May the Best Man Win

by Mira Lyn Kelly

  No phone calls. No texts.

  He’d gotten through the whole day, but now as he lay in bed, nothing to keep his thoughts on the up and up, she was there again. Whispering his name, biting his shoulder, laughing in his arms.

  Christ.

  Grabbing the remote, he sat up and turned on the TV. Flipped channels until he landed on Jurassic World.

  There she was again. Emily. Pushing into the front of his mind. Making him wonder whether she’d like this one or not.

  After all, it had the thrills and big-budget appeal. The snappy dialogue and the added bonus of starring her screen boyfriend, Chris Pratt. He was pretty sure it would be right up her alley. Before he knew it, he had his phone out, her contact pulled up, and his thumb twitching in readiness to hit Dial.

  Enough.

  He didn’t care what movies she liked.

  He wasn’t interested in a repeat of those few hours where he’d been able to hold her and laugh with her and… Shit.

  He didn’t want to watch a movie with Emily. End of story.

  Except it wasn’t. Because even when he’d switched to hockey, the Blackhawks beating the snot out of the Penguins wasn’t enough to keep him from thinking about her. About whether she still liked hockey. If she ever got to a game. And if he took her to one, whether—

  Okay, the idea of accidentally falling into bed with her again wasn’t horrible. But based on the regularity with which those soft, brown eyes had been popping up in his thoughts throughout the day—and if he was totally honest with himself, before that—he knew better.

  He’d read somewhere that doing something once could be considered an accident, twice a pattern, and three times meant you were looking at a habit. Emily had become his habit. His addiction. And like a junkie, he wanted another fix.

  Which wasn’t going to happen.

  Finally, he turned off the TV, punched his pillow again, and told himself to chill the hell out, while reminding himself of all the reasons he wasn’t interested in Emily Klein.

  * * *

  The thing about Janice Sagal was that not much got past her. With her no-nonsense attitude, intolerance for bullshit, and acute attention to detail, the wiry brunette was indispensable as Jase’s assistant. One catch. Those keen powers of observation weren’t limited to assisting Jase with private banking. Janice wanted in on his private life, a right she’d assured him she’d earned after taking down a certain unsavory message from one of his less-discreet girlfriends. And over the years they’d come to an understanding: Jase dished gossip and Janice ate it up, gave him nonstop flak about it, and did a phenomenal job on everything he asked her to and more.

  What they had worked, and she’d become a confidante and true friend. One who took exception to being left out of the loop.

  And Jase had definitely left her out of this one. For months, though it was really the last week that would have him in hot water.

  Hence his use of the break room on sixteen instead of the one on seventeen, which was just down the hall from his office but frequented by Janice. Whom he’d been avoiding.

  Downing the dregs of the coffee he’d been chugging since he arrived at quarter to eight, he sent up a silent prayer for his stomach lining and then headed back to his office. He had a meeting scheduled with the VP in twenty, so blowing past Janice without stopping to talk shouldn’t trigger any alarms.

  God, he was a pussy, but this stuff with Emily… Hell, he didn’t need anyone reminding him about it when nearly a week after the fact he could barely go a half hour without thinking of her himself.

  Janice was on the phone chewing some poor schmuck out over a screwup with the weekly reports when he walked past with a nod. She rolled her eyes at him in what was a pretty typical greeting, and he grinned as he slipped through his door.

  Safe—or so he’d thought.

  He’d barely sat down when she waddled through the door toward one of the open seats across from him.

  He swallowed as guilty tension settled in his gut.

  He was allowed to have a few secrets. He was a guy, for fuck’s sake.

  “Hey, Janice, what’ve you got?” he asked, watching uneasily as she lowered herself into the chair, her big baby belly making her movements more awkward and adorable every day. Not that he’d dare tell that to her face.

  “Your meeting got canceled,” she announced, like the information he could have gotten by phone, email, or text was worth her making the trip into his office.

  Not likely.

  He waited, his tongue tucked against a molar, pretty sure he knew where this was going.

  “So,” she started with a lengthy exhale he wasn’t entirely sure was just for effect. “What’s with the skulking around and dodging behind corners every time it looks like our paths are going to cross in the hall?”

  Forcing a laugh, he shook his head. “Skulking? What?”

  He’d totally been skulking.

  “That’s how you want to play it?” She made a gruff noise, pressed a hand to her belly, and readjusted in her chair. “Okay, fine. I heard someone saw you crawling out of a dark corner of a certain church this weekend…with the flames of hell licking at your feet, Jase. And yet, when we spoke at length about the wedding, you neglected to mention anything about a girl. The best part, Jase, and I have to hear it thirdhand.”

  “That might be a little on the dramatic side.” Christ, who were her sources?

  For a while he’d thought one of them was Sean. The guy was such a chronic kiss-up, and it gave him hives that he hadn’t been able to win Janice over. But he hadn’t even been at the wedding.

  And neither had Molly, whom Janice adored and even met for lunch from time to time.

  Brody and Max were possible, but he just couldn’t see either of them calling Janice to whisper salacious somethings in her ear.

  “Is it?” She looked like she was about to say more—really dig into him—but then she sort of froze up, her face going from white to red.

  Oh no.

  He knew better, but just couldn’t help himself. “You okay, Jan?”

  It was only a matter of time before that baby refused to settle for the tight quarters he’d been camped out in for the past seven months, but it was too soon. Jase had done a little reading and—

  Narrowed eyes snapped to him, and he forced himself not to shrink back. “Don’t you think I’d tell you if I wasn’t all right?”

  “How about I get you a glass of water or something?”

  Her head turned from side to side in a slow warning he wasn’t going to ignore. “How about you tell me who the woman at the wedding was, and we forget this whole thing?”

  Christ, she knew how to play hardball. And he knew better than to resist. “Emily Klein. Bridesmaid for Sally Willson. We went to high school together.” And then, because he had to admit it to someone, he added, “We used to hang out.”

  Janice suddenly looked a whole lot more comfortable. Still, he reached into his desk drawer and grabbed the bottle of water he had tucked inside. Cracking the top, he walked it around to Janice and then sat back on the desk, arms crossed. Waiting.

  A shrewd smile stretched across her lips as she took a sip and nodded for him to go on, rubbing her belly like it was some kind of hairless cat.

  Again. Not something to share.

  But there was no getting out of this business with Emily. Not entirely.

  “Anyway, you’ve gotten in too late in the game on this one, Jan. It’s over.”

  “That’s too bad. Sounds like she was giving you a run for your money. Would have liked to see that, for a change.”

  Jesus, who was feeding her this stuff?

  “So you won’t be seeing her again?” she asked, giving him that helpless-pregnant-lady look.

  This time, Jase was shifting like he was the one with seven pounds of little human
taking over his insides.

  Janice’s brow rose. “Jase?”

  “Not exactly. I mean, I’ll be seeing her at a wedding coming up. And I imagine there will be more after that. She’s got about a million girlfriends. And somewhere along the line, they started marrying my guys. But that doesn’t matter. Seeing her won’t change anything.”

  Janice just stared at him a moment with an expression on her face that he hadn’t seen before. Didn’t care for.

  “We agreed, Janice. She’s no more interested in continuing than I am.”

  “Sure,” she offered, that look not budging a bit.

  He wanted to demand to know what that look was supposed to mean, but he already did. She was calling him an ass and asking him what kind of fool he took her for.

  “Nice,” he grumbled as Janice pushed awkwardly from her seat, then scowled at him as he helped her the rest of the way up.

  “So when’s this wedding?” she asked, making her way stiffly to the door.

  “Three weeks. And in the name of full disclosure, I’ll be seeing her at the rehearsal dinner too. But before you start watching the phone, waiting for your sources to dish, it’s a plus-one thing. So we’ll both have dates for both nights.”

  “Oh, a date, like you took to Romeo’s wedding…because that was a plus one too, wasn’t it?” she asked, knowing full well it was and he hadn’t.

  “Doesn’t matter. I’ll take one to this. Just so Emily doesn’t get any ideas.”

  Chapter 14

  February

  “Whoa, look who managed to claw his way free of the bedroom.”

  Jase glanced up from tying his Nikes to see Max clapping Romeo on the shoulder across the locker room.

  “Good to see you, man. How’s the better half?”

  “The morning sickness is gone,” Romeo said, grinning. “Sally’s appetite is back, and baby’s been asking for cake. Lots of cake. Like, we’ve gone through four since we got back from Florida.”

  What Romeo didn’t mention was that he’d been baking the cakes his new wife had been craving from scratch for almost two weeks now. A fact Jase knew, since he’d been the one Romeo called from the grocery store in a panic about whether the cake from the bakery department was going to be good enough. What exactly they put in it, and whether a box mix would be better. He’d been going off the deep end over cake—and friends didn’t let friends go down that way.

  So Jase had called Janice, gotten a recipe, met Romeo at the store, and taken him back to Chez Foster where they’d muddled through the cake-baking process together like men. Meaning, it took three tries, a second trip to the market, and a refusal to call for directions…but in the end, that was one fine cake Romeo took home.

  Janice to the rescue again.

  “You here for the game?” Jase asked, joining them along with Dean and a couple of the other regulars they’d been playing ball with over the past few years.

  “Yeah, man. I need it,” Romeo said, patting a stomach as flat as Jase’s. Probably more so. “Don’t want to get soft.”

  Max snorted, cutting a glance at Jase. “Come on, man. I know he just got married and has a baby on the way, but no way can I let that one go.”

  Never.

  “And this was the only place you thought you could get hard?” Max asked, eyes gleaming, hand over his heart. “Man, I’m flattered, but I respect the institution of marriage far too much to—”

  “Aww, shit,” Romeo groaned, shaking his head. “Bite me, Brandt.”

  “That’s what I’m saying… I want to. You know I do. But it’s over, lamb chop.”

  These guys. Gotta love ’em.

  A few minutes later, the other guys headed out to the court, while Jase stayed behind as Romeo finished getting changed.

  He looked good, relaxed like he hadn’t looked since before the engagement party. “Married life looks good on you, man,” Jase told him.

  Reaching into his gym bag, Romeo nodded. “It’s been good.” Then checking to see who was left in the locker room, he added, “Having that wedding behind us, man… What a difference. Suddenly, it’s just Sal and me, you know? No more town hall meetings about the big day. No more worrying if this one will fall through too. No more Willsons looking at me like they wished they could scrape me off their shoe.”

  It had been rough with them, for sure. “They coming around now that you guys are official?”

  Romeo laughed. “Not likely, but the wedding is over. It was like you said—they just sort of faded back into the woodwork. Yeah, they’ll be around with the baby, but in small doses. Not like my folks.”

  “Glad to hear it.”

  Romeo pulled a fitted sport shirt over his head and closed his locker.

  “Being honest here, you look worse than you did two weeks ago. What’s going on?”

  Jase shook his head but then shrugged, because it was Romeo, and the guy had divulged his darkest secrets and worst fears to him over the years. Jase could trust him, and maybe he just needed to say it.

  “Emily.”

  Romeo raised a brow and lowered his voice. “I thought that was nothing. She isn’t suddenly looking for more, is she?”

  Running his palm across his mouth, Jase shook his head.

  “Then what… Oh, shit—are you the one who’s falling? Because seriously, if that were the case, you’d have just made my wife the happiest freaking woman on the planet. She worries about you, Jase, with that string of ‘girlfriends’ but never anyone special. And Emily… She’s special. Dude, let me tell Sally.”

  Jase almost choked on his tongue. “No! You’ve got it wrong. I’m not falling into anything, especially not with Emily.”

  He liked women. Respected them. But when it came to romance, there were rules he lived by, and falling went against them. Jase liked to date. Exclusively. But on a limited basis and always on his terms. Girlfriends. Brief relationships that were casual and fun, with minimal chance of drama or expectations getting out of hand. And it worked.

  “So what is it?”

  It was the sizzle-and-pop chemistry between them. Her long legs and soft smile. That sharp wit and wicked, sweet tongue.

  “She’s going to be there for the rehearsal tonight. Marcos Nicks’s wedding. We’re paired up as attendants for tomorrow, which means we’ll probably be partnered for the meals.”

  He’d have to dance with her. Feel her in his arms. Close enough to touch in all the places he knew he shouldn’t.

  “If you’re worried about it being weird between you, or her expecting something from you, just call her up, man. She’s cool. I think you’re stressing about nothing.”

  Romeo didn’t get it. And even though the words were there, Jase couldn’t make himself say them out loud.

  He was the one who wanted something. He was the one who hadn’t been able to get Emily out his head. And even as he stood there sweating about the night to come, a part of him knew it was because he’d already accepted the inevitable.

  “Jase, chill. Shake out your arms, loosen up your shoulders. It’s one night. Look, if you two hook up again, whatever. If not, then no big deal. But relax about it and just…hell, let life happen, you know?”

  He was right. Besides, there was always the possibility—the good possibility—that once Jase actually saw Emily tonight, he’d take one look at her and realize he’d been worked up over nothing and he wasn’t interested anymore. Okay, so maybe it was more like a slim possibility, but a possibility just the same.

  “Yeah, thanks, man.”

  Romeo smacked the back of his hand into Jase’s gut and flashed him a mouth full of pearly whites. “Then enough of this chick business. Let’s play some ball.”

  * * *

  By the time Jase pulled into the lot of the squat Episcopal church that night, he’d almost convinced himself that seeing Emily again was all it wo
uld take to get his head back on straight. Like some kind of contagion, she’d be the key to a cure.

  But as he approached the red-painted double doors, his heart started pounding the way it used to before a big game. When all the guys would be chest bumping into each other, rattling helmets, and smacking the glass with their sticks—and he’d be staring at the scoreboard, his blood pumping hot, all thoughts zeroing in on that one goal.

  Emily’s laugh reached him the moment he stepped through the doors to the vestibule. That heavenly sound echoed through the open space, playing in the rafters before slipping softly around him.

  He wanted her.

  And cue the not-so-soft physical reaction. Great, he was already scanning for the closest closet. A month had been too long.

  Crossing into the nave, he saw her. She was wearing a classic black dress that clung in all the best ways, leaning casually against one of the pews and talking to another bridesmaid. Emily’s hair was pinned up in some kind of twisty thing that was sexy enough to have him wondering what it would take to get it down again.

  What it would take to get her alone again.

  And then she stalled where she was, turning to look over her shoulder his way.

  His pulse jacked.

  One look and he’d know whether a coatroom or closet visit was off the table or not.

  “Hiya, Jase. You made it,” Brody announced, clapping him hard on the shoulder and effectively yanking Jase’s attention around to him and Max. Whom he hadn’t even noticed walking in.

  “Guys, good to see you.” Or normally it would have been, but they’d just cost him the answer to a question he’d wanted very badly. A glance back to Emily, and she was fully engaged in her conversation. Turning back to the guys who were watching him a little too intently, Jase asked, “We know when they’re starting?”

  The sharp clapping of their wedding coordinator, followed by the command that they begin, had everyone turning back toward the front of the church, and all attention was on the rehearsal at hand. Jase’s too. It was either that or pull a fire alarm and lure Emily into another dark alcove, and he wasn’t sure either of their eternal souls could take the hit of a second infraction.