Chapter 5 Wedding Bells #2
“You mean you’ve moved on from Aurelie? Just when I thought her concrete ‘no-way-in-hell-Steve’ was starting to crack.
She’s gonna be heartbroken.” Paige teased him about Aurelie, her best friend and Steve’s longtime crush.
Steve was relentless in his pursuit of her when Aurelie had first moved to town.
Aurelie wasn’t dumb, though. She knew trouble when she saw it, and Steve was most definitely trouble.
“Nah, it’s always been you, doll. I want to make Owen jealous for stealing the most beautiful girl in Banberry from me.
Save that dance?” Paige’s cheeks flushed with heat, turning a deep crimson.
She’d always had an innocent crush on Steve, and he pandered to it, which made Brad crazy.
Luckily, Owen was a good guy and knew his wife well enough to understand he had as much of a chance at roping a bull in the rodeo nationals as he did taming all his wife’s crushes on men and travel destinations alike.
He’d known he was marrying a wild woman, but he also knew she’d always love only him.
It gave Brad hope that there was someone for him out there.
“Will do. Now hide my brother for the next hour. My mom’s on a rampage, but I don’t think she’ll show here.”
“You got it,” Steve said, leaning in to kiss Paige once on each cheek. She turned away with a silly grin on her face. Brad slugged Steve on the shoulder.
“What?” Steve asked.
“You know. Now, be a good date and get me to the bar.”
“Yes, sir,” Steve said, winking at Brad. “Your sister’s still hot though, dude. I can’t help myself.”
“Go. Now.”
Steve took the reins, sliding in next to two extremely attractive women. Of course. In the three seconds it took Brad to squeeze in next to Steve, his friend was already shaking the girls’ hands, introducing himself and Brad. At least they looked to be around the guys’ ages.
Brad waved at the women without really looking at them. From the corner of his eye he caught small groups of people pausing their conversations and pointing, trying and failing to be discreet. Whether the talk was his career success or personal failure—or both—he wasn’t sure.
He ordered a beer when the bartender came around. Steve could handle talking to the two women while Brad nursed his feelings and a drink. The idea of a wingman now seemed as ludicrous as coming to the wedding in the first place.
“Brad,” someone said, drawing him out of his self-imposed exile. It was one of the women, who looked familiar. Someone he’d known when he was younger, but… how? “It’s good to see you again.”
Her cheeks were rosy, her smile bright and full.
That was nothing compared to what he could see of her figure.
The bar was crowded, making it hard to sneak a peek without being obvious, but man, she had curves in all the right places, he could see that much.
She smiled at him in a way that made him nervous, but not the same type of nervous he had been coming into this wedding.
A thrill of excitement and passion surged through his veins, and damn if he couldn’t recall the last time that’d happened to him.
She had long brown hair with loose curls that, for some inexplicable reason, he had the sudden uncontrollable desire to run his fingers through.
He tried to reply to her, but the words caught in his throat.
He coughed and tried again. Words were never this hard for him—they were usually his strong suit.
“Hi.” Hi? That was the best he could do? Jesus.
Steve checked him with his hip, apparently listening in enough to catch what an ass Brad was making of himself. He was acting like a fool, but he couldn’t help it.
“Um, I’m not sure if you remember me, but I was one of Julia’s roommates in college. Just for a semester, though. I met you at one of her parties Freshman year.”
That’s where he knew her. It all came back to him—her hair was much longer now, and if he remembered right, she used to have glasses. Sophie.
“It’s Sophie, right?”
Her eyes—a beautiful, deep, chocolate brown—brightened and her smile widened.
“Yeah. Wow, I can’t believe you remembered. It’s good to see you again.”
She moved out of the crowded line of people bellying up to the bar, carrying a long-neck beer bottle, and ended up shoulder to shoulder with Brad.
He inhaled, suddenly aware of his own body in a way he hadn’t been in a while.
Sophie smelled of plumeria, one of his favorite smells from childhood.
His mom insisted on growing a small plumeria plant in their home, despite living in western Montana, which wasn’t exactly prime growing weather for the tropical plants.
It was somehow still thriving, despite the frigid chill that had infiltrated the farmhouse.
“You, too,” he said, his voice almost a whisper.
Steve hip-checked him again, this time sending him toppling into Sophie, who caught him in her arms, their faces centimeters away from each other.
“Sorry,” he muttered, wishing it was at all appropriate for him to slug Steve in the arm.
But as he extracted himself from Sophie’s embrace, his body tingled where it had collided with hers, a feeling that sent goose bumps shooting across the rest of his skin.
“So,” Sophie said, breaking the awkward tension, “where have you been since college? Tell me everything. You were an English major, weren’t you?”
Wow. How did she remember that?
“I was, yeah. I taught high school for a while, then went back for my master’s in fiction. Since I taught as a graduate student, they offered me a full-time lecturer position in the department when I graduated. I was there until just recently, actually.”
“Oh no, why’d you leave?” Sophie’s eyebrows were pulled up in legitimate concern.
It dawned on Brad that the way she’d asked him meant she had no idea who he was now, what he’d accomplished. Which meant… she wasn’t just talking to him because he was Banberry’s newest rising star.
“Well, I got picked up for a book series, so I figured I should concentrate on that for a while.” He left it at that, not wanting to sound like he was bragging about his success.
“That’s incredible. What do you write?” Sophie had her elbow on the bar, her chin in her hand, intently looking at him like he was her star already.
Suddenly, it was as if all the other people in the room, including Steve and the woman he was talking to, faded away.
He found himself wanting to tell her everything and in turn find out everything he could about her.
He also realized that he’d seen her before, recently.
Again, though, he couldn’t figure out where.
“I’ve shifted my focus recently. I used to write literary fiction, you know, the kind that’s only printed in obscure journals, but I dunno what happened.
I decided one day that wasn’t fun anymore, not especially when I had to grade lit fic from my students.
So I’ve been writing campy crime novels ever since.
I’m actually in the middle of the fifth book in a six-book series.
It was in the local paper,” he added, regretting it as soon as he had.
Now he sounded like a pompous ass. When he mentioned the paper, though, a newspaper cover image flashed across his subconscious.
Oh, yeah, that’s where he’s seen her recently.
“But hey, didn’t I see you in the Times a few months ago?
Something about you and some guy as a power couple?
” He held his breath as he waited to hear her answer.
Please be single.
“Um, you did. But it’s not relevant anymore.
We broke up.” Brad exhaled slowly. He could have skipped laps around the bar.
“That’s pretty fantastic about your books, if you ask me.
” She changed the subject. “Is any of it published so I can get a hold of it? I’m secretly into campy crime novels—it makes me forget work drudgery and just have fun with the whodunit.
I feel bad I haven’t heard of yours, but truthfully, the day job doesn’t really allow for much outside reading.
” Her hand rested on his arm, and his pulse raced at the gesture.
“Yeah, well, um, you can find the first three books on or in bookstores and the others are close behind it. The first is called The Treaty Bargain, part of the Jewel Thief series. But, um, what’s the day job?
I mean, what are you up to now?” he asked, wanting the attention off of him.
He longed to hear her talk, and wished she’d never stop touching his arm like she was right then.
As if he jinxed himself, Sophie took her hand from his arm and ran her fingers through her hair, letting the bouncy tendrils rest on her shoulder.
His gaze followed her every movement, and it was then he noticed Sophie wore a strapless black lace dress that went to just above her knees.
Her thighs were toned but somehow still curvy, and the same applied to her hips, her stomach, her shoulders.
She was strong and sexy—naturally beautiful—whereas Julia had been more concerned with things like her hair and makeup and nails.
God, how had this woman escaped his vision in college?
Most likely because he’d only had eyes for Julia.
Yet another example of what a waste that had been in other ways now.
Who knew what opportunities he’d missed by perpetually trying to keep her happy.
Brad took a long pull from his beer, never taking his eyes off Sophie.
“I’m a lawyer. Well, I was a lawyer. Actually, I guess I still am, just an unemployed one at the moment.”
“I’m sorry to hear that. Did you do trials and all that?”