Laney blinked, and the long line of her lashes cast shadows over her the freckles sprinkled over her cheekbones. She wasthawing. Maybe she even wanted to see me too, though there was no way she was going to admit it.
“Tell me about Derek,” I ordered.
I’d watched her for a few minutes before butting in. She’d already been wrapped up in conversation with the guy when I entered the restaurant, and I didn’t need to know what he’d been saying to hate everything about him. His self-important bullshit stank from clear across the room. It was in the cock of his head when she was speaking, the snarling curve of his lip, the haughty roll of his eyes. But really, I only had to look at Laney to know he was bad news. The way my girl shrank told me everything I needed to know: the dude had it coming, one way or another. I was no knight in shining armor, but I’d be happy to teach him a lesson called Respect for Laney Fisher that involved a couple of jabs and my lethal right hook.
Laney, however, looked like she would rather discuss anything but him. “There’s not much to tell. We have history, and I can’t avoid him because he’s the best man.”
“Not good enough. I’m your husband, even if it’s only for the next few days. Fess up.”
“Ronan, I need to get back.”
I glance at the clock above her head. Shit. “Or we could just leave, and you could tell me everything.”
Laney shook her head. “Ronan, not everyone can just get up and leave whenever they feel like it. I’m the maid of honor. I have obligations to the bride, and they include eating a fancy three-course dinner, catching up with old friends and family, and making a speech about romance and fate and all the things true love is supposedly made of.”
By the time she was finished, you would have thought she was listing types of mold she had to clean out of her basement, not tasks for her best friend’s wedding.
“Well, then, you’re not doing it alone,” I decided.
That divot between her brows appeared again. God, she was cute when she was confused. “Ronan, that’s really not necessary?—”
“Look,” I interrupted. “I realize I already messed things up by announcing our so-called marriage in front of everyone, but you deserve to have that dipshit make pitying comments about your personal life the way you deserve meningitis. Not on my watch. So let me do you a favor and be the adoring plus-one that pisses off your ex, and afterward, we can have that talk I flew all the way here for. Deal?”
Those candy-drop lips opened, and I only just managed not to slip my finger between them and tell her to suck.
Fuck me. This nice-guy shit was harder than I thought.
Laney glanced toward the party, toward the noise that was starting to wane as people were clearly moving to the dinner tables. She had a glass face—I could see her weighing her options like she had an actual scale in her head.
It was really a question of whether she wanted to be the good girl she was supposed to be or the woman I was enabling her to be.
“All right,” she said finally.
I wanted to punch the air with one fist, but settled for fixing my tie.
She held out a hand. “You coming, snookums?”
I grinned. “After you, snickerdoodle.”
10
SAND BETWEEN MY TOES
LANEY
Two hours later, I was stuffed with three courses of delicious farm-to-table food, feigning a buzz long after my single glass of champagne had worked its way through my system, and ready to go.
The rest of the evening had actually been pleasant. I’d made polite conversation and accepted the congratulations of several of Megan’s family members. Enjoyed good food and gabbed with the bridesmaids (minus the one I couldn’t even look at anymore). Even managed some polite repartee with the Devil, otherwise known as my ex-boyfriend.
All of it seemed so easy with Ronan Black’s arm resting over the back of my chair or his fingers toying pleasantly with the wisps of hair around my neck.
Ronan liked to play games. Of this, I was sure. He’d suggested the idea of playing husband and wife for the evening with the glee of a middle school boy getting ready to toilet paper a rival’s house. So, it was a surprise when his version of pranking my ex involved next to no attention sent Derek’s way and mostlyjust consisted of him being like the best boyfriend—or husband—in the history of relationships.
The moment I shivered, he placed his jacket around my shoulders.
He quietly traded my glass for his so people didn’t catch on that I was abstaining.
And every time Derek, who was sitting on my left, tried to pull my attention back to him and his well of narcissism, Ronan skillfully guided the conversation with compliments about me that should have sounded fake but somehow came off as the most genuine praise I’d ever received.
