My Best Friend's Mardi Gras Wedding

by Erin Nicholas

  But that was convenient since their business was, after all, showing people a good time. The people who came to the Boys of the Bayou Swamp Boat and Fishing Tours were here to ride around on airboats and pontoons, drink, laugh, see a few things they didn’t get to see back home, and make some memories.

  Owen especially loved the swamp boat tours full of bachelorette parties. Not because he loved women—which he did—but because he especially loved women who had no business on the bayou in their high-heeled sandals and spray tans. He loved to get them a little dirty. Literally. And wet…though when he said that he added, “in all ways a pretty girl can get wet.”

  It was hard to be in a bad mood around Owen. Unless he was flirting with a girl you were interested in, because Owen had a bad-boy air about him that seemed to always trump Josh’s good-guy vibe.

  But today, Josh really thought he could be in a bad mood around Owen.

  Victoria Kramer had stood him up last night.

  His reaction to that fact told him everything he needed to know about how he felt about her. He’d had no intention of sending her back to Iowa untouched this time. Hell, he wasn’t so sure he’d had any intention on sending her back to Iowa at all.

  Maybe it was better she hadn’t shown up. Was he ready to get married? Because he wasn’t really able to envision any other way for Victoria Kramer’s second trip to Louisiana to end.

  “Josh!” That was Kennedy’s voice.

  Josh finally sighed and turned. If Kennedy was out here, it was about business. One of the tours had gotten messed up or something. Kennedy was his little sister and she handled all the bookings and scheduling. She’d grown up around the muddy waters of the bayou, but she was not an outdoorsy girl. She resented every time she had to come out on the docks.

  Which meant she’d probably tried to text or call him. Well, he’d had his phone turned off. Because he wasn’t in the mood to talk to anyone.

  But when he turned, he realized that was one luxury he was never going to get. Not in Autre. Not with his family. Not only were Owen and Kennedy approaching, but Sawyer was with them as well. What the hell?

  Josh reached up and turned his cap backward on his head and took his sunglasses off. “What’s going on?” he asked as they got close.

  “There’s a girl here for you,” Kennedy said. She was frowning, but it looked more concerned than annoyed. That was unusual. To say the least. Sawyer, Owen, and Josh had been annoying Kennedy for about twenty-four years now. He wasn’t even sure what it would take to make her concerned about any of them.

  “A girl?” he asked.

  “Yeah.” Kennedy looked a little pained. “She was booked on the next airboat tour with Owen but she came rushing in, giving me some story about how she’d just been trying to get here no matter what and she’d booked the tour because our bus picks up at the hotels.” Kennedy rolled her eyes. “Apparently Uber seems sketchy to her, and the idea of taking a taxi by herself seemed unsafe and she didn’t have another way to get down here.”

  “A girl booked one of our tours just so she could get a ride down here?” Josh asked.

  Their grandpa, Leo, and their cousin, Mitch, drove the buses that went around to the hotels in New Orleans to pick up tourists and bring them to Autre for the tours. They also directed them to Ellie’s bar across the street for a pre or post tour cocktail. They both also delighted in using the time to play good old, downhome, Cajun music over the stereo system and to tell the tourists all kinds of crazy facts about living in Louisiana. Like that there is a five-hundred-dollar fine if you have a pizza delivered to someone without them knowing about it and all about the haunted Manchac Swamp Bridge.

  “I guess,” Kennedy said. “And now she’s insisting she needs to talk to you. She’s been sitting on the dock waiting for you. Doesn’t want the tour with Owen.” She was clearly put out by this girl.

  “I even went in and introduced myself,” Owen said. “She said no thanks.”

  Josh had to laugh at the look of disbelief on Owen’s face over that fact. “Really? She’d rather wait for me than get on a boat with you? I gotta meet this girl.” Josh suddenly felt a little better about things. Tori hadn’t shown up, but some girl had booked a tour just so she could get to Autre. For him. And she’d been unimpressed by Owen. Yeah, he definitely wanted to meet her.

  “Hold on there,” Sawyer said. “We’re…concerned.”

  Okay, Owen thought this was funny and Kennedy was probably torn between amused and worried. But very little amused Sawyer these days, so he was obviously firmly in the concerned camp.

  “A girl choosing me over Owen isn’t cause for concern,” Josh said. “I mean, come on.”

  “Not that. She seems a little…off,” Kennedy said.

  “Off?” Josh asked.

  “We’re thinking she’s either a stalker or she’s pregnant with your baby,” Owen told him.

  Josh froze. “What?”

  “She’s very…jittery,” Kennedy said. “She won’t tell us what she wants to talk to you about. And even when I told her she could be waiting for three hours in the hot sun, she said fine.”

  “Three hours?” Josh asked. “Where the hell did you think I was taking that last tour?” Their tours lasted about ninety minutes, maybe a little more if the gators were out and being show-offs, or if they happened to get the boat stuck in some of the lower grassy areas.

  “I just told her that to try to get her to leave,” Kennedy said. She frowned at Josh. “She said she wasn’t going anywhere until she talked to you.”

  “And you think she’s pregnant?” Josh asked. “Does she look pregnant?” That seemed like something that should be pretty obvious. Though he hadn’t had sex with anyone in over a year, so there was no way it was his no matter how pregnant this woman looked.

  “She doesn’t,” Kennedy said. “But it could be early.”

  “It’s not mine.”

  “How can you be so sure?” Owen asked.

  “Because I haven’t—” Okay, his brother and cousin knew that he’d been less…promiscuous over the past several months, but since he worked in New Orleans a couple of nights a week, they didn’t know for sure that he hadn’t had sex at all. They were already wondering what the hell was going on. If they knew he’d been celibate for almost a year, they’d take him to the doctor.

  Or, if he gave them Tori’s name, they’d load the truck up and take him to Iowa.

  Either way, they’d realize that this was a big deal. Was he ready for them to all know that Tori was a big deal?

  And why was he using present tense when thinking about her? She was a big deal? Shouldn’t he be thinking in terms of she had been a big deal? It was over. She hadn’t shown up last night.

  “I’m just sure,” he finally said. “If she’s pregnant, it’s not mine.”

  “Then she really might want to kill you,” Kennedy said. “I gotta say, that was my first guess anyway. You made her fall in love and then never called her again or something.”

  Josh frowned at his sister. “First, your faith in me is overwhelming.”

  She shrugged, clearly not caring that she might have wounded him a little.

  “Second, does she seem homicidal?”

  He couldn’t say that he’d never pissed a woman off to the point that she might come looking for a confrontation, but he didn’t think he’d ever made anyone murderous.

  “Not really,” Kennedy said. “She’s just sitting there with Gus. She didn’t want anything to drink. She isn’t even on her phone. She’s just sitting there on the dock, watching the water.”

  “She’s sitting there with Gus?” Josh asked. Gus was the river otter that lived under the far Boys of the Bayou dock. He’d shown up one morning and after about a week of watching him, the guys had decided he’d either gotten lost or was orphaned. The boats coming and going kept a lot of other animals out of the immediate area and the guys let Gus stay because, well, he was cute and he entertained the tourists. He rarely got up on the doc
k though and he didn’t sit with people. The guys would toss him food and he didn’t run from them, but he also didn’t get too close.

  Kennedy shrugged. “He climbed up on the dock and waddled over to her. He’s just sitting there by her feet.”

  Wow. That was different. “What did she do?”

  “She didn’t freak out or anything,” Kennedy said. “She did talk to him a little. And she kept the other people from touching him or getting too close.”

  “She seems…contemplative,” Sawyer said. The oldest of the business owners, he was often the voice of reason, the calm one who naturally took charge. Quit fucking around was his favorite phrase and he said it at least once a day to Josh and Owen. Sometimes both at the same time. He was also the only one of them who would use a word like contemplative. “Not angry. Maybe a little nervous.”

  “Nervous?” Josh repeated. Now he was even more curious. “So you’re all out here to protect me?”

  That was…nice.

  “I got a picture of her,” Owen said, holding out his phone. “We just wanted to make sure you knew her and to give you a heads-up. Just in case.”

  Josh stepped closer to Owen’s phone. And his heart kicked so hard against his ribs that he felt a little light-headed.

  Tori was here.

  He immediately started up the ramp to the building.

  “Hey!”

  “Josh!”

  He heard his family calling after him, but he didn’t have time to explain to them who Tori was. It was a long explanation. Okay, not really. “A girl I met last year” would have done it. But she was…more than that. And he had no patience or time to try to make that make sense to them. Because it didn’t really make sense to him and he’d been thinking about it for a year.

  He rounded the corner of the building that housed the office, check-in area, restrooms, and gift shop for the Boys of the Bayou.

  And there she was, sitting on the scarred wooden benches, amidst the group of tourists that were scheduled to go out with Owen on the airboat.

  She was leaning against the building, her long, bare legs stretched out, ankles crossed, watching the water lap at the dock. Gus was lying on his side on the dock at her feet, apparently sunbathing.

  She looked so gorgeous that Josh felt a little weak in the knees.

  That was completely something his dad or grandad would say. But, for the first time in his life, Josh understood it.

  He sucked in a breath and gave himself a second to be sure he wasn’t going to rush her. He gripped the edge of the building and said simply, “Tori.”

  There was a lot of conversation going on around them, but she somehow heard him. She looked up at him quickly. And a bright, sincere smile stretched her mouth immediately. She bounced to her feet, startling Gus. He skittered across the deck and she glanced at him. “Sorry,” she told him.

  He slipped off the edge of the dock and into the water. Several of the kids on the benches ran to the railing to watch the otter swim away, but Tori’s gaze locked on Josh’s.

  “Hi,” he finally said.

  “Hi,” she returned.

  He curled his fingers into the wood under his hand, forcing himself to stay put. Because stomping toward her, throwing her over his shoulder, taking her into the office and slamming and locking the door would be a little much. Probably.

  She tucked her hands into her front pockets. Her shorts were blue denim and hit high on her thighs. She wore beat-up blue tennis shoes with no socks. Her top was a simple gray T-shirt that said, Dogs have owners. Cats have staff. Her hair was in a ponytail and she didn’t have any makeup on.

  She looked fucking amazing.

  “I know that you obviously didn’t want to see me. Not showing up last night should have been—I mean, it was—a clear message. So me coming here is pretty…crazy. But I need a favor and I’m really hoping—”

  “I was there last night.”

  Tori stopped. “What?”

  Josh let go of the building. “I was there. I went to Bourbon O. Four times.”

  Her eyes widened. “I was there. It was a little…wild in there, I’ll admit. But I went. I asked the bartender about you.”

  “I don’t work there anymore.”

  “I figured that out.”

  “That’s how you found me here?”

  “Yes.”

  Josh felt his gut tightening. She’d been there. She’d tried to find him. She was now here. He took a step toward her. “You were there?”

  She nodded. “You too?”

  “Definitely.”

  They just stood staring at one another.

  “Wow,” she finally said softly.

  Josh became aware that everyone around them had gone completely quiet and were now watching them. He glanced behind him. Yep, his family was there too. Everyone looked wildly curious and he knew that his mom, dad, and all of his grandmothers and grandfathers would know about this in roughly fifteen minutes.

  He might as well give them a really great story.

  Josh stalked toward her. She sucked in a quick, sexy little breath as he got close. Without a word, he bent, and lifted her over his shoulder with a little “Josh!” from her. Then he headed for the office. He stepped into the cramped room with the single desk and stacks upon stacks of files, papers, and catalogs. He slammed the door behind him, locked it, and put Tori back on her feet.

  “Wha—”

  He covered her mouth with his.

  4

  God, she tasted amazing. Better than he’d remembered. And he’d been remembering a lot. Often. Almost every night. That had gotten to him the most. He was never affected by women like this. He’d kissed far more than his share of girls in his life. He’d had some really amazing nights with several of them. And he barely remembered their names. Oh, there were a few whose names he remembered, sure. And he’d had two girlfriends in high school that he’d really liked and still saw around town. But he had never thought about a woman every single night for even a week after simply kissing her, not to mention nearly a year.

  Tori gave a soft moan that made him hard and aching in one second flat. She arched against him, slid her hands up his neck to his head, pushed his hat off, and then ran her fingers through his hair.

  Holy shit, that felt good.

  Her hands in his hair. That was all she’d done and yet he was two seconds away from putting her up against the wall and driving deep.

  Of course, he had to get her shorts out of the way first.

  He cupped her ass, pulling her up against his throbbing cock and started walking her backward. She went with it, taking those steps, her lips and tongue moving against his.

  When her back was against the wall, he slid his hands up her sides, his thumbs skimming over the outside curves of her breasts. She shivered slightly at the touch. He kept going, for now, not stopping until he cupped her face.

  He kissed her long and hot, drinking in her taste and scent. Her hands went to his hips, her fingers hooking through the belt loops on his khaki shorts. She pulled him against her, arching her back, the fly of her jeans against his.

  Josh sucked in a deep breath and finally, reluctantly, lifted his head.

  “I’m so fucking glad to see you.”

  “I’m so fucking glad I got on that bus,” she said, her voice breathless, her smile wide.

  “I hope you’re planning to stay for a while. Like all day. And night. And then the next. Four or five.”

  Her eyes widened. “The next four or five days?”

  He lowered his head, brushing his lips over hers. “I was thinking more like months.”

  She laughed softly, her breath hot against his mouth. “So everything I remember feeling last year is still here.”

  “Definitely still here,” he agreed. And stronger. Absence did make the heart grow fonder. He also knew it made memories fade and fantasies grow. But it seemed that neither of those things had happened in regard to Tori. He remembered everything—the freckles on her nose, the
length of her eyelashes, the reddish-gold highlights in her hair, the way her laugh punched him in the gut and made him hard as steel.

  “Thank God,” she said softly.

  “So that’s a yes to the four or five months?”

  She laughed again. “Part of me is a very definite yes.”

  “That’s the part I want.”

  “Well, I can definitely offer you a chance to hang out with me for a few days.”

  “Done.”

  “You don’t even want to know what for?”

  “Doesn’t matter.”

  “Wow,” she said again.

  Josh brushed his thumbs over her cheekbones. “That’s what I was thinking.”

  She blew out a little breath. “So how do you feel about weddings?”

  “Are you proposing?” he asked.

  Everything in him felt lighter now that she was here. Things felt…right. It was the most bizarre thing ever, but thankfully he had a whole bunch of people who were going to understand. Not normal people, of course. But all he had to do was walk across the street to his grandmother’s bar, pull up a stool, and tell the handful of people who would be there all about meeting Tori, spending eleven months apart, and now agreeing to marry her after being together again for only ten minutes.

  They’d all get it.

  But Tori grinned up at him. “Not yet,” she said, her eyes actually twinkling.

  “Ah, better than a no.” He didn’t remember the last time he’d felt this good. And his life consisted of showing people the swamp, fishing, and pouring drinks. He had it pretty easy and yet, Tori was making him feel a sense of happiness he’d felt only once before—when he’d seen her sitting across the bar from him at Bourbon O that second night she was in New Orleans.

  “I have a wedding to go to. Actually, a whole wedding extravaganza,” she said. She rolled her eyes. “It’s a multi-day thing. It’s my best friend’s wedding. And I could use…a date.”

  The way she paused in front of a date made him curious. “Just a date?”

  She wet her lips. “Well…”

  For a moment, he was distracted by those lips. Unable to help himself, he lowered his head again and kissed her. She sure as hell didn’t push him away. She fisted the front of his Boys of the Bayou T-shirt and got up on her tiptoes.