Chapter 18
38 hours until the wedding
There’s a small stage behind our table where a band picks up their instruments.
The first song is morose and thick with emotion—something about a woman whose lover has left for battle—but since I’m not exactly fluent in the Scottish brogue, I only catch about twenty-five percent of the lyrics.
The next song is lively and the crowd claps along as the fiddler plucks the strings with a surgeon’s precision. I’m a little (okay, a lot) tipsy from the Scotch and I sway back and forth to music in a happy, drunken stupor.
As the song ramps up, people pair off and begin to dance, bodies bouncing through the jaunty notes.
“Want to dance?” Jack asks, holding out his hand to me.
I look down at his outstretched palm, and I’m briefly reminded of my earlier resolution to create more space between us. But now, several drinks in, with my resolve weaker and my inhibitions lower, I take his hand.
As he leads me away from the table, cutting a path toward the band, the churning crowd presses against us, sending me right into Jack’s chest. He grips my waist, steadying me.
“You okay?” he asks, dropping his mouth to my ear, where hot breath tickles my skin. I nod as my stomach fights a series of roller-coaster-style dips that don’t have anything to do with the Scotch.
The beat picks up and his fingers fold around me, pulling my body flush against his. My chest flutters from the closeness.
We rock back and forth, swaying outside the beat until he catches my eye and we both laugh, aware that neither of us has any idea what we’re doing.
“I don’t know the steps,” I admit.
“Me either. We’ll have to make them up.”
We turn and spin until I’m dizzy and laughing and not entirely sure which way is up. But what I am sure of is that I like Jack’s hands on my waist. I like our bodies pressed together. I like it a lot.
I wait for thoughts of caution reminding me that this isn’t a good idea, that we shouldn’t be so close, but they don’t come. Instead, alcohol pumps through me, clouding over the rational part of my brain, blurring out any earlier resolutions I might have made.
I’m no longer thinking, just feeling. Feeling his fingers skating along the band of my jeans and the tantalizing way his knee parts my thighs, gently coaxing them apart.
We’re close enough that I can count every freckle on his chin, every crease in his forehead, and I find myself wondering how many hours I’d spend in front of a canvas trying to get the shade of his mouth just right. How it would feel to press my lips to his. To taste him. To have his scent draped over me like a blanket.
He’s saying something, and by the way his eyes flash, I know it’s supposed to make me laugh, but I can’t focus. I can’t hear anything except the crescendo of my racing pulse.
I fake a laugh, pretending to have heard what he just said, but Jack knows me too well.
“Ada?”
“Hmm?”
“You okay?”
No. No I’m not okay.
“Just dizzy,” I lie.
Searching eyes fall heavily on mine, then lower, dropping to my mouth. I’m not sure who leans in first. Maybe it’s him. Or maybe it’s me. But his day-old scruff brushes against my jawline, and everything slows to an exaggerated pace, distorted and warped like it’s happening inside a fishbowl. Even the music has dulled to a low thump in the background.
I wait for one of us to pull back, to acknowledge that we’re way too close, touching in too many places, but I don’t move. And neither does he. Instead, we linger, lips hovering centimeters apart, close enough that it’s hard to tell which shaky exhale is mine and which is his.
He shifts nearer, lips grazing my cheek, and I wonder with almost feverish desperation if we’re going to kiss. Or if we’ll float in this decadent purgatory forever. But just as my heart crawls into my throat with anticipation, the music stops, and the moment expires with it.
A round of applause breaks out around us, but neither of us pull away. We stand there blinking and immobile like the lights have just come back on in the movie theater and we’re unsure how to reenter reality.
But even though we’ve stopped moving, it feels like we’re still spinning. Or maybe like the room itself is spinning.
My first thought is that I’m dizzy from dancing, but then my stomach rolls and all thoughts of Jack and his mouth instantly disappear as I bend at the knees, overcome by a wave of nausea.
Jack places a protective hand on my lower back. “Ada? What’s wrong?”
“I don’t feel good,” I tell him.
“Let me get you some water.”
But I don’t have time to wait for water, because I feel the Scotch about to make a reappearance. I turn on my heels and elbow my way through the crowd. My feet scrape against the sticky wood floor, followed by desperate hands pushing open the door. As soon as I’m outside, my mouth stretches wide, accepting deep gulps of cool air.
I must have drunk more than I thought. Probably because I was distracted. Jack Houghton is officially a health hazard.
“Ada?” I open my eyes. Jack is standing in front of me, face clouded with worry. “Your face is green.”
Great. Green isn’t my color.
My insides lurch, and I put my hands on my knees, waiting for the inevitable. One shaky breath later, the contents of my stomach empty out all over the concrete.
Jack pulls my hair from my face, while his other hand rests on my lower back, rubbing in slow circles. “You’re okay,” he whispers.
My eyes burn and my legs wobble and I stumble, falling clumsily into his chest. “I’m sorry,” I whisper. “I drank too much.”
“There’s nothing to apologize for.” His arms wrap around me, pulling me into his warm chest.
I nod helplessly, eyes welling with tears. I don’t really know what I’m crying for—if it’s shame or disappointment or the overwhelming surge of every repressed feeling I’ve tried to pack away over the last few days—but suddenly it’s all frothing toward the surface, spilling down my cheeks in thick, wet streaks.
The rhythmic tempo of Jack’s hand stroking my back stops, and I worry I’ve officially scared him off. But then he leans in, close enough that his stubble scrapes my cheek, and says in a voice so soft and gentle it comes out more like a whisper, “Come on, let’s get you to bed.”
“Jack—” I start to say, but before I can protest, he scoops me up in his arms, cradling me against his chest, and carries me away.