The Wedding Date Disaster Read online

  Hadley flinched in his arms. “It’s complicated.”

  “When isn’t that the case?” Which was exactly why he liked the numbers side of business—spreadsheets, actuary tables, business valuations—that were logical and followed an unbiased formula.

  “It’s not complicated with us.” Hadley looked up at him, her chin set at a stubborn angle and her gaze filled with 98 percent certainty. “We don’t get along, end of story.”

  It was her 2 percent of doubt, though, that grabbed his attention, promising possibilities he shouldn’t ever consider.

  “Is that really all there is to it?”

  Hadley lowered her gaze, suddenly seeming to find the collar of his stretched T-shirt completely fascinating. “Yes.”

  “Whatever you say, Hadley.” But they both knew she was wrong, even if neither of them was going to do a damn thing about it.

  Chapter Ten

  Hadley lasted five dances past when she should, and every single one of them had been with Will. Now they were back in PawPaw’s apartment, and she was in the guest bathroom trying to reach the zipper tab on her dress without ripping it or popping her shoulder out of the socket. She reached behind and did a back bow deep enough to crack her spine but couldn’t reach it.

  Blowing back the strands of hair that had come free from her braid during “Twist and Shout,” she changed tactics and went high, reaching over her shoulders that she’d slumped forward in an effort to reach the zipper. Still nada.

  She’d worn sweaty sports bras that were easier to peel off than this dress.

  Okay, there were three choices here. Sleep in the dress, ask Will for help, or gnaw off her own arm like a coyote caught in a trap. While option one was tempting, she couldn’t imagine that Alice would appreciate getting back a wrinkled, slept-in garment in the morning. That left only one realistic prospect—asking for help.

  Biting back her distaste of having to ask a favor from the evil twin, she called out, “Will, can you help me with this zipper real quick?”

  She barely got the words out before he was in the doorway, filling it up and making the already small bathroom seem minuscule.

  “I can’t reach the zipper,” she said, trying—and failing—not to react to the fact that he’d already taken off that ridiculously small T-shirt. It wouldn’t have been so bad if he’d put another shirt on. He hadn’t. It was just him in a pair of jeans that hung low on his hips, showing off the tops of those vee marks on his hips that made forming words really fucking hard. “Can you just get me started?”

  “Sure.” He closed the distance between them until he stood directly behind her as she faced the mirror over the bathroom sink. “Here, let me get the flowers first.”

  Touch gentle, he tugged the ponytail holder from the bottom of her braid and then ran his hands through her long hair, combing out the long-stemmed daisies so they fell, landing in a circle around her bare feet. There wasn’t a sound in the room, as if the rest of the world had fallen away. His fingers combed through her hair until it was smooth and loose, then pushed it to the side, exposing the back of her neck. Watching him in the mirror, there was no missing the tension in his jaw or the way he swallowed hard before reaching for the zipper.

  She held her breath as he paused, her heart hammering against her chest. Then he inched the zipper down, the fabric of the dress falling away as he did so. The muscle in his temple pulsed as he stood frozen behind her, looking down at her bare skin, want and need swirling in his green-eyed gaze.

  The thrill of anticipation made her skin tingle as she watched it all play out on his face. Gone was the usual smirk, the cocky self-assurance. He was a man at a breaking point. He wasn’t alone in that.

  An hour ago, Hadley would have known exactly what to do in this situation. She would have walked away with a cutting remark and one single triumphant look back. But now? She wasn’t going anywhere. Desire, warm and demanding, had her bare nipples puckering beneath the dress as she felt the back of his knuckles skim down the length of her spine at a leisurely pace that stole the air from her lungs, not stopping until he brushed the scalloped edge of her panties, sending a shiver of lust over her.

  It was all she could do to stay upright as a languorous warmth flooded her body. Holy hell, she clenched her eyes shut and inhaled a deep breath in a desperate attempt to remember why this was a bad idea. But when she opened her eyes again, she found him looking back at her in the mirror, and all her best intentions melted away.

  He raised an eyebrow in question, his fingers hovering over the edges of her open dress. One shake of her head and she knew he’d walk away. Both of them would act as if this moment had never happened—as much as that would be possible. It’s what she should do, because despite whatever was going on now, she knew Will Holt wasn’t for her.

  They weren’t potential lovers. They weren’t friends. They barely tolerated each other. Yet here she was, practically burning with want and nodding her consent.

  There weren’t words or an acknowledgment; he simply used the slightest touch to nudge the dress off her shoulders and down over her hips until it pooled on the floor. His sharp intake of breath thundered in the small bathroom as he reached around and cupped her bare breasts with his strong hands. The last bit of her hesitation faded away when he took her nipples between his fingers and rolled the hard peaks, tugging them lightly and sending pleasure shooting through her—the kind that made her knees buckle as she bit down on her bottom lip.

  She planted her palms on the sink to help keep her balance under the blissful torture. There was just something about watching him tease her with slow, sure movements as they stood silently in front of the mirror that knocked her off balance, sped up her pulse, and left her yearning for more. It had to be the strangeness of the situation. It couldn’t be because of Will; that wasn’t even something she could consider.

  It was just a case of right moment, wrong man—one with magical hands.

  She’d just about gotten a handle on how fucking good it felt to have him touching her, sending the best kind of little shocks from her nipples to her clit, when he leaned down and kissed the spot right behind her ear, moving with deliberate intent down the side of her throat. Electric desire sizzled along her skin as he kissed and licked and sucked and nipped his way down to where her shoulder met her neck. That, in addition to the way he was tweaking her nipples, was exactly the kind of world-tilting teasing that had her holding on to the sink so she wouldn’t slide off the side of the earth into oblivion.

  He lifted his head, and the mix of intense lust and surprised wonder on his face as he looked at her in the mirror knocked her back to rights. What in the hell was she doing? This was Will Holt. He was the worst. They couldn’t stand each other. She should stop things now and—

  The tips of his fingers glided down her stomach, not stopping until he brushed the edge of her panties. Anticipation whipped through her. This wasn’t a good idea—but she nodded anyway. And when his fingers slid under the elastic band, she promised herself this wouldn’t change anything.

  …

  Will hadn’t walked into the bathroom with any plan beyond helping with Hadley’s zipper. He’d never meant to touch her silky skin, feel the way she responded to his touch, or let things get to the point where she was all but naked and he was sliding his fingers between her legs. God, she was soft and slick and so ready for him. And the look on her face when he circled her clit? The raw, honest desire was the hottest thing he’d ever seen.

  He could watch her like this the whole night, take her right up to the edge and then back off. “Tempting” didn’t even begin to cover it, but he was a greedy bastard and he wanted more. He wanted to watch her come.

  Fingers slick with her, he moved against her, keeping rhythm with the rocking of her hips and the tightening of her body in anticipation. He lowered his mouth to her neck, kissing and nipping his way up to her ear, taki
ng note of each time her breath caught, every barely perceptible sigh escaping her lips, and exactly how tight her grip on the sink became as her body moved closer and closer to that edge. And when he circled her clit again with two fingers, pressing with just enough pressure to make her bite down on her full bottom lip, she collapsed back against him.

  Reaching behind her, she slid her hands between them, gripping his hard cock through his jeans. His entire body stiffened, and he let out a desperate hiss, the quiet sound booming in the otherwise silent bathroom. His gaze locked with hers in the mirror. She tugged her lip between her teeth and shot him a challenging, teasing look as she squeezed him tight.

  Fuck. That’s how she wanted to do this? Two could play at that.

  He increased the speed of his fingers, sliding through her wet folds and circling her swollen clit, getting her right to the edge and pulling back. By the time he stopped a third time, a flush stained her cheeks and she had a wild, desperate look in her eyes. Before he knew what she was about, she turned so she was facing him and she was unzipping his fly. His jeans were halfway down his thighs before his brain could catch up, and by the time it did, it was too late. He yanked his wallet out of his back pocket and took out a condom. While he rolled it on, Hadley turned back around and placed her hands on the sink again. What an inviting sight. If there was anything that could tear him away from watching her in the mirror, it was seeing his hands gripping her hips as he lined himself up. Sliding inside her, he ground his molars together, desperate to keep it together longer than a few short thrusts.

  He would have stayed still inside her for longer if he could have, but she was too tight, too warm, too fucking perfect. He had to move. Thrusting forward, he sank into her before pulling back and doing it again and again. There weren’t any words, but they didn’t need any. She met him halfway on each advance, and when he reached around in front of her and dragged his finger over her clit, she responded by gripping him so tight, he nearly came on the spot.

  “Say my name.” The demand came out rough and hard. It wasn’t fair to ask things of her when she was on the edge of her climax, but he needed her to say it. He needed to know she wasn’t thinking of Web while getting off on his dick. “Say it.”

  “Will,” she said, half begging and half demanding more.

  That was all he needed to hear. He’d give it to her—everything she wanted in this moment, it was hers. Finger circling her clit, he thrust inside her, fucking her in a slow, steady rhythm that had her quaking in his arms before she came hard enough that he had to catch her with an arm around her waist so she didn’t collapse onto the floor.

  It was all he could do not to fall over the edge with her right then, no matter that he wanted to extend the moment—delay falling back into who they were to each other outside of that door. But he was too close, and when she squeezed his cock in the aftershock of her orgasm, he knew the battle was lost. He thrust into her slick warmth, once, twice, three times, burying himself as deep as he could go before coming, his jaw clenched tight to muffle the sound.

  Watching her in the mirror as he came back down from that high, the unspoken hint of possibility hanging in the air, he took in all of her—the rosy pink of her nipples, the tangle of her long brown hair, the full, round curve of her hips—and wondered if maybe he’d been missing what was right in front of him all along.

  He opened his mouth to say something—anything—but that’s when he glanced over at the mirror and saw her staring right at him. There was no missing the regret in her big brown eyes. It sliced through him, sharp as a serrated knife, shredding whatever he thought could have been.

  Silent as he’d been since he unzipped her dress, he stepped back, breaking their connection, and moved over so she had a clear path to the door. “Just give me a second to clean up.”

  “Yeah, of course.” She scooped up her clothes, not looking at him, and walked out. “Take your time. I’m all done in here.”

  Yeah. He just bet she was.

  He shut the bathroom door behind her, turned on the shower, and got in before it even had a chance to warm up. Right now, he needed the frigid water to beat against him so he’d stop feeling her soft skin. Then he’d be able to block out the memory of how she trembled right before she came, her fingers gripping the sink like it was a lifeline. He’d be able to see the reality of the situation. Life was transactional. His grandmother. Mia. Hadley. None of it meant anything to them; it was just a means to an end.

  Closing his eyes, he stepped fully underneath the icy downpour and didn’t even flinch. Fuck. He was so damn tired of it all.

  …

  There was only one bed in the guest room at PawPaw’s because of course there was. Thighs jellified, she put her underwear back on and threw on the T-shirt she’d been wearing earlier. For half a second, she worried about the fact that she wasn’t wearing pajama bottoms, but after what had just happened in the bathroom, the time for that was well past.

  What in the hell had she been thinking? She hadn’t, and that was exactly why when she looked at Will in the mirror and realized that this was what there could have been between them, she’d never regretted anything more in her life. Instead of the sniping and the snarking, they could have…well, they could have at least been friends instead of nearly instant enemies. That thought, though, was immediately shown for the absolute bullshittery it was by Will’s reaction. It was like a switch had been flipped and he’d gone back to being Sir Supreme Dick.

  And you thought you could at least be friends with him?

  She was totally blaming the post-coital happy hormone rush for that bit of ridiculousness.

  So yeah, not having PJ bottoms was pretty far down on the list of shitty things right about now, because she’d just fucked a guy who hated her guts. And she couldn’t stand him, either. He was the worst—unless she took into consideration what he could do when naked. Of course, that was best forgotten.

  Pulling back the covers to the guest bed, Hadley made a promise to herself that she wouldn’t be fooled by a fabulous orgasm and abs she had serious regret about not having licked. Will was still the evil twin. He just happened to be one with a fabulous dick.

  She closed her eyes and evened out her breathing so when Will walked out of the bathroom a few minutes later, he didn’t even attempt to talk to her before getting into bed. And the fact that he left a solid foot of open space between them? That was perfect. Abso-fucking-lutely perfect. Touching him again was the last thing she wanted. Once was definitely enough.

  Chapter Eleven

  Going by her horny subconscious, once was definitely not enough for Hadley. In her dreams last night, it had them doing it everywhere but on horseback while galloping off into the sunset. But when she cracked open her eyes the next morning, she was alone in bed—not that she cared.

  Now, the fact that the corner of her pillow was damp because she’d spent the night drooling on it, and probably snoring, did dent up her pride. So her nemesis had seen her naked, made her come in a bathroom, and had been serenaded with the song of her wet-chain-saw snoring. Aaaaaaaaand she was going to get to spend three hours shut up in a car with him on the drive back to the ranch.

  Please, God, let PawPaw be in the mood to tell every story he knows…

  That would fill up the drive for sure. Hell, that might even get them through dinner. Of course, that left tonight. In the cabin. Alone.

  She grabbed Will’s pillow and held it to her face so she could groan into it—only to be hit with the unmistakable scent of sexy, off-limits Evil Twin. A better woman would have tossed the damn thing across the room. She was weak. She took a second and a third inhale. The sound of the bathroom door opening registered two seconds later than it should have.

  “Are you smelling my pillow?” Will asked.

  She didn’t have to lower the pillow to see the smirk on his face, since there was no missing the self-satisfaction in hi
s voice. As tempting as it was to just go ahead and smother herself with his pillow, she wouldn’t give in and let him win.

  She sat up and let the pillow drop. “I was screaming into it.”

  While true, it would have sounded more convincing if her voice hadn’t squeaked in the middle of the word “screaming.” Some reactions, however, couldn’t be helped—especially now when it came to seeing Will wearing only a pair of zipped but unbuttoned jeans that were being held up by the patron saint of regrettable sexcapades. There was just something about the bare feet, muscled chest, damp hair, almost-totally-naked combination that gave him a sexy, vulnerable vibe that was her catnip. Obviously her better judgment needed to wake the fuck up because if there was anyone who didn’t fit that bill, it was the Evil Twin himself. They’d only been arguing every time they met for the past year. She knew better than to get fooled by the happy trail that disappeared behind his zipper.

  “That was some quiet screaming,” he said, lifting an eyebrow. “I guess I shouldn’t be surprised. You were very quiet in the bathroom last night.”

  And there it was, the reminder of what kind of an egomaniacal prick he was. That was why her heartbeat had picked up, her nipples were poking against her cotton T-shirt, and why her gaze kept dropping to his zipper, wondering for how much longer it would hold.

  “We’re not talking about that,” she said, her cheeks burning. “Ever.”

  “Really?” He thumbed the button of his jeans but didn’t fasten them. “That’s what you’re going with?”

  She forced her gaze up past his sinewy chest to his face. “Yes.”

  “Ouch. A man of lesser ego would be crushed right about now.” He buttoned his jeans, grabbed his T-shirt from where it lay across the bottom of the bed, and pulled it on. “Seriously, though, we do need to talk, just to get everything out on the table. Last night was fun and all, but it’s not a good idea for it to happen again.”