to linger on it because we reached the dancefloor and Seb swept me into his arms like a pro.
My body was pressed right up against his. The buckle on his belt dug into my stomach ever so slightly, and his white shirt was soft against my hand as I slipped my arm around his waist.
A slow dance.
I could manage this.
Cha Cha Slide? Yes. The Macarena? Nailed it. The floss?
No. Nobody over the age of ten could do the floss, and if you could, how? Teach me!
To be honest, I wasn’t sure I’d done the Macarena or the Cha Cha Slide for years, either.
Seb rested his hand at my hip and held the other to the side, dipping his head into mine as our bodies swayed to the slow music. “See? This isn’t so bad, is it?”
I squeaked in response.
I really, really didn’t dance.
He laughed silently, pulling my body even closer to his.
It was nice.
Too nice.
Part of me wanted to stay here, to be wrapped up in him, and the rest of me wanted to run away and hide in a bathroom somewhere where I wouldn’t have to address the fact that being so close to Seb was driving me insane.
With no justification for my anger, I was like a ship in a storm.
Completely lost at sea, going with the motions, praying for a break in the cloud so everything would make sense again.
God, I needed to go home and clear my head.
He was just so handsome and fun and comfortable and a total pain in my ass.
It was everything I wanted in a man, honestly.
It just sucked that he was Sebastian.
“Look at you, pretending like you want to be here,” he murmured in my ear. “You almost look like you’re enjoying it.”
“I’m imagining murdering you,” I whispered back, tilting my head so my mouth brushed his earlobe. “It’s not very taxing and more than a little enjoyable.”
“Do I need to call someone about your murderous tendencies? Are the FBI aware of this?”
“Probably. I’m pretty sure I’m on a watch list from my Netflix history alone. Thank God they don’t know which books I sneak from the storeroom when I’m burned out on romance.”
“Burned out on romance? What is that?”
I smiled and leaned back so I could meet his eyes. “It’s when I’m tired of idiots getting their happily ever afters and would rather read about idiots who murder people instead.”
“I don’t really know how to respond to that.”
“You don’t need to,” I said breezily. “You just need to know that it’ll hurt more if you scream.”
“You’re scarier than I remember.”
“Excellent. That’s what I was going for.”
He laughed just as the song ended. I made to pull away, but another, more upbeat song came on, and Seb grinned as he tugged me back into him.
I groaned. I really, really didn’t want to dance anymore. I’d given in for the slow dance because it was little more than glorified swaying, but actually dancing…?
No.
There was no way it was happening.
“Nuh-uh,” I said, desperately trying to pull away from Seb.
“Come on. One more song,” he said over the sound of the music.
“Noooooo.” It was the most pathetic sound ever, and we both knew I was going to give in.
Mostly because he was bigger and stronger than me and I really didn’t want to cause a scene.
Seb dropped his jaw and offered me an open-mouthed smile, then wiggled his hips like he was some kind of male Shakira. He looked completely ridiculous, especially when he did jazz fingers with his one free hand.
“You look so stupid!”
He dropped his head and laughed, then used his good arm to force me into a spin that I groaned my whole way through. By the time he’d pulled me back into him, my heart was thumping furiously against my ribs.
My body was pressed firmly against his, and my lips parted as I drew in a deep breath. Every part of me tingled as time seemed to stop as our bodies came together like they were made to be this way.
The pause lasted for all of a second before Seb grabbed my other hand and started dancing.
If you could call it dancing.
It was halfway between watching Dancing With the Stars and watching your dad do the macarena while half-drunk at the l
atest family reunion.
The worst part?
He could dance better than I could.
“See?” he said in a low voice, lips brushing my earlobe. “It’s not so bad.”
“It’s terrible,” I murmured. “I’m scarred for life.”
“Yet here you are. Dancing. With me.”
“Awful choice, really.”
“You didn’t have a choice.” He twirled me out, flashed a grin, then pulled me back into him.
I slammed into his body with the finesse of a bowling ball and looked up at him. “And I resent that.”
“You’ll live.” His grin reached his eyes and made them shine, and he tilted his face down so that our noses almost brushed. “You’re not complaining nearly enough for someone who’s hating every second of this.”
“I’m biding my time so I can murder you while you sleep,” I replied. “Strike while the iron’s hot.”
“Revenge is a dish best served cold,” he retorted.
“You’re right. Is there anyone here you hate that I can make out with?”
Sebastian stopped, ending our dance, and stared down at me with his lips twisted to one side in a somewhat sardonic smile. “No. But even if there were, I wouldn’t let you do it anyway.”
“Let me? I’ll have you know that nobody lets me do anything. I do what I want. I’m an independent woman.”
“All right.” He clasped my waist and turned. “That guy over there. With the dark hair, red tie, drinking the… is that a cocktail?”
“Martini.”
“Drinking the martini,” Seb continued. “Like he’s James fucking Bond. Darren Greenwood. One of my cousins. As my friend from England would say, a total knob.”
“And?” I was more interested in the fact he had a friend from England. That was one hot accent…
“And I don’t like him. Go make out with him.”
I stared up at him. “You’re ridiculous.”
“You asked.”
“It was a joke.”
He twirled me out to arm’s length and brought me back in, slamming me against his body. “It wasn’t funny,” he said into my ear. “Jokes should be funny.”
“Well, this whole weekend isn’t funny, but here I am,” I shot back.
“You’re so fun when you’re feisty. Even more so now that I know you don’t really hate me.” He gripped my hips and pulled them against his. Our bodies swayed together, and our lips were only centimeters apart. All I had to do was stumble and we’d be kissing.
Just like that.
That easily.
That simply.
I had to swallow back a smartass retort to his last comment because there was every chance I’d either let out a little whimper or accidentally on purpose fall into him just to kiss him.
Because he was right.
Sebastian was completely and utterly, annoyingly right.
Now that I knew the truth, I couldn’t hate him.
I didn’t hate him.
And you know what?
I wished I did.
Because when he twirled me out and back into his body for the hundredth time, my heart thundered, and a shiver ran down my spine.
And that was one thousand times more complicated than hating him.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN – SEBASTIAN
rule thirteen: faking it is easier if you have a little bit of reality to draw upon.
“It’s that one. Definitely that one.” Holley fumbled with the cards as she attempted to take them out of her purse.
“That’s your credit card,” I said dryly and pulled the room key from my back pocket with a grin, brandishing it in her direction.
She gasped and pointed. “I don’t have one of those!”
“A room key?”
“No, an ass pocket!” She shoved me in the arm, and I stumbled through the door, laughing. “God sake.”
I was still laughing as she stomped into the room and kicked off her shoes with the elegance of a drunken turtle on a tightrope. One of them almost hit the coffee table where a glass full of water was sitting on a coaster, and she stilled, then slowly turned to look at me.
“Oopsie.”
“Indeed,” I muttered. “Are you getting changed first, or am I?”
“I can change in the bathroom.” She waved her hand in my direction and used the back of the sofa to stop herself from stumbling too much.
“Why don’t I get changed in the bathroom and you stick to the bedroom? Less things for you to bump into in there.”
“Excellent idea!” She hiccupped and clapped her hand over her mouth. “I swear, I didn’t even drink that much.”
The best part about that was that it wasn’t a drunk person insisting they hadn’t drunk that much when they were three glasses of wine and four cocktails in.
She’d had three drinks, and one of those had been with dinner.
Holley was a lightweight.
And I was having the best time laughing at her.
“Okay, I have my clothes, so hurry up, because I don’t want you to see me naked.”
“I wouldn’t mind seeing you naked,” I teased, joining her in the bedroom and pulling some sweats out of my suitcase.
She groaned. “Gray sweats? Do you have to?”
“What’s wrong with gray sweats?” I asked, knowing full well exactly what she was about to say.
“They show peen lines.”
That was not what I was expecting her to say.
“I’m sorry?”
She reached over to my side of the bed and grabbed my half-empty bottle of water from this morning. After she’d glugged it down, she sat back up and said, “Peen lines. Gray sweatpants show peen lines. Like when women wear big panties and leggings and you see the panty lines on her butt.” She rolled to the side and drew a diagonal line across her butt cheek to emphasize what she meant.
I blinked at her. “They’re not leggings.”
“No, and thank God for that. Women everywhere would explode en masse if they were.” She stared at me for a moment. “Are you going to get changed?”
“Are you going to jump me in my sleep?”
“Only to murder you, not grope you, dear.” She gave me a wan smile, but there was a twinkle in her eyes that showed she was hiding a laugh. “Go.”
I did as I was told and retreated into the bathroom, pausing only to grab a clean pair of boxers and a t-shirt from my case. I tossed them over the side of the bath and undid my tie. It was so freeing to undo the top button of my shirt, and I rolled my neck from side to side.
What a long ass day it’d been.
I wanted nothing more than to climb into that bed and crash, but I had a feeling Holley was going to be awake for a while.
She hadn’t had a ton of alcohol, but she’d had a coffee not long ago.
I was beginning to wonder if that had been some kind of mistake.
“Sebastian! I need to pee!”
And I was done wondering.
“Hang on!” I shouted back through the door. I quickly changed into my clean clothes even though I’d intended to shower. She’d actually acted like she’d enjoyed being around me for the past hour, and even if he was a little drunk…
I was going to take it.
“All yours.” I stepped out so she could get in. She was already changed, wearing a pair of flannel pajama pants with a hole on the right knee and a faded bookworm tank top that I vaguely recognized from the window of the bookstore.
With a mumbled thank you, Holley ran into the bathroom and slammed the door behind her. I raised my eyebrows when, a moment later, there was a big sigh of relief from other side of the door.
Yeah.
This was wild.
I tossed my dirty clothes over onto the floor in the corner and went through to the mini bar in the living room. It’d been restocked at some point, so I grabbed two big bottles of water and some of the leftover snacks from the previous night to take through to the bedroom.
Holley was still in the bathro
om, so I grabbed the remote control and jumped onto the bed. I turned on the TV and settled back against the headboard, glancing toward the bathroom door. A tap was running inside, and the white noise was broken by the loud flush of the toilet.
Why the fuck was I listening to this?
I shook my head and flicked through the TV guide to find something to watch. Not that I was sure that anything I chose would stay very long—Holley would likely change it as soon as she got in here.
The bathroom door opened, and she stepped out, peering at the TV. “I’m not watching sports.”
I sighed. “How about a movie?”
“How about Netflix?”
“I’m not sure the hotel has Netflix.”
“What kind of third world country is this?” She dropped onto the bed next to me and snatched up the huge bag of cheese popcorn. “What hotel doesn’t have Netflix?”
“When was the last time you stayed in a hotel?”
She paused, then reached up and pulled some clips from her hair. Her curls tumbled down, and she shook her head from side to side, sending them flying.
“Ooh. That was a bad idea.” She pressed her fingers to her forehead. “What were you saying?”
“I asked you when the last time you stayed at a hotel was,” I said, trying not to laugh. Tipsy Holley was kind of cute.
“Oh. I have no idea. When do I have time to visit hotels, Sebastian? I have a business to run and two unruly best friends to keep in line.”
“Do they know that’s how you refer to them?”
“I should hope so. I’ve been saying it for fifteen years.” She met my eyes and shoved a handful of popcorn in her mouth. “They’re just not as organized as I am. Sure, I forget birthdays, but we never run out of ink in our printer.”
“Your priorities are… interesting.”
“Can’t run a business without printer ink.” Another piece of popcorn went in her mouth.
“But you can forget your best friends and business partners’ birthdays?”
“They remind me. Also, I have reminders seton my phone that recur every year. They’re linked to my Google account so I don’t have to set them every time I upgrade my cell.” She grinned. “Now that is organization.”
“That’s a little scary, Holl.”
“Holley,” she said. “You say scary, I say efficient. Po-tay-to, poh-tah-to.”
