Chapter 29
Liam stepped out of the shower into a cloud of steam, the rivulets of water tracing down his skin as he reached for a towel and scrubbed it over his face and hair.
He hadn’t fully realized what a circus the night would become when he’d agreed to come to Hope Falls’ version of My Big Fat Greek Wedding.
Maybe he should’ve, he’d heard Frankie talk about her family gatherings, but hearing about the legend that was the Costas Clan and experiencing them were two different things.
He was fairly certain only experience could have prepared him for the evening’s trajectory.
He patted his face dry and frowned at the bright red patch of fresh blood on the white terry cloth towel.
His hand swiped the frosted mirror. He leaned forward to get a better look at the bridge of his nose, which had had an up close and personal meeting with Aunt Joanna’s fist. He’d committed the mortal sin of attempting to steady Athena, one of Frankie’s cousin’s, on the dance floor when she was, at least, four drinks past her limit.
His efforts were rewarded with her projectile vomiting all over his chest and torso, which Aunt Joanna slipped in, resulting in what Liam was coining her Three Stooges arm flail.
Her windmill embodied Larry, Moe, and Curly, and she nailed him with a left hook that would’ve made Joe Frazier proud.
The real agony of the evening had nothing to do with bloody noses or ruined dress shirts.
What made Liam’s ribs ache—literally, as if a heavy object pressed against them—was how close he came to breaking every rule of decency and family loyalty.
How many times had he caught himself reaching for Frankie whenever she was within arm’s length?
How many times had he watched her through the thicket of gowns and black ties, just to catch a brief glimpse of her eyes to see if she was looking at him the way she did when they were alone?
It was a kind of torment he’d never experienced, not even in med school, not in the military, not even in residency when fellow students joked that they were being pushed to their mental, physical, and emotional limits and likened their sleep deprivation to waterboarding and other forms of torture.
He’d deluded himself into believing that he and Frankie could just be “normal” around each other.
That he could stand across from her at the altar, walk down the aisle with her after his father kissed his bride, be next to her to take photos, or seated beside her as they toasted the newlyweds without feeling like a live wire of electricity in a rainstorm buzzed between them.
How na?ve could he be?
The wedding had been a procession of near misses.
The way Frankie’s shoulder brushed his as they lined up for the wedding party photos.
The melodic tinkling of her laughter across the table during the dinner, like wind chimes during a blustery day.
The moment she nearly dropped the champagne flute, and, in the half-second of chaos, he’d caught her wrist and steadied her, only for him to freeze and look away because the alternative was too dangerous.
He couldn’t permit himself to be close to her for more than a handful of seconds, and yet every primal instinct in his body was driving him to be as near her as physically possible, to make her laugh so hard her head fell back so he could press his lips to the hollow beneath her ear and say something that would make her blush and swat his arm and then kiss him with the same fire she had in her eyes.
Liam had spent the last three hours clenching his jaw, counting backward from a hundred, and pretending he was fine.
He was not fine. He was the exact opposite of fine, actually, and every time he caught a whiff of her perfume or heard her voice from across the room, it was like being stabbed with a very tiny, very sharp knife.
Watching her after the cake was cut as she licked the frosting off her lips, it was pure torment not being able to walk over and kiss her.
As much as he wasn’t a fan of getting punched, it had been a relief to have an excuse to leave the wedding early.
It was obscene how much he missed her when she was right next to him.
It was also obscene how close he was getting to not caring if he caused a family scandal.
Because this was supposed to be his dad’s and Frankie’s mom’s day, not a crucible for his own bad decisions.
He’d gone along with pretending Tristan and Frankie were still engaged.
He’d stayed silently on the sidelines because it was important to her to keep whatever was between them a secret, at least for now.
And now there was Zion. He still didn’t know what the story was there, and honestly, he didn’t give a shit, not until Frankie told him otherwise.
As far as he knew, they’d only ever just been friends.
No matter what anyone told him, he couldn’t believe that she’d gone from his bed, telling him that she loved him, to being in a full-blown relationship with another man by the afternoon.
As he continued to dry off, he could hear the patter of rain getting louder outside, the kind that slicked the pine needles and turned the gravel driveway to mud.
It had been drizzling when he made the trek from the hall to the cabin nearly thirty minutes ago, but now it sounded like it was really coming down.
He hadn’t planned to use the cabin his dad had reserved for him at all tonight.
But after being puked on, he decided to come and get cleaned up so his Range Rover didn’t stink like vomit for the foreseeable future.
His clothes were getting dry cleaned by the resort.
He’d grabbed his duffle bag out of his SUV.
That was one benefit of being a doctor, he typically had a change of clothes with him as well as toiletries.
Now, standing in the humidity of the bathroom, he wondered if he was actually losing his mind.
He’d spent the last half hour replaying the night on a loop, scrutinizing every look, every word he’d shared with Frankie, and he felt the urge to drive his fist through the drywall.
He resisted, barely. Kept a polite distance.
He exhaled, a long, shaky breath, as he popped the top off of his Degree deodorant and spread it under his arms.
As he set the stick back down, a sharp, insistent knock at the door made him jerk his head to the side.
His clothes were being delivered to his house, so the only person it could be was Poppy, possibly annoyed that he’d left the festivities early, or maybe worried about the graphic bodily fluid mess he’d been involved in and upset she’d had to have heard about it secondhand.
The offense occurred when she was talking to Frankie and Zion, so he hadn’t spoken to her before he left.
He’d told AJ to let her know he was leaving, and AJ had offered to drive her home, which he assumed she’d be happy about.
Hell, he was basically being her wingman, or wing-brother.
Still, Poppy wasn’t exactly the poster child for emotional stability, and Liam could already imagine her barreling into the cabin, demanding to know if he was okay and making sure his nose was not broken. She did tend to be overprotective of him despite him being the older brother.
With a sigh, he ran a hand through his damp hair, wrapped the towel tighter around his waist, and started for the door. Before he made it two steps, the knock came again, harder this time, rattling the window beside the front entry.
He unlocked and swung open the door, fully expecting to see Poppy’s small, furious face.
Instead, he found himself blinking down at Frankie, standing on the porch with her arm lifted to pound on the door once more, fingers clenched in a fist, and knuckles white.
Her eye makeup was smudged to a smoky haze, causing her to somehow look ridiculously beautiful and slightly unhinged.
Neither of them said anything right away, they just stared.
For a beat, he stood there in shock, mouth open, brain blank, no words forming.
He registered the surprise on her face, the way her eyes flicked up and down his bare chest, the towel, then past him to the damp footprints he’d tracked across the pine floor behind him.
Rain dripped from the tip of her nose and beaded on her lashes, and he was suddenly, acutely aware of the way the porch lamp’s light haloed around her, making her look like she was glowing and angelic.
He reached out to pull her inside, but before he could, Frankie bulldozed past him without warning, nearly knocking him off balance. She stormed into the cabin and circled around in the middle of the kitchenette area before heading to the closet.
"Who the fuck is in here?" she demanded, marching straight into the bathroom, checking behind the door, then back out as she rephrased. “Who was here?”
“What?” he asked, confused at what was going on.
She stalked up to him, so close he could feel her breath fan against his bare chest. "Who. Is. She?”
It took a second for his brain to catch up.
He saw the scene through her eyes. The towel, the bare chest, the still-wet hair.
The utter lack of clothing—suddenly he understood.
She thought he’d hooked up with someone.
The thought was so absurd, so off-the-rails, that he almost laughed, but the look on Frankie’s face extinguished any humor before it could reach his mouth.
He took a step back, feeling defensive at her accusation. "Seriously?! That’s what you think I’m doing? You think I brought someone back here and fucked them?”