Chapter 18
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
NAT
I was sure I wasn’t the first bride to be thinking about what my soon-to-be husband looked like when he came—flushed cheeks, parted lips, thick cock in hand as his eyes pinned me in place—but I wasn’t exactly a typical bride.
From the moment I’d walked in on Asher, I hadn’t been able to get the sight of him out of my head. Lying there, stomach muscles rippling, arms tight as he stroked himself faster and faster. And then when his eyes had locked on mine and he’d spilled himself across his stomach, I’d nearly come without so much as a flick across my clit.
One thing was for certain—I definitely hadn’t needed any blush today. My cheeks had been flushed from the moment I’d shut the door with a squeaked apology, and they hadn’t shown signs of letting up anytime soon.
The real question was, what the hell did we do now?
Not just after I’d stumbled in on him pleasuring himself—while saying my name, apparently—but there also was that kiss to contend with. We may have been able to plead ignorance prior to that, but now there was absolutely no denying the chemistry that crackled between us.
I wasn’t sure which was worse—being in a marriage with someone I wasn’t attracted to, or being in one with the best friend I absolutely was .
“Is it time to go now ?” June asked, barely restrained frustration echoing in her voice.
“Almost, Junebug,” Asher said. “You got on your dress pretty early. We won’t be leavin’ for a bit yet.”
“Actually, that might have changed,” I said as a text came in from my mom.
Asher glanced at me, the first time he’d made eye contact for more than a fleeting second since Cockgate, and raised a brow. “As long as it’s not you backin’ out on me, we can figure it out.”
I laughed and batted aside his concern. Surprisingly, the thought of not going through with it hadn’t even once entered my mind. But that was something I could unpack later. Right now, we had other things to deal with.
I turned my phone to face him and gestured to it. “My momma’s guilt-trippin’ us into coming over for pictures. What, since we didn’t care enough to invite her to the ceremony and all.”
Asher huffed out a laugh and rubbed a hand across his trimmed beard. “All right. If we’re gonna do that first, we better get a move on. How long till you’re ready?” he asked with a raised brow.
“All I need to do is put my dress on. But she’s ordered me not to do that either so it doesn’t get wrinkled. So…I guess I’m ready now? How about you? You thinkin’ about maybe cleanin’ up a bit?” I asked, somehow managing to keep a straight face even through my blatant lie.
He looked ridiculously hot in his dark jeans, vest, and a light gray button-down shirt rolled to his elbows, showcasing the toned forearms I hadn’t ever really paid much attention to before. But now, after seeing them flex as he’d pumped his cock mere hours prior, they would most definitely be starring in my nighttime fantasies. He’d left his hair loose like I loved, and I had the strongest urge to run my fingers through it. Gather a fistful just to guide his face close to mine.
“Thought I’d go like this,” he said with a shrug. “Hope it won’t be too much of a burden to say I do to someone who looks like a bum.”
“I’ll force myself to suffer through.”
“I appreciate that. We can leave as soon as Owen wakes up and swing by your parents’ on the way to the courthouse.”
No sooner had the words left his mouth than the monitor crackled with Owen’s happy, sleepy baby murmurs.
“I’ll pack the diaper bag,” I said, having no idea who the hell I’d become that that was now my first instinct.
“Already ahead of you, wifey.” He winked and gestured to where the diaper bag sat by the side door.
I ignored the way my stomach bottomed out before soaring thanks to the nickname that didn’t actually mean anything. And I absolutely didn’t watch him walk down the hallway toward Owen’s room, or admire the way his jeans hugged his ass, or bite my lip over his confident stride. Did not.
Getting everyone out of the house still wasn’t a speedy affair no matter how many times we’d done it, so it was almost an hour later before we walked into my parents’ house. My mom wasn’t exactly the kind of woman who’d let her guests show themselves in without a word—her Southern hospitality too ingrained for that—which was why it was so bizarre no one greeted us when we walked in the door.
I furrowed my brow, glancing around at the empty house. “Hello?”
“Nat, you’re here!” Momma said, overly loud, a bright smile on her face as she rounded the corner from the back of the house.
She strode toward us in a light gray skirt and a sleeveless navy-blue silk blouse, her heels clicking on the hardwoods—the woman didn’t know the meaning of loungewear.
“What’re you all dressed up for?” I asked. “You’re not aimin’ for an invite to the courthouse, right? It’s seriously not a big?—”
“No, no.” She waved me off. “Nothing like that. I just, um, have a meetin’ later with the historical committee.”
I narrowed my eyes. While it wasn’t unusual for her to have a meeting of that nature, it was unusual for her to stumble over her words. Something was off here—I just wasn’t sure what.
Before I could ask what the hell was going on, my mom grabbed June’s hand and spun the little girl around, the skirt flaring out around her.
“I’m so glad Ava’s old dress fit you,” Momma said, grinning down at June. “You look just like a princess!”
“I do?” June asked, awe in her voice as she stared down at herself with wide eyes.
“You most certainly do.”
June glanced back at me and Asher, a grin splitting her face. “I’m a princess today!”
“You’re definitely pretty enough to be one,” Asher said while expertly dodging Owen’s flailing arms.
“Why don’t you give me this one?” Momma said, grabbing Owen from Asher’s arms without waiting for the okay. “I’ll take the kids out back so you can get changed, Nat. Asher, would you mind stickin’ around in here in case she needs help? Plus, I’d like to get a shot of you two walkin’ outside, all right?”
Just like yesterday, she didn’t wait for a response before striding down the hallway toward the backyard, June’s hand clutched in hers as Owen grinned at us over her shoulder.
“Well, I guess we have our orders,” I said with an eye roll. Truthfully, it was a testament to how far I’d come that hearing something like that didn’t immediately send me fleeing in the opposite direction.
Normally, I wouldn’t think twice about dragging Asher upstairs and into my room while I changed, making him zip me up without question. But now, with this weighty attraction between us that had never been present before, I knew we stood on shaky ground, and making him watch me change probably wasn’t the smartest idea right before we were supposed to get fake-married.
Knowing we didn’t have much time, I shoved those thoughts out of my mind and stepped toward the main floor bathroom.
“I’ll just be a sec,” I said, holding the garment bag up so that it didn’t drag on the floor.
Last night, after an emergency call to Will’s best friend, Avery, with a plea to borrow a dress appropriate for a courthouse wedding—“Something nice, but not too nice. Dressy but still kind of funky. It is Nat, after all.”—my sister had dropped it off, and I hadn’t even unzipped the bag to peek.
It wasn’t like I had much choice in the matter. I hadn’t exactly brought wedding apparel with me to Argentina, and there hadn’t been time to swing by Portland to raid my closet when I’d dropped everything to fly home to Havenbrook. No matter the dress, I’d wear it because I didn’t have any intention of showing up to marry Asher looking like a bum while he looked like he stepped out of the pages of GQ .
I hung the dress on the hook at the back of the door before unzipping the garment bag and spreading it wide. My breath caught as I took it in. The dress was long and flowy, a mix of pale pink, lavender, and teal all woven together to look like unicorn cotton candy. The front plunged low—thank God my breasts were small enough that I wouldn’t need a bra, because there was no way I could wear one with this—the dress held up by tiny straps topped with draped cap sleeves.
I undressed, stripping down until I wore only a pair of pale-pink lace panties, all too aware that Asher was just on the other side of the door. I slipped the dress over my head, the soft fabric gliding over my body as if it were tailor-made for me. I zipped it as much as I could before accepting I wouldn’t be able to finish the job by myself.
I cracked open the door, and Asher’s head snapped up from where he stood, braced against the wall opposite me.
“You need help?” His voice was low as his gaze dropped, though I knew he couldn’t see anything since I stood just behind the door.
“Yeah, do you mind?” I asked, no idea why I sounded so damn breathy.
I opened the door the rest of the way and turned my back to him, holding in a shiver at the change in temperature when he stepped close. His fingers grazed a path up my spine as he secured the dress on me, and my nipples peaked at the featherlight touch.
Holding my breath, I watched him in the mirror, his chin tucked to his chest, eyes downcast as he kept his focus on his task at hand. When he’d fastened the zipper all the way, he lifted his gaze to meet mine in the mirror, that newly present electricity arcing between us.
After several silent beats, he finally said, “You’re gorgeous.”
And I couldn’t speak.
Couldn’t breathe.
Couldn’t do anything but stay snared in his gaze as he looked at me like I was everything. Like he wished he’d been taking this dress off me instead of putting it on. Like he wanted a replay of this morning, but without the interruption, just to see how far things would go. Like he wanted to kiss me again as a lead-up to a hell of a lot more.
I swallowed and tore my eyes away. “I bet you say that to all your almost-wives right before you’re about to get fake-married.”
He laughed, a low, throaty sound, his breath gusting across my bare shoulders. “You caught me.”
“Knew it.”
“I know you were kiddin’, but I need you to know I wouldn’t be doin’ this with anyone but you, Nat.” His eyes bored into mine, and I read every ounce of sincerity he’d intended in the look.
Licking my lips, I nodded. “I know. Same goes.”
His mouth ticked up at the side. “You ready?”
I took a deep breath, pressing my hand to my stomach that had, for some ungodly reason, become infested with butterflies, and nodded. “As I’ll ever be.”
He stepped back and offered me his hand, smiling when I interlocked our fingers. With how long we’d been friends, I’d been on the receiving end of his smiles thousands of times, which meant there was no reason for my stomach to flip like it was. It was probably nerves. This was a big day—real or not—made all the more so thanks to my mom’s insistence on us showing up there first.
“I shouldn’t be surprised my momma wanted us to take pictures, but I’m gonna feel like an idiot out there smilin’ when we both know this isn’t…” My words trailed off as we stepped outside, my brain not quite comprehending what I was seeing.
“What the fuck,” Asher breathed just loud enough for me to hear.
Well, that was good. At least now I knew I wasn’t having some sort of psychotic break where I imagined an intimate wedding wonderland in my parents’ already immaculate backyard. A backyard that, just yesterday, had been totally and completely normal.
Now, though, it’d been transformed into something out of the pages of a magazine. Strings of bulbed white lights hung across the pergola above the deck, as well as throughout the plethora of trees on the property as far back as I could see—hundreds…maybe thousands of them.
Will and Finn, Mac and Hudson, Nash, my nieces, as well as my parents and Gran, sat in the scattered white folding chairs.
“Where’s Rory?” I asked Asher, because, yeah, that was what really mattered right now.
“Right here,” my sister said from my left and thrust a bouquet of wild flowers into my hand. “Just go with it. There wasn’t any way we were talkin’ Momma out of it.”
“Out of what ?”
“All of it.”
“I—” I shook my head. “How did you pull this together?” I asked in awe, but I had no idea why I’d even posed the question.
Of course, they’d pulled it together—I was dealing with Mac, the mayor, Will, Havenbrook’s event coordinator, and Rory, an interior designer.
June stood next to my momma, who held Owen, a grin splitting the little girl’s face as she waved to me and Asher. “I did the flowers, Uncle Asher! All by myself!”
She jumped and pointed to the petal-strewn path that led to an ivy-covered arch where Edna, Gran’s best friend and Havenbrook’s mail carrier and general troublemaker, stood, a grin across her mouth.
“What the hell is Edna doin’ standin’ there like she’s a minister? Are we dreamin’?” I whispered, squeezing Asher’s hand, if for nothing else than to ground myself.
“Feels like we might be.”
“Well, don’t just stand here,” Rory said, giving me a little push. “Get a move on.”
“Wait,” I said, shaking my head. “Get a move on for what ?”
“Now, don’t be mad, sweetheart,” Momma said. “After all this time with y’all as best friends, we just didn’t think it was right that you were gonna go and have a quick wedding at the courthouse without any of your family there.”
Guilt punctured my stomach, and I slid a glance to Asher out of the corner of my eye, his look mirroring mine.
“Oh, don’t look at him like that,” Momma said. “We just wanted to do something nice for y’all.”
“But…” I stalled, trying to come up with a plausible reason we couldn’t have our very fake marriage come from this very real wedding. “We have an appointment at the courthouse.”
“I took care of that,” Mac said, waving a hand through the air.
I breathed out a laugh. Of course she did. So, I’d kill my sister later, then. “Um, okay, well, we also don’t have anyone here to marry us.”
“I beg your pardon,” Edna said with a sniff. “I got myself ordained on the interwebs last year. Now, if you don’t mind, kids, I’d like to get this show on the road. I was promised there’d be food and booze as payment.”
“The fewer questions, the better,” Rory said as she strolled toward the empty seat next to Nash, who glanced back at us with raised eyebrows and a slight shrug as if to say, might as well go with it .
“What do you say?” Asher squeezed my hand and met my gaze. “You ready to get married?”