Chapter 1 #2
“Fuck him,” Caren said. “You’ve got all these other people who love you. You’ve got an amazing support network, including all your cousins. Mind you, hopefully this big one stops choking you to death.”
Travis frowned at her again, but loosened his hold on Lacey. His cousin pretended to gasp for breath and he rolled his eyes.
Glancing up, he saw Gray moving toward them, a concerned look on his face. “About time he turned up, where has he been?”
“He was calling his mother,” she said. “She’s late.”
“No great loss,” Travis said, having met Gray’s mother a few times.
“Travis!” Lacey chided, looking around. “She is Gray’s mother. She’s a bit annoyed that we’re not doing some big society wedding so she’s being . . . difficult. And he didn’t really care whether she turned up, however, she was meant to bring Rory.”
Rory was one of Gray’s sisters. His other sister, Julia, was already here with her husband. He was an okay guy if you didn’t have to talk to him for more than two minutes. Then he’d chew your ear off about his job a plastic surgeon and it was boring as hell.
Rory was younger and quieter. Well, she might not have been quiet before she was kidnapped by the Latin Lothario, a stalker who had been using her to get to Lacey. He hadn’t known her back then.
Since then she’d been struggling.
“I thought Rory was doing better,” Travis said.
“She has been,” Lacey said.
“Lacey, are you all right? What happened?” Gray asked. “Hunter said you were on the phone and looking upset.”
“My prick of a dad has gone home. He doesn’t want to be part of the wedding. But it’s his loss,” Lacey said. “Because I am done with trying to get his love and attention and he’s the one who misses out.”
Gray blinked. “Wow. How long was I gone?”
Caren giggled and Gray smiled down at her. “How are you, Caren?” His voice was soft, almost tender. Why was he speaking to her like that? He couldn’t even know her that well.
Although he wouldn’t know what she was really like.
Caren had lived in a huge house with her very smart, successful parents.
She’d always acted like she was too good for them or something.
She’d never wanted to get her clothes dirty, used to whisper things to Lacey rather than speak out loud, and she’d once eaten the last piece of cake that his aunt had been saving for him.
Yeah, she’d been a strange kid that had grown into a stranger teenager. Then at around fifteen or sixteen, she’d disappeared and left Lacey in a state because she couldn’t even be bothered to say goodbye.
“I’m hunky-dory, thank you,” she told him.
Hunky-dory? Who said that?
Well, at least she spoke now. That was an improvement from when she was younger.
“That’s good. I take it you had something to do with Lacey’s attitude toward her loser of a father.”
“Hey, it could have been me,” Travis said with a scowl.
Gray shot him a look. “I doubt it.”
“I’m insulted by your lack of faith in me,” Travis told him.
Gray snorted. “I doubt that too.”
Asshole.
Travis sighed as he looked down at Lacey. “Honey, I’ve tried to tell you so many times over the years not to let him hurt you. You know that the only family you need is us, right?”
“And you have my family now,” Gray told her. “As much good as they are today.”
“How did it go with your mom? Is Rory okay?” Lacey asked.
Gray sighed, looking worried. “I think that Mom is actually making things worse. She’s well-meaning but she’s smothering Rory and feeding her fears.”
“We need to get Rory away from her,” Lacey said.
“Yeah,” Gray agreed. “But I don’t know how to do that. I think Rory needs normalcy. A job.”
“I need an assistant. Maybe she’d like to work for me,” Caren said.
“What do you do?” Travis asked.
“I’m a photographer,” she replied. “It might not be what Rory is interested in, though.”
“Thanks for the thought, I’m not sure she’d want to travel to the places you go to, though,” Gray told her.
The places she went to? What the hell did that mean? Where did she go as a photographer?
“Fair enough,” Caren said. “I’ll keep searching for an assistant. I’m not traveling out of the country until after New York, so another few months.”
“New York?” he repeated.
What the hell? She was going to New York? His territory?
“Oh, did you decide to go to New York?” Lacey asked. “Are you sure you want to?”
“Want to? No. Have to? Debatable. But I’m going anyway.”
Lacey threw her arms around her friend and hugged her tight.
What the hell was going on? Travis didn’t like when he didn’t know something. Although why he cared what was happening with this woman, he had no idea.
She’s a nuisance, remember?
You don’t like her.
Only, she was going to be in his neck of the woods.
It’s a big city.
You won’t even see her.
But why was she going there?
“Travis lives in New York,” Lacey told her. “Perhaps he can show you around.”
Like hell.
But as he opened his mouth to refuse, Caren shook her head. “I might not have been to New York for twenty years, but I think I’ll be all right on my own.”
A woman on her own in New York City? Was she crazy? Anything could happen to her!
“A lot has changed in twenty years,” he told her. “You need to be far more careful now. What area are you staying in? Does it have good security? Do you have personal security to carry on yourself at all times? Are you planning on taking public transportation?”
Everyone stared at him like he’d grown another head.
“What?” he snarled. “These are legitimate questions I’d ask any woman who was moving to New York on their own.”
“Right . . . well . . . I’m probably not moving there permanently. Maybe six months to a year. And I’m sure I’ll be fine.” She gave him a strange look.
“Caren’s traveled a lot and she’s used to taking care of herself,” Lacey told him, patting his arm. “But it’s really nice that you care so much.”
“I don’t.”
Shit. He wished he could take those words back as he saw a flash of pain on Caren’s face. That surprised him. He hadn’t thought that anything he’d say would hurt her. And she’d been the one to quickly reject the idea of him showing her around.
He’d also noticed that she still hadn’t told him what area she was staying in.
“Well, I better get to work,” Caren said into the awkward silence.
“You’re not here to work!” Lacey told her. “You’re here as my friend.”
“I’m still going to take some photos.” Caren winked at her. “I just can’t help myself. Especially with such a beautiful bride.”
Caren darted away through the crowd. Not that it was hard to follow her path. The woman stood out in a sea of muted beige, black, and blue.
Did orange and pink even go together?
Anyway, it was none of his business what she wore. Or that she was moving to a large city that she barely knew anymore.
At least he’d solved the question of why she was here. Obviously, she was the wedding photographer.
She better not fuck up the photos of his cousin’s big day.
“Stop scowling at Caren,” Lacey said, elbowing him in the ribs. “She’s going to think you don’t like her.”
“I don’t like her.”
“Travis!” Lacey scowled up at him. “Be nice.”
“Like she was when we were younger?” he retorted.
“She was just a kid. People change. And you don’t know everything that someone is going through.” There was a strange look on her face.
What did she mean by that? What had Caren gone through? She’d lived a charmed life, hadn’t she? She lived in a nice house, and had always wore expensive clothes.
“She left without a word,” he grumbled. “You were heartbroken for months.”
Lacey leaned the side of her face against his bicep. “Always looking out for me, aren’t you?”
“Of course. That’s what big cousins do.”
“I prefer to think of you as my big brother.” A look of sadness filled her face and he knew she was thinking about Brax.
But, fuck him.
He knew it was wrong to think that way about his cousin. He’d only been fifteen when he’d died. Still a kid. Travis shouldn’t hold him fully responsible for his actions. But he’d been reckless and stupid and his actions had ended his life.
And they’d hugely affected Lacey’s. She’d lived in the shadow of his death until she’d left home and gotten away from her toxic father.
“Yeah, I like the idea of that,” he told her, trying to hold back his emotion.
“So does that mean you’ll say yes?” she asked.
“Yes to what?” he asked suspiciously.
“To walking me down the aisle.”
“You want me to give you away?” he asked, shocked.
“Yeah. What do you say?”
He swallowed heavily, surprised as an even bigger swell of emotion hit him. “Yeah, honey. I’d be happy to walk you down the aisle. Not giving you away, though, because you’ll always be mine.”
“Of course I will be.” She wrapped her arms around his waist and he sent Gray a warning look.
If he did anything to hurt his cousin, he was a dead man. Instead of looking annoyed or angry, Gray just nodded in understanding.
He got what Travis was laying down.
Gray led Lacey away so they could talk to some other people who had arrived at the wedding dinner rehearsal.
Christ. He still didn’t get the point of all this.