Miles
“Ijust realized something.”
I finish rolling my sleeves and find Hendricks’s reflection in the mirror. He’s lounging on the bed, arms behind his head as he keeps me company. I’m transported back to when we were growing up in Burlington, and he used to do the same thing while I got ready for one polo tournament or another.
His presence calmed any nerves zipping around my belly.
They still do, though Hendricks is rarely around in the same capacity.
These days, he meets me on the sidelines or watches from the stands where he continues to be my biggest fan.
I’ve learned to deal with the nerves differently, and usually with the help of a groom or two.
“Yeah, what’s that?”
“You”—he grins wide—“are the first of us to get married.”
For a second, I wonder what he's talking about, then my shoulders begin to shake, and so do Hendricks’s.
Everything about this is funny. The sub-context of me being the most unmarriable Burlington, picturing the look on Lando’s face, the fury I’ll be subjected to, has me doubled over, wiping tears from my eyes.
“I should have put money on it.” I laugh as I finish buttoning up my shirt. “They’re going to freak, aren’t they?”
Hendricks’s smile drops, and he nods slowly. “I'd say of all of the stunts that you've pulled, this is probably up there with the night you spent in jail.”
“Hey,” I object, because the two situations are vastly different.
For one, I was drunk then, whereas for this current situation, I’m as sober as the judge who’ll be marrying me in a couple of hours.
Second, I thought I was rescuing some cows, when it turned out that I—we—were, in fact, stealing them. “You were there too.”
“True.”
I’d never seen my mum so angry, and I don’t think I’d ever seen Lando so angry either.
He was twenty-four, six years into running Burlington and still trying desperately to prove himself to all the detractors who thought he was too young to be taking over a Dukedom and multibillion-pound empire after our father died.
He had to spend the morning apologizing profusely to one of the local farmers who’d woken up to find that a herd of their cows had been relocated.
After that, I was sent to Argentina for the summer to play polo.
Slumping down on the chaise longue, I peer out of the vast window overlooking Aspen Mountain.
It’s no Valentine Nook, but the view is stunning nonetheless, and I feel my anxiety dropping the longer I stare.
The niggle in the back of my mind questioning whether getting married is too far even for me quiets down.
But my twin senses weakness. “Sure you want to go through with this? You could just fly back engaged.”
I shake my head. “They’d sniff it a mile away. Especially after what happened with Caroline.”
The year before last, Lando, our eldest brother, was due to marry his long-term girlfriend, Caroline.
It was no secret that we all hated her, but Lando was love blind.
Fortunately, it ended before they made it down the aisle, though not without drama.
The night before, Lando found her fucking his best friend.
The wedding was called off, and Hendricks, Alex, and I scooped him up, and we flew here to Aspen.
If I think about it, it’s what started this journey for us all in the first place. If we hadn’t returned last winter, I wouldn’t have run into Ruby.
I wouldn’t have obsessed over this woman who hated me, and I wouldn’t be marrying her now so she can fly to England and play on my team.
But I will have to face the consequences.
I know that. It’s partly why I was so insistent that Arthur send the prenup and legal documents over, so I can at least wave them in Lando’s face when he accuses me of irresponsibility for the millionth time.
If I had a penny for every time he called me irresponsible, I wouldn’t need a prenup attached to my family trust.
“It’s not a big deal, like Arthur said, it’s my MO, a classic Miles Burlington fuckup. No one will bat an eyelid when it gets annulled.”
“Milo, c’mon—”
Turning around, I look at my staunchest defender. But rehashing the myriad times I’ve been called irresponsible by my family is not something I wish to do. It’s a self-fulfilling prophecy at this point. They think I’m reckless, therefore I am.
Except I can’t quite bring myself to put Ruby in that category.
“Last week, I found out Torres has been signed to a new team playing out of Buenos Aires. Los Tigres Luchadores—”
“The Fighting Tigers?”
I nod. “They’re playing in England for the summer schedule.
Their fixtures haven’t been announced yet, but I know they’re going for the Cup.
Why wouldn’t they?” I don’t need to voice aloud my deep-seated need to beat him.
Hendricks knows. He can feel it in his bones as profoundly as I can.
I have to win. I have to beat him. “It’s why I want Ruby.
She’s going to make an excellent reserve once I’m done with her, but she’s worked for him. She’s got the dirt.”
“Did she tell you she has?”
“No. I haven’t asked, and I’m waiting until we’re back home. But I heard on good authority that she worked at his yard in Florida.”
Hendricks nods, though I know he doesn’t approve of my plan for revenge. He doesn’t want me to get hurt again.
“Have you spoken to Clemmie about this?”
“About what?”
He shrugs, brushing some lint from his jeans. “Just the whole Torres situation.”
My brow creases as I peer at my twin. I can’t imagine any scenario where I would have discussed polo with my younger sister. Beyond attending the matches with my family at Foxleigh, she has absolutely no interest in the game and never has.
“Why would I have?”
“Dunno,” he replies, swinging his legs off the bed. He gets up and walks over to the bathroom, where I soon hear him pissing, then the flush of the toilet and the tap running.
But he doesn’t add anything else, and I’m left with the distinct impression there’s more to his question than he’s letting on.
He walks out, drying his hands on a towel. “We should get down to the courthouse. Story and Ruby are meeting us there with Max. Bags are packed and being taken to the plane separately.”
I roll my eyes. Just like yesterday at our pre-wedding dinner, Story declared that once we’d signed the paperwork and fetched the license, we had to stick with the tradition of the bride not seeing the groom. I didn’t ask if the rules applied to fake weddings.
“I don’t know why we need to go through this pretense. I saw her this morning. We should have just left from there.”
“You know Story.” Hendricks grins, the rest of his sentence hanging in the air, but I don’t pick it up.
While Story has been my brother’s best friend since we were kids, I was never her biggest fan. But as she’s now back in Hendricks’s life and he’s finally truly happy, I’ve made peace with her. Doesn’t mean I don’t think she’s a ridiculous pain in the arse, though. I’ll just keep it to myself.
Standing, I take one last look in the mirror and give myself a nod of approval. Story might have mentioned no jeans, but I had even less desire to go shopping yesterday than Ruby seemed to, so I’m wearing the only clean pair I have, paired with a crisp white cotton shirt from Hendricks.
This will do. And the next words out of my mouth are ones I never thought I’d utter.
“C’mon. Let’s get me married.”
We aren’t the only people getting married in Aspen today, and it takes me a couple of minutes searching through the waiting room to find Ruby. When I do, I wonder why I didn’t find her immediately.
My mouth dries. The chatter around us quietens to nothing.
I’ve never seen anyone more beautiful.
She is stunning.
When I saw her earlier this morning to finalize the paperwork, sign documents with Story as our witness, and load the ponies for their flight home, her hair was in its usual thick braid. Her face was bare save for the mass of freckles dancing across her cheeks and nose.
Now she’s almost unrecognizable.
Her loose and shiny hair falls in a mass of soft waves.
Her almond-shaped green eyes look impossibly big, framed by long black lashes and sparkling with a dusting of gold.
In lieu of a dress, she’s wearing a jumpsuit in the subtlest shade of pink, which brings out the color of her eyes, and dear God .
. . the way it’s hugging her arse should be illegal.
And don’t get me started on what it’s doing to her boobs.
I’m about to throw down with every man in here who’s even thinking about looking at her.
Even I don’t know whether I’m supposed to look, or if looking will earn me a punch in the face, because I totally believe Ruby will deliver the latter with relish.
But fuck me. They are spectacular. High, round, soft.
Enticing. I never thought of myself as a boob man, but if Ruby’s are anything to go by, I am.
My brain churns overtime while I wrestle with what to do, because I’m going to be living with this woman for the rest of the summer, and I can’t fall at the first hurdle.
In the end, I take the path to safety and lean down to brush a kiss on her cheek. “You look beautiful.”
The pink blush she’s wearing deepens. “Thank you. So do you.”
Her words have a strange effect on me.
I don’t expect shame to curl around my bones, but it does.
I know I look good, I always do, but right now I know I don’t have anything on Ruby.
Regret is another sensation I’m not used to, but I feel it right now.
I wish I’d tried harder to look good for her because bubbling up is a need to impress her, something else alien to me.
What the hell is the matter with me?
“Thank you.” I dip my head and hold my hand out. “Shall we do this?”
“Let’s go.”