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With a relieved breath, she opens the gift. Inside is a scrap of something ivory, lacy, silky, and small. Sloan gasps, then shoves it back into the box, slamming the lid shut.
“What is it?” I ask, not even trying to wipe the smile from my face.
“Nothing.” Her voice sounds high-pitched, almost panicked.
“Obviously something. Nia wouldn’t have wrapped an empty box.” I reach for it. “Show me.”
She hides it behind her back. “It’s for me, so I don’t have to share it with you.”
“But isn’t that the idea?”
Sloan huffs. “Could you back off? This day has already been a lot, and it’s barely nine in the morning.”
“I just want to talk to you.”
“I’m listening.”
I guide her over to a soft blue chaise under the window, with a view of the lawn—where everyone is cleaning up and resetting for the next wedding—and the ocean. “Sit.”
She resists. “What are you going to do?”
I merely smile as I spot a portable music player with a USB port, power it up, and plug in the thumb drive. Sinatra’s “The Way You Look Tonight” flows softly from the overhead speakers. It’s nice, sets the mood. “I’ll pour us a glass of bubbly.”
Wordlessly, she watches while I do, taking the glass from my hand with trembling fingers.
“To us,” I toast.
“Sebastian…”
“Drink to us, wife.”
She forces out a nervous breath. I see the exact moment she decides to brazen her way through this because she lifts her chin and tosses back the whole glass of champagne in a few healthy swallows. Then she raises a brow at me. “Trying to get me drunk so I’ll have sex with you?”
“I don’t need booze for that.” I empty my glass, then sit beside her.
She scoots away from me. “You’re awfully sure of yourself.”
“When I had you naked in my hotel room, you came on my tongue in thirty seconds.”
“That doesn’t mean anything.”
“Okay. Let’s try it again. You know, to make sure it wasn’t a fluke.”
“This isn’t a game.”
“It’s not, but you keep treating it like one.”
“Me?”
“Yeah. You avoid me, needle me, push back against me… I’m just trying to make love to my wife.”
She stands, pacing nervously. “I don’t think that’s a good idea.”
I follow her. “Why? Because I get to you?”
“You don’t.”
Sloan insists she’s not playing games, but she keeps doing it. So turnabout is only fair. “Prove it.”
