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My skin warms. My whole body is buzzy and light. “I’ve got you. I’m good enough to make sure I won’t win. I’ll protect you from the horrors of I do.”
“Mmm. You’re more than a ten, Hunter Colburn.” He cups my chin and kisses me. It’s sexy and messy and tastes like Woodford Reserve, and his beard is doing unholy things to my brain. I grab hold of the table for balance. He stumbles, then balances himself, breaking the kiss to whisper, “Can’t wait till the game is over.”
“Me too,” I say as my pulse spikes, but it’s not from the liquor that’s gone to my head. It’s the night, it’s the thrill, it’s the sex plan for later.
It’s the now too.
The wild adrenaline of the dare.
I’m in my element. I’m ziplining. I’m skiing a black diamond. I’m parachuting out of a plane.
“I’m so going to not win,” I say to Nate, doubling down in the spirit of things. He wraps his arms around me, and he’s having a blast.
The dealer doles out the cards. I’ve got an ace. I need to get rid of this fucker. I focus on the two in my hand instead. Or wait. Maybe I should ditch the two? Nope. Don’t want to win with an ace high.
I draw two cards, consider my hand, then pray like hell.
“One by one, show your cards,” William announces.
I blink, fighting off the haze of the alcohol to scan each hand laid on the table.
Tanner lands with a pair of fours. Damn. That won’t do me any good. But he’s holding his breath, crossing his fingers, hoping others have better hands.
Same here.
Luke slaps down an ace high, then taps it for emphasis. He’s safe. “Take that motherfuckers,” he says as a rock forms in the pit of my stomach.
“So cocky,” Bryan says, patting his lone king. Why does he have a get-out-of-jail-free card too, dammit?
With a wicked grin, William shows off a pair of sixes while his husband waves a pair of fives.
The rock becomes my stomach.
Bryan points at them. “So you two win?”
Tanner sucks in a breath.
William laughs, very oh, silly boy. “We’re already married. We’re not getting un-married.”
“Fair point,” Nate says, then displays his jack high. “Looks like Tanner needs a groom.”
The baseball player cringes. He’s been taking a romance timeout since his brief and torrid fling with a sports reporter ended badly.
Nate chuckles and tells me, “Damn good thing I suck at cards, right?”
Dread chills me.
I turn mine over, revealing to the table what I’ve known for several frozen seconds. My cards are snakes. I have three fucking twos.
The guys all stare at my winning hand. Once again, the crew goes terribly quiet. The silence when William dropped his nuptial news? It has nothing on this noise-less, heavy moment.
All eyes are on me.
My neck prickles.
I’ve screwed up everything.
I swallow past the dry spot in my throat, my heart thumping erratically as I finally meet Nate’s blue eyes.
His are strangely blank.
This is worse than I’d thought.
Then Luke breaks the silence. “Looks like Chandler’s getting hitched to his super-hot date,” he says, smacking the table and grinning.
Suddenly, everyone’s laughing, and they rhythmically bang fists on the felt and shout get hitched, get hitched, get hitched.
And Nate is no longer stony-faced. My date erupts into laughter, then into more PDA than he’s given before.
His arms slink around my waist, and he’s kissing my cheek, murmuring, “Perfect end to a perfect night.”
Holy shit. I did this. I gave him the great time he needed and deserved.
All I want to do is make him happy, especially since he’s rubbing his beard against my face. The whiskery brush sends a hot spike of pleasure down my spine, then his words send another. “And just think, afterwards,” he murmurs, “we get to consummate our vows.”
I go up in bourbon-fueled flames. “I’m getting married,” I shout to the room. “And I’m finally, fucking finally, getting shagged. This is the best night ever.”
The guys all laugh. “Nate, your new dude is a baller. This is the guy you should have married in the first place,” someone says.
A baller. I’m a baller.
“He’s so much more fun than your ex,” another puts in.
I preen.
“Hunter is the best date ever,” Nate declares as he wraps me in his arms without a word about what I just said. Maybe he didn’t realize that I confessed my dude virginity to him. Or maybe it’s just no big deal to him.
But either way, I got that secret off my chest and now we’re going to get hitched and bang all night long.
Everything is stellar.
We leave the VIP room and head straight for the blinking neon lights across the hall, the sign beckoning us with 24-hour weddings at The Extravagant Chapel.
But right before we walk inside, Bryan tugs Nate’s shirt, and says in a serious tone, “Buddy, maybe go to a twenty-four-hour drive-through instead. More private.”
