Chapter 29
PAIGE
Nora, Amber and I set up by the pool. It’s all thanks to them, truly. Nora apparently called in some favors, and now we have string lights set up over the pool and cocktails decorating the nearby table. Music plays from a portable speaker.
“I know it’s not a real wedding,” Nora says while pouring Bellinis, “but that’s not an excuse to not celebrate.”
“We like celebrating,” Amber adds. She has long, reddish hair and a wide smile. West’s younger sister, and always quick with a joke.
I look between them. “The others coming tonight think it’s real. We have to make sure they keep thinking that.”
“We’ll play along,” Nora says. Everything with her has felt so delightfully easy, when nothing with her brother ever has.
“I’m a fantastic actress,” Amber says.
That makes me laugh. “Thanks. It’s frustrating, but the will that regulates my shares… well, there’s a clause in it. I get an additional ten percent when I marry the ‘love of my life.’”
“Wills,” Nora says with a sigh. “That’s why West and I are getting married this September.”
“Really?”
“Well, it’s not the only reason.” Her cheeks flush. “But he has a similar clause for the trust of his family estate. So we sped up the process a little while we work on getting it dissolved for future generations.”
“Congratulations!” I say. They’re clearly in love, too. I saw the way he looked at her at dinner.
Her smile widens. “I thought I’d be the first to get married in my family, but then Rafe beat me to it.”
“Don’t worry about it,” I say. “Ours doesn’t really count. You’ll be the first.”
We finish setting up, and my nerves relax with each passed joke. The guests arrive by boat. Leelyn was so excited when I mentioned Nora’s bachelorette party idea, and she brought Sylvie, of course, as well as a few other designer friends I’ve met over the past week.
Amber managed to find a veil somewhere and pins it to my head. “Perfection,” she says.
I was worried it wouldn’t flow. But it does, all the women getting along. Several brought games and we end up in a heated discussion about bachelorette party traditions.
“I tried to tell her,” Leelyn says, looking at Sylvie. “We should have ordered something dick-shaped, because that’s such a bachelorette thing! We could have done a cake! Or… or… cupcakes!”
“I refused,” Sylvie says. She’s leaned back in her chair, cigarette in her left hand. “I do not accept visible penises in my vicinity. Non. They’re not chic.” She blows out smoke in the opposite direction. “I have to deal with invisible ones most days. In meetings, out in public. That’s enough.”
“You’re very brave,” Nora says, smiling at Sylvie.
“Thank you, chérie. I know.”
“But at least we have drinks, and that’s the most important thing for a bachelorette party,” Amber says. “How about ten questions for the bride and a shot for every one you get wrong?”
“So potentially ten shots? I’ll be swimming in the fountain again!” I say. My head is spinning already, in that pleasurable way, and I’m having more fun than I expected with a group of women who were all strangers to me just weeks ago.
Tomorrow, I have to be perfect.
But tonight I can be human.
“You swam in the fountain?” Nora asks.
“Are there pictures?” Amber chimes in.
Leelyn nearly rises from her seat in excitement. “You should have seen Raphael. He was furious. It was delicious!”
Amber laughs so hard she has to wipe tears from her eyes. Nora looks at me with an expression so full of shock that it makes me smile in genuine fondness.
“I’m sorry. Is that considered desecration?” I ask her.
“No. It’s a fountain, not a grave.” Her face slowly splits into a smile. “Wow. My brother really had no idea what he was getting himself into with you, did he?”
It’s the closest she’s gotten to accidentally spilling the truth in front of our audience, but I can’t seem to find it in me to care. I shake my head instead. “I don’t think so, no.”
We play games, but thankfully I don’t have to answer any questions about Rafe. I’d fail most of them if I had to. Eventually, Leelyn reaches into a giant bag she brought.
“We have something for you,” she tells me, and sets a glossy burgundy box on the table. I open it slowly, to the delighted cheers of the guests.
It’s a lingerie set.
It’s deep red and luxuriously lacy. They ooh and ahh when I lift out the matching bra and the thong. Beneath them is a red robe with lace cuffs. There’s a pair of knee-high stockings too, complete with garters.
“This is beautiful,” Nora says. “Is the robe silk?”
“Of course it is, chérie,” Sylvie says. “We’ll get you a set for your wedding as well.”
Nora gives the older woman a smile. Of course. They’ve known each other for years. The Montclairs and their designers.
“You should put it on,” Amber calls from across the table.
“Yes, yes, you must!”
I look around the table, at the fascinating, diverse group of women here tonight. The languages and the glamour, the Aperol spritzes and the glittering pool. And the drinking games that transcend all of that.
I love the taste of debauchery in the air.
“Put it on, put it on!”
I clutch the box to my chest. “Your demands have been heard. I’ll give it a whirl.”
The girls cheer as I walk toward the house. The French doors are open and I head into one of the downstairs bathrooms. From upstairs I can hear loud music playing where Rafe and his friends have kicked things off.
It doesn’t sound like Bach.
His friends are terrifying too, in their way. I looked them up online earlier. One of them is a duke. A duke! I never thought I’d meet one. He seems the most reserved of them all, with blond hair and icy eyes.
Alex is the opposite. Broad smiles, auburn hair, and a Scottish accent. My little internet search told me he owns and runs a big whiskey company. He seems easy to get along with.
West too, to a certain extent. He’s polite and handsome, with a last name I recognized immediately. His is a legendary American family.
Of course the members of Rafe’s closest circle are all as impressive as him.
In the bathroom, I slip out of my white dress and put on the delicate lace and long stockings. It’s shockingly beautiful craftsmanship. I’ve never worn anything so fine. I pull on the robe, and it falls around me like a cape.
In the mirror, I look like someone else. I’ve never worn fancy lingerie. I’m a cotton thong and t-shirt bra kind of girl. Sportswear and boat shoes.
But it fits well, and it looks…
Decadent.
Indecent.
I head out of the bathroom and walk through the living room, my fingers tapping along to the music.
But I come to a stop in the kitchen.
Rafe is standing by the counter. He’s got two bottles of champagne beneath an arm, turned to leave. But then he sees me.
He goes very still. His eyes look down at my body, lingering on the exposed skin. Just like they did yesterday when I was topless. There’s power in having one of the most powerful people in the world wanting you. Even if he won’t admit it to himself.
Or to me.
“Having fun?” I ask him.
The top three buttons of his shirt are undone, and his hair is a bit mussed. There’s more color in his cheeks than usual. He looks alive, and good, and handsome.
“Not as much fun as you, clearly. What are you wearing?” he asks.
“It was a gift from the girls.” I part the silk robe, giving him a look at the thong and the lacy stockings. “Like it?”
He sets the bottles down. “You’re wearing that?”
“They dared me to try it on.” I run my hand along the counter and take a few steps closer. “Are you enjoying your Beethoven? Reciting Latin with your friends?”
He shakes his head slowly, and those green eyes flash. He says something in rolling Italian that I can’t understand.
My smile slips. “Stop doing that.”
“Doing what?”
“I can’t understand you.”
“Then learn to,” he says, completely unrepentant. “Don’t drink too much before tomorrow.”
“That’s not what you said.”
He lifts an eyebrow. “Wasn’t it?”
I tap my fingers against the marble. There’s a pulsing beneath my breastbone, like its pounding in time with the music. I shouldn’t want to talk to him. Shouldn’t want him to want me.
And yet here I am, like a moth to a flame. “I hope you kiss me better tomorrow. In front of all those people.”
“Kiss you better? I kissed you just fine the other night.”
“It was like a handshake,” I say, “at the end of a meeting. It was pathetic.”
“Pathetic,” he repeats. There’s a curve to his lips, the dimple showing.
“Yes. You were holding back, and I think an audience will be able to tell.” I tilt my head and feel like the most powerful woman alive. “I think you’re afraid you’ll like it if you kiss me properly.”
“You’re the one daring me to kiss you, darling.” His eyes are on mine, and from upstairs, I hear a muffled crash. Are they destroying the pool table?
“I’m daring you to?”
“Calling a man’s kiss pathetic is a challenge, no doubt about it.” He takes a step closer, and the buzzing inside my chest slows into the pulse of liquid honey.
“I’m not touching you until I have to,” I say.
“Right. Because you’re afraid you’d like it if I kissed you like a real wife and not a fake one.” His eyes dip down, skimming my mouth.
“Over a hundred people will be watching tomorrow,” I say.
“I know. I’ve reviewed the guest list.” There’s a looseness to him that I’ve never seen before. “Maybe you’re right. I didn’t kiss you properly last time.”
“I just told you that you didn’t.”
“Paige,” he says, and this time his smile looks crooked, and real, and it makes my stomach tighten. He almost never uses my name. “Do you ever shut up?”
My lips part. “You’re rude.”
“So are you.”
“Only to you.”
“Funny,” he says, and there’s so little space in this kitchen, like the walls are conspiring to keep us close. “It’s the same for me. Like you bring out the worst in me.”
His hand comes up to tip my head back, fingers brushing beneath my chin. “Right back at you,” I say. “All I’m saying is… you could use some practice.”
His lips curve again. He’s smiled more in the last few minutes than he has in the weeks I’ve known him, and damn him, it’s throwing me off.
“Darling, if you think I’ll back down from a challenge, you haven’t been paying attention.” He dips his head, lips only an inch from mine. There’s a faint buzzing sound in my head. “If you bite me,” he murmurs, “remember that I bite back.”
He kisses me.
It’s soft and warm and skilled, like it was the last time. But then his fingers slide back to cup my face, and he tips my chin back, and his mouth grows firmer.
Oh, I think, as he kisses me with strong lips and lazy confidence. He’s not bad at this.
I wish he was.
But he’s not. He kisses me like he’s been thinking about this.
Like he already knows I like it. I find the fabric of his shirt to hold on to.
He tastes warm and clean and just faintly of whiskey, and the buzzing in my head is gone.
It’s quiet, blissfully quiet, and my thumbs brush against the warmth of his chest.
The chest that I’ve seen in excruciating detail. Run my oil-covered hands over.
Rafe deepens the kiss, his tongue brushing against mine in a single sweep, and something drops out beneath me. He groans against my lips and pulls me tighter against his body.
Like he’s taking exactly what he wants.
Shivers rise over my bare skin. My nipples pebble against his chest, through the thin lace bra. I find his lower lip with my teeth, wanting more, but he pulls back an inch.
“I told you, no biting.” His voice is husky, and he dips his head again, because that won’t stop him. Of course it won’t stop him.
Both of us have fangs.
“Rafe, man. You’ve been gone—Oh.” A loud Scottish voice sounds out nearby. Rafe lifts his head, but he doesn’t drop his hands. His pupils are blown wide.
“I’ll be back,” he calls over his shoulder.
I meet Alex’s gaze. The auburn-haired Scottish friend. “Take your time,” he tells us, grinning. He disappears back down the hallway.
Rafe runs a thumb over my cheek and brushes it over my lip. “Look at you, being so well-behaved,” he says. “You made it nearly the whole way through.”
My breath is coming so fast it’s embarrassing. “Now we know. We can do this in front of an audience.”
“Mhm. Not so pathetic.”
“No.” I release his shirt before I can do something worse, like try to kiss him again. I can’t give him the satisfaction. “It was… decent.”
Rafe lifts an eyebrow. He’s still touching me too, the asshole, his fingers on my cheek warm and soothing. “You’re lying.”
“Just because you’re attracted to me doesn’t mean I’m attracted to you.”
He looks down at the lingerie. I think for a moment he wants to protest or tell me to close the robe.
Instead he just brushes his fingers beneath my chin and takes a step back. “Liar,” he repeats, and sticks the champagne bottles back under his arm. He disappears down the hall, and I’m left with an ache inside and a mind ablaze.