Chapter 12
CHAPTER 12
SAWYER
W ith the ease and familiarity of a lifetime around boats, I eased the Boston Whaler back into its slip and cut the engine. Mama Flo had already looped the stern line around a piling as I leapt to the dock to tie off the bow. We were officially back on Hatterwick.
Everybody gathered their stuff, as if something momentous hadn’t just happened. I handed Mama Flo and Mimi safely to the dock, then reached to take Willa’s hand. She was more than capable of making the transition herself, but I couldn’t stop myself from stepping close and wrapping an arm around her waist, plucking her from the boat and hauling her safely into me until her feet touched the worn wood planks.
We stared at each other for a long moment, because we’d done the thing we set out to do and now… now was the after we hadn’t talked about.
The wind had snatched a lock of her hair from her braid, plastering it across her cheek. I tucked it behind her ear. “Now what?”
She stood close enough that I felt her chest rise and fall with a sigh. “Well, at the very least, I need to go tell Bree, because obviously I’m not taking you back to the cottage tonight. That would be weird.”
Because it’s our wedding night.
And, shit, now I was trying desperately not to think about that, because, of course, it wasn’t going to be that kind of wedding night. My dick wasn’t getting the memo because this was my wife. She still wore the pretty white dress. Color flushed her cheeks, and her hair was windblown and a little wild. I preferred it this way. Not so hemmed in by perfection. I liked that for Willa, who’d been jailed by rules around appearance and propriety for so much of her life.
“That would be a great place to start spreading the news,” Mimi agreed. “Why don’t y’all go on by the Brewhouse on the way back?”
“May as well. At least it won’t be very busy this time of day.” That would certainly be easier on her than any kind of formalized Surprise! We Eloped! reception Mimi might dream up.
“Okay. I wouldn’t say no to a glass of wine, even if it’s not even four o’clock.”
“I feel like we can make that happen.”
We piled our stuff into Willa’s Jeep and made the short drive up to OBX Brewhouse. Mimi and Mama Flo followed in their own car. The sprawling two-story structure was clad in weathered gray shingles, with a wraparound porch dotted with rocking chairs and benches for patrons to wait until their table was ready or enjoy a glass of beer made on-site. The microbrewery had been added during the rebuild, after an arsonist had burned the place nearly to the ground during my last summer on the island before joining the Navy. Awning windows were propped open on three sides, taking advantage of the sea breezes and the view of Pamlico Sound a couple of blocks away. It looked as if it had always been here, exactly like this. Bree had worked hard to ensure the rebuild stayed true to the character of the tavern her grandfather had run his whole life, even as she’d added a new addition to house the stainless-steel kettles and other equipment for the microbrewery that had become a tourist draw in its own right.
As predicted, the parking lot was only partly full when we arrived. Before we got out of the Jeep, Willa shoved her sunglasses up on top of her head and looked at me. “We have to behave like married people.”
Where was she going with this? “That’s the point of this little exercise, right? To let people know we’re married?”
“I mean, yes. I just… We can’t go in there as friends.”
“We’re still friends, Wren.”
Her cute little nose screwed up. “I know. But I mean, they’re going to expect PDA.”
Ah, was that what had her worried? She’d seemed okay with the kiss at the wedding. In fact, she’d seemed into it, something I’d been trying to not think about when I’d forced myself to let her go. Maybe it was the public part of PDA that bothered her.
“I won’t do anything you aren’t comfortable with.”
She waved a hand. “I’m not worried about that. You’ll just have to remember to, you know, touch me.”
Oh Wren, wanting to touch you is not something I have to think about. It’s keeping my hands off you that’s the problem.
But I wasn’t about to admit that.
Keeping a perfectly straight face, I nodded. “Understood.”
When she still didn’t get out of the car, I reached out to take one of the hands she’d knotted together in her lap. “Are you worried Bree’s going to be upset?”
“No. Maybe? I don’t really know how she’s going to react, honestly.”
“And you’re afraid of having that conversation in a public place?”
Her shoulders relaxed. “Yes.”
“You’ve been friends for years. She knows you. She’s not going to make some kind of scene, even if she is upset. And I can’t think why she would be, even if this is a surprise.” Unless she was worried that I’d somehow taken advantage of Willa’s vulnerable, grieving state to force her into something she didn’t want. But if Bree thought that, she’d take it up with me first, not Willa.
“Okay. Let’s do this.”
We strode to the main doors, and I opened them for her, placing a hand at the small of her back to steer her through. Then, mindful of the edict Willa had just handed down, I left it there as we moved through the entryway and past the empty hostess stand.
The roar of whoops and hollers and cheers that greeted us as we rounded into the restaurant startled Willa so badly she practically leapt out of her skin, jolting back into me. Instinctively, I wrapped around her, turning to shield her from… whatever the hell was happening.
Over her head, I spotted a banner stretched across the top of the bar. Congratulations Willa and Sawyer! There were wedding bells on either side.
“What the actual hell?”
Willa lifted her head from my chest and peered past my shoulder to where a wall of our friends stood. Bree and Ed were behind the bar. Gabi was perched on a stool at the end, grinning from ear to ear. Caroline and Hoyt, Hoyt’s folks, the kids. There were a handful of other locals in the rest of the restaurant, but this was effectively most of our found family already gathered right here. And obviously, they knew.
I looked back at Mama Flo and Mimi, who’d followed us inside. Mimi just shrugged, a grin ruining her innocent, who-me? expression. Clearly, this was her doing.
Caroline was the first one to hurry over. “Congratulations! Oh, my God, I’m so excited for you! I knew it! I knew you two were in love with each other.”
Wait, what? Things aren’t like that between us.
But as Caroline dragged us deeper into the room, and we accepted more congratulations and handshakes, there was more of the same from literally everybody.
“Always suspected.”
“You two make the cutest couple.”
“Predicted this all the way back in high school.”
Willa and I kept looking at each other until finally she stopped moving. “We thought y’all would be surprised.”
I’d never heard a unanimous scoff before.
Caroline propped both fists on her hips. “Honey, the way you two feel about each other has been the worst kept secret on Hatterwick in ages. We totally knew as soon as he was back to stay that something like this was going to happen. I do confess, I did not expect elopement this fast. I’m really proud of you! That’s great.”
Bree had come out from behind the bar. She was smirking at both of us as she pulled Willa in for a hug. “Nothing between you two, my ass.”
Willa just gave a helpless shrug and smile before she snuggled back into me. It was instinct to tighten my arm around her and brush a kiss to her brow.
Gabi clapped her hands. “Let’s celebrate. Bree is, of course, in charge of drinks. There are appetizers, and we even got cake.” She gestured expansively to a tiered stand loaded with little cupcakes iced in wedding white with what turned out to be our initials piped on top in blue.
Willa took one look at those cupcakes and teared up. “I didn’t… We didn’t… How did you do all of this?”
Hoyt’s grin was secretive. “A little bird told us what you two got up to today.”
Now it was Willa who looked back at Mimi, who simply blew her a kiss and said, “You’re welcome.”
I braced myself to do whatever was needed to extract my bride in case this was all too much, but instead she laughed. “Thank you.”
And that was how we found ourselves in the middle of a wedding reception we hadn’t planned for the marriage we hadn’t known we were entering more than twenty-four hours ago.
Somebody produced a knife, and we were ordered to cut the cake. Together, we sliced right down the middle of one of the cupcakes, which turned out to be Italian cream—Willa’s favorite. Mimi wasn’t the only one who had her phone out to take photos as we fed bites to each other. I didn’t smash cake in Willa’s face. She’d have hated that. Instead, I held it out so she could take as big or small a bite as she liked. I ate the entire half she offered me. Her eyes lit with challenge as she did the same, then turned to lick a trace of icing off my thumb.
My dick leapt at the feel of that little tongue against my skin and the expression of impish delight on her face as she did it. I told myself it was just in the name of selling our cover that I reeled her in. “You’ve got a little something right…”
I licked the icing off the corner of her mouth. And then that mouth was right there . No newly wedded man in his right mind wouldn’t kiss his wife after that. It was strictly performative.
Except she sighed into the kiss, rising against me, wrapping her arms around my shoulders as she kissed me back, and I was lost. She tasted of butter and sweetness and something deeper, richer that had to be simply her. Everything in me craved more of that taste, and I chased it, deepening the kiss, pulling her closer. She opened for me on a little whimper that set my blood aflame.
It was the cheering and whistles that broke through my out-of-control lust. For a moment, I could only wonder why the hell all these people were here, why we weren’t alone to follow this madness to its inevitable conclusion.
And then I remembered.
Somehow, I found the strength to pull back. But as I stared down at my wife, with her rosy lips swollen from mine and those eyes so hugely dilated with arousal, all I could think was, I am in so much trouble.