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The guard pointed to a hallway on the right. “Straight down that hall, make a left at the water fountain, and it’s the second door on the right.”
“Thank you.” Laura grabbed her oversized bag and started down the wide corridor.
The long hallway was flanked with wooden doors on each side. She didn’t stop to read the signs that hung above them, but she was having serious doubts that there was suddenly going to be a restaurant in room 304. The floors must have been recently mopped because she felt like she was ice skating on her heels.
She was hurrying so quickly that when she rounded the corner her heels slid out from beneath her. Her eyes squeezed shut as she prepared herself for impact on the hard, tiled ground. But instead of sharp pain radiating up through her tailbone, she felt large arms wrap around her.
A noise that sounded like a morph between a scream and a moan escaped from her as she found herself cradled in the arms of an angel. She’d been caught in the position of the woman in the famous V-J Day sailor kissing the nurse in Times Square. Or like she was being dipped on Dancing with the Stars. Her eyes opened to find that her savior was not any angel, it was Hot Tattoo Guy.
Had she fallen and hit her head and was now imagining this scenario? This had to be a dream. What would HTG be doing in a government building in Chicago the day after she’d run into him, literally, in Whisper Lake at Well Brook?
His eyes mirrored her shock and they both froze.
“It’s you,” she breathed out in disbelief.
“Hi,” he grinned.
“Oh good! You found her!” Kennedy heard Laura’s voice and HTG straightened her up.
“Are you okay?” Laura asked as Kennedy wobbled slightly on her feet. Her unsteadiness had nothing to do with her heels or the slippery floor. They were due to her legs feeling like noodles after being in the arms of Hot Tattoo Guy.
“Yeah, I just… I almost fell but…” Kennedy glanced between Laura and Hot Tattoo Guy. Her best friend being there only made the situation seem more surreal.
“They’re ready for us.”
Kennedy heard Knox’s deep voice as he stepped beside Laura.
“What’s going on?” she asked, her head swimming in confusion.
“We’re getting married!” Laura enthused. “And you and Seb are our witnesses.”
“Seb?” Kennedy repeated in disbelief as it sank in that Hot Tattoo Guy was Seb, aka Sebastion Savage, Knox’s little brother.
“Oh right, you two haven’t met. Seb this is Kennedy, Kennedy Seb.” Laura quickly made introductions.
“Hi,” Kennedy smiled suddenly feeling a little lightheaded.
“We need to go. Our number is up,” Knox wrapped his arm around Laura.
Seb’s lips curled in a lopsided grin as he offered Kennedy his arm. His very muscular, very tattooed arm. “Ready to go witness a wedding?”
She knew it wasn’t a marriage proposal, but that didn’t stop her from swooning.
7
As Seb andKennedy stood as bookend witnesses to his brother’s civil ceremony there was an electricity in the air unlike anything he’d ever felt. And this wasn’t Seb’s first trip to the courthouse wedding rodeo. He’d played the role of witness to half a dozen nuptials, most of which had taken place in Vegas after tattoo conventions. The tattoo community was a tight-knit one. People in that world had felt like family and he’d had the honor of bearing witness to six of his brothers and sisters in ink. And as far as blood relatives getting married, six months back he’d attended his oldest brother Ford’s wedding.
But this union felt different. Knox and Laura’s vow exchange felt more intimate than any he’d experienced. He wanted to believe that it was truly just the special connection that his brother and Laura shared, but he wasn’t totally convinced that was the case. There was a very good possibility that the crackling tension he was experiencing had more to do with the woman standing opposite him than it did with the couple tying the knot. The woman who he’d crashed into two times in the same number of days. The woman with the blue-green ocean eyes that he could easily drown in. The woman who had mesmerized him in the most innocent and intoxicating way.
Seb was doing his best to figure out what it was about the captivating Kennedy that was so different. Why had she awakened him in ways no one and nothing else had been able to do since his accident?
She was attractive. But so were the dozens of women he’d dated. She seemed nice enough, but they hadn’t had a real conversation yet. Still, he felt like heknewher.
Seb did remember last summer when Knox moved to Whisper Lake Kennedy had shown him a house and they’d “met” on Facetime, but the encounter had been brief and he hadn’t remembered it until today. And over the time his brother and Laura had been together, he’d heard them mention Kennedy, but he hadn’t paid that much attention to what they’d said. He’d sort of been dealing with his own shit. But neither of those reasons explained why he felt like he knew her. Whatever recognition he felt for her was completely independent of anything before she’d crashed into him yesterday.
He shifted on his feet and forced himself to look forward. He was doing his best to pay attention to the judge as he conducted the ceremony, but his attention kept being pulled toward Kennedy. Every few seconds his gaze would drift back over to her. She was like a magnet that he was powerless against. Each time he glanced in her direction he’d notice a different detail about her.
As an artist, Seb saw the world in shapes, lines, and angles. That was how his brain had always interpreted things. When he looked at Kennedy, he didn’t just see a beautiful face, he noted its sweetheart shape. He zeroed in on the defined cupid’s bow that sat on top of her pouty, full lips. He memorized the sensual lines of her almond eyes, the angle of her high cheekbones, and the slope of her sexy neck.
