Chapter 4
FOUR
Anson
Fucking hell.
I’m walking as fast as I can without breaking into a run.
Straight for the nearest exit. I need air.
I need space. I yank at the tie around my neck, loosening the grip it has on my throat, as I slam into the bar on the door, unlatching it and popping it open into the emptiness of the night.
I walk to the edge of the patio, leaning against the railing as I run my fingers through my hair for the fourth or fifth time since I got out here. I’m sure I look like a mess.
I am one.
She thought I was Marlowe’s brother. Jasper.
My right-hand man at my company, and a good friend.
I had no idea they were involved with one another.
It hasn’t been that long since her breakup with Chris.
A few weeks. A couple of months. Technically longer, but I know she was still sneaking out to see him by the number of times she asked me to check on her mom on the way home. At least until he fucked up royally.
I scrub a hand over my face.
I don’t need to worry about Chris’s fuckups right now. I have one of my own.
Huge. Massive. Fucking earth-shattering.
Because she thought I was Jasper, but I don’t have an excuse. I know her voice. All too fucking well. I can’t say I didn’t know it was her. Which means now she knows I have no problem stripping her down and—
“Ans? Hey! I thought that was you.” My brother’s voice calls from the doorway before I hear his footsteps over the cobblestone. “Something on fire? Saw you bolting.”
I’m not keen to talk to anyone right now, but if it has to be someone, better my brother Bo than anyone.
“Nothing’s on fire. I just needed air.”
“Any particular reason?” Bo asks as he sidles up next to me, leaning back on the rail with a longneck in his hand. He knows me too well.
I take a deep breath and force myself to stand straight.
“I fucked up.”
“Ate too much of that fondue tower? Don’t tell me you mixed it with that strong-ass IPA Ramsey picked. That shit hurts. I got some antacids out in the truck.”
I cut him a sharp look that has him raising a brow.
“No.” I grit my teeth. “Something worse.”
“Worse than that IPA? I didn’t think there was much worse than that.”
“Can you be serious for a second?”
“I’m serious.”
“You’re not serious enough.”
“Okay. You’re scaring me now. I was well on my way to too drunk to give a shit about anything, and now I feel like I gotta sober up for whatever you’re about to tell me. Do I need to get some water first?” He lowers the beer from his lips and gives me a thoughtful look.
“I need to figure out how to unfuck this.” I ignore his soliloquy and push on.
“Well, don’t let it be anything that pisses our little sister off. She just found out Grant and Dakota have to skip out on the double honeymoon thing they had planned.”
“Everything okay?” My mind blanks out for a minute as I worry the Stockton troubles have reignited.
“Yeah. I guess Hudson and Charlotte are going to an important meeting overseas, and Grant and Dakota want to go. They’re doing a yacht in the Mediterranean after. But you know it’s not what Hazel had planned. I guess they weren’t going to tell her until tomorrow, but someone let it slip tonight.”
“She’ll be fine once she’s on her honeymoon. Ramsey will make sure she relaxes.” I shake my head. It’s a mild inconvenience, but she’ll survive it. There’s been too much over the last couple of years I worried she wouldn’t survive for me to care much about the logistics of their vacation plans.
“I guess. She’s saying they had some couples things they were supposed to do, and now it’s ruined.”
“Again…”
“Yeah, I know, but I still feel bad, you know?”
I nod as I hook my boot on the lowest rung of the railing.
“All right. Hit me with it.” Bo looks at me like he’s preparing to get punched in the face.
I wish someone would punch me in the face right now. Knock me out cold so I don’t have to keep reliving this nightmare scenario. I still feel like I’m reeling from the gut punch of hearing “never in a million years.”
“I nearly…” I can’t bring myself to say the words. They’re on the tip of my tongue, but I can’t even decide which ones best frame the situation. “There was a closet and—”
“Did you fuck a bridesmaid?” Bo’s smile curls into devious amusement at my predicament. Of course the drunk version of him would think this is good news.
“No.”
“Did you get lost in the closet? Because honestly, shit’s dark. It happens.” Bo’s brows knit together as he looks me over. “You didn’t break anything, did you?”
“No, I didn’t break anything. But there was a lost bridesmaid. We didn’t fuck. We almost… Something along those lines. I didn’t realize…” The words fade on my lips as I find myself trying to admit the most embarrassing part of all of this. “She didn’t know it was me.”
“Who is she?”
“Bristol.”
“Bristol? Fuckkkk.” Bo curses, shaking his head for a moment before his brows knit together in confusion. “She didn’t know it was you? How the hell did she not?”
“It was dark.”
“Surely there was an opportunity for you to discuss it?”
“She told me to keep quiet so no one would hear outside the door.”
“Okay.” He considers the predicament. “Who did she think you were?”
“Jasper.”
“Oh… well. Double fuck.” Bo states the obvious.
“Yeah. Double. Fuck.”
“Are they together?” Bo glances back at the door.
“I don’t know. I don’t think so. It would be quick if so.” I try to do the math in my head from how long she and Chris called it quits to now. Not that it really matters. These things happen fast. Obviously. Look at me and Bristol.
“Just figuring out if this is all going to come to a head out here with some blood is all.” Bo looks between me and the door warily.
“Well, here’s hoping he doesn’t find out. It was an honest mistake. I’d hope Jasper would give me the benefit of the doubt.”
“Me too. I’d rather not have to fight one of our oldest friends. It’s gonna make for an awkward day on Monday for you two regardless.”
I hadn’t thought that far ahead. I was too focused on the fallout with Bristol to even imagine the consequences this would have on work.
Jasper and I are friends, but he’s also one of my crew leads at my construction company.
I was thinking of promoting him. This is all going to throw a wrench in things. Maybe literally.
“Yep.” I run a hand through my hair again, only now remembering the gel Hazel’s stylist insisted the groomsmen use this morning as I destroy the perfectly tousled style she gave me. Not that it matters. Not much is gonna matter if this goes south. More than it already has. “Fuck me,” I curse.
“So she didn’t know it was you, but you knew it was her?” Bo clarifies.
“Yes. I thought she knew though. It was her idea. She just rushed me in the closet while I was minding my own fucking business, hunting for the right brand of whiskey. Next thing I know, she’s begging me to—” I pause.
Bo doesn’t need those kinds of details, and he smirks at the way I come to a dead halt.
“I thought it was odd that after all this time she was crossing that line, but I just… Fuck. Just fuck.”
“So let that be your story, then. You knew it was her, but you didn’t want to embarrass her when she came on so strong. Happens to the best of us.” Bo shrugs and flashes another glance at the door.
I shoot him a sidelong, suspicious glance, but I don’t have time to sort whatever mess he’s gotten himself into today. For once, I have my own. Not that I’m proud of it. I might have been in another life. But not in this one.
“I think I should go.”
“No. Don’t run off. You’ll look guilty. Guilty people run.”
“I am guilty. I should never in a million fucking years have crossed that line. Even if I thought it was her idea. At Hazel’s wedding no less.” I don’t know what got into me. She kissed me and that was it. I lost all sense of reason.
“A bridesmaid coming on to one of the groomsmen at a wedding reception is a tale as old as time, Ans. You’re not guilty of anything except being normal for fucking once. You’re allowed to be human.”
“You say that like she’s not Ford’s aunt. Fannie’s sister. Hazel’s best friend.” I list all the reasons I had to stop myself from touching her. There’s probably a dozen more if I had a few more minutes to recount them.
“She might have started that way, but she’s been more to you than that for a long while.” Bo gives me a sympathetic look that only serves to make me more self-conscious.
“She hasn’t.” I cut him off at the pass.
His lips collapse into a thin line as the skepticism rolls over his face.
“Then all the more reason for you not to run. Get some air. Take a shot of whiskey,” Bo instructs, pulling the flask out of his jacket and handing it to me. “Steel your fucking balls and go back in there like nothing happened.”
“Is that how you handle these things?” I stare at the flask for a long moment before I take it and twirl the cap free. “Just pretend like nothing happened?”
“More or less.” He shrugs.
I take a long swallow. I’m doomed. I don’t even know if I can pretend. Let alone if I can stand the look I’m bound to see on Bristol’s face.
“And that works?” I ask as the whiskey burns its way down my throat.
Bo’s a lot more liberal with where he draws the line than I am and gets himself into trouble with women more often than he’d like to admit.
I’d rather avoid it with every last fiber of my being.
I like structure. Clear boundaries and agreements.
No strings. No hurt feelings. I don’t have more to offer than that.
“Most of the time.” I get another tilt of his shoulder that tells me something’s on his mind.
“Most?” I ask, giving him the opening he needs if he wants to talk about it.
“Most,” he confirms. “I think it’ll work for you tonight, and that’s all that matters.”
“And if it doesn’t?”
“Then we can discuss an exit strategy.”
I hand the flask back to him and work on my tie, doing my best to put it back in place before I tuck my shirt back in.
“She really did a number on you. I’m surprised you survived it.” He smirks, and I try not to echo it. But a flash of her making muted little sounds for me before she marveled at the size of my dick plays on an unbidden loop in my head.
“She thought I was Jasper.” I remind myself as much as him.
I need to think unsexy thoughts before I go back in. I try the kind of stuff I normally would discuss when I’m talking to her. School pickup times. Practice schedules for Ford’s football team. The grocery list. The broken latch on her dryer she needed me to fix.
I can do this.
“You got this, champ!” Bo slaps my shoulder in encouragement before I head for the door, and I throw one last glare his way before I make my way back into the gauntlet.