2 Wednesday 553pm, 3 Days
Callie wasn’t awake when I finally got back to the room last night.
She mumbled something about rainforests.
Or carparks? And I couldn’t bring myself to wake her up.
Thankfully, she was also joking about the naked sleeping, and I managed to keep my dick under control as I drew her into my arms. Who knew being with the person you loved could be almost as hard as being away from them?
Now, we’ve just checked into our new hotel after another brutal leg of travel.
At least we get to camp out in one location for a few days.
If all goes well, we won’t have to do anything other than show our faces at some wedding events and greet incoming guests.
After this past month, I’m looking forward to much needed R&R with Callie, especially since our tour will push the honeymoon into next year.
Endless hours of romantic bliss coming up, and I plan to soak in every second.
Funny that I’m feeling the pressure of time when we’re preparing for a lifetime together, but that’s musician life for you.
All hope of an evening naked with the most beautiful woman on the planet is dashed when the most annoying woman comes rushing toward us in the lobby.
“There’s the happy couple!”
“Rita, hi.” Callie is all smiles and hugs for our wedding coordinator. I’m all impatient nod.
“I’ve taken the liberty of putting together a schedule of events for your stay. It includes the locations for all the receptions, meals, and?—”
“Wait, receptions?” I ask.
“Well, yes. Every morning we’ll have a formal brunch to welcome the guests who arrived the previous day, and?—”
“Wait. Huh?”
“The Welcome Brunch.” She says it like she didn’t just make that up right this second.
“No.”
“What do you mean, no?” she quips, painted eyebrows lifting high on her forehead.
“I mean, no. Is that even a thing?”
Callie reaches for my hand. “Hun…”
Nope, too pissed even for Callie-calm. But Rita doesn’t flinch. She hasn’t since the day we started choosing napkin shapes and shit. Pretty sure that’s why Callie insisted on keeping her around.
“If you recall, it’s just a brunch-style event each morning. You’ll have to eat anyway, so it works perfectly.”
Not when you want to be naked in bed with your fiancée.
“I just can’t— You know what? Fine. Whatever. Look, we’re tired. Can we just go over the rest tomorrow?”
Her face scrunches into a painful display of sympathy. Must not have covered that expression in wedding-planner school. “Ooh… Well, I wish that were possible. But unfortunately, if you look at the schedule , you’ll see you have a Welcoming Dinner in just over an hour.”
“Welcoming dinner? I thought it was a morning brunch.”
“That’s something else. This is the Welcoming Dinner .”
“Who the hell are we welcoming?”
Callie shoves an elbow into my side. Sorry, but what level of wedding hell is this?
“ You’re being welcomed.”
“Huh?”
“It’s a reception to honor?—”
“Well, can’t we be welcomed tomorrow?”
She looks like I just suggested serving baby unicorn steaks. “I’m afraid that’s not possible. Preparations for The Welcoming Dinner are already underway. We’re scheduled for forty-eight guests.”
“You’re just making shit up. No way that’s a thing.” I shoot an exasperated look at Callie. “That can’t be a thing, babe.”
Callie sighs and soothes my fist between her palms. “I know, sweetie. It’s a lot, but remember your brothers and sisters are coming in to help out, and we thought it would be good to greet them all at once tonight rather than try to meet up.”
“So this is a welcoming brunch!”
“It’s dinner,” Rita corrects. “Starts at seven pm. Mediterranean fare.”
I glare over at her. “I don’t want to fucking welcome anyone. I just want to sleep. We haven’t had a break in weeks.”
Horrified at my lack of wedding hospitality etiquette, Rita sends a pleading look to Callie. Oh hell no. She does not get to force my fiancée between us.
“Fine. We’ll be back down at seven pm to welcome the shit out of everyone. Welcome!” I call to the dude rolling a carryon bag toward the elevator. He looks back, confused, and I wave with my brightest smile.
“Welcome!” That’s for the concerned grandma who tucks her grandchild to her side as she shuffles past. Callie tries to hold in a snicker beside me.
“There. See? I was born for this.” I throw my arms up and wave to the lobby. “Welcome, everyone! Bienvenido! Aloha! Oi! Willkommen!” I give Rita a look, and Callie chuckles.
Rita appears ready to cry. “Clearly you need some time to unwind,” she says. “We’ll see you at dinner.” She turns on an expensive black heel and stomps off to her imaginary Rosette and Champagne Kingdom.
“You’re a jerk, Casey Barrett,” Callie says, pushing me toward the elevator.
“I’m the jerk? What’s with all the damn welcoming? If I’d known about this…”
I cringe, and her eyebrows lift in challenge.
“Yeah? If you’d known, then what?”
I draw her into the elevator and pull her back against my chest. “I would have kidnapped you and forced you to marry me in front of a judge,” I whisper in her ear. “Then we’d be off on a beach somewhere sipping cocktails and making babies.”
She giggles and relaxes into me. “What about your rehearsals?”
“Okay, fine. We’d be in a hotel room making babies.”
“I thought you wanted to wait with kids.”
“It’s a fantasy, babe. Enjoy the dream.”
She locks my arms around her. “Reality won’t be so bad. We’re just tired. By tomorrow we’ll be more than ready to welcome .”
“Hmm. People didn’t seem to like that just now.”
“Not strangers, silly.” She turns to face me. “We got this.”
“As long as I got you.”
She grins and pulls my lips to hers. “You’re ridiculous.”
“Oh my gosh, it’s so beautiful!”
I follow Callie’s gaze around our suite, and I gotta say, it’s not bad. My mood shifts slightly into more positive territory. This hotel has “bridal suite” locked down. A few bouquets of flowers brighten the surfaces and, is that a gift basket? Callie is already investigating.
“I’m not sure when we’ll have time for summer sausages, but it’s a nice gesture,” she says. I can see the thank you note to the hotel staff already forming in her head.
“It’s probably for later. They know we’ll need our strength for tonight’s workout,” I tease, wrapping my arms around her from behind. She giggles from my scruff against her neck.
“Nice try. Because first…” She twists around and ruins any hope I have of sexy time with a peck on the chin. “Welcoming Dinner.”
So I might grunt at that… or pout… whatever. “Fine. Can we at least shower together quick? Just a little innocent fun, I promise.”
Her expression is encouraging. The way her fingers dig into my biceps—definitely a good sign. I’ve just switched on the full-charm when?—
“Eek!”
I spin around to track her death stare. “What?” I ask.
“Right there!”
“Where?”
“Right there!” She jumps back a good five feet.
“What’s right there? A ghost? Burglar? What?”
“On the wall!”
I squint at the wall, as if the new perspective will give me some insight into chick-brain.
“Babe, I don’t see anything.”
“Next to the picture.”
She’s pressed against the foyer wall now, finger pointing with all the foreboding of the Ghost of Christmas Future. “Spider,” she whispers, eyes full of impending doom.
“Cal, I don’t…” I take a few steps toward the wall. Maybe there’s a black spot to the right of the frame?
“This?” I point at the pin-prick of tiny legs.
“Yes!” She covers her mouth and takes more steps toward the exit. Soon she’ll be in the hall.
I turn back to the intruder who’s now ruined any chance I had of getting lucky. “Dude, you’re so screwed,” I mutter, slipping off my sneaker.
“No!” This scream is more hostile than the initial shriek. I turn, weapon suspended in mid-air.
“What?”
“Don’t kill it!”
“Um…”
“It doesn’t deserve to die!”
I glance at the bug. At my shoe. Back to Callie. “So you don’t want it gone?”
“Of course I do!”
“You do want it gone?” I raise the shoe again.
“Gone, yes, not dead! Put it outside or something.”
I swallow and pull in a deep breath. “Okay…”
“Here.” She darts forward and disappears into the bathroom. Does she think spiders can jump twenty feet in one shot? I keep my research questions to myself as I wait.
She emerges seconds later and tosses me a cup from the bathroom.
I catch it against my chest. “Nice thought, but how do I get it in here? I doubt he’s aware his options are the cup or death.”
“Um…” She bites her lip, scanning the room. “Oh, got it.” Grabbing the channel guide brochure, she legit slides it across the floor in my direction. It goes all of a foot.
We both stare at it for several seconds before I sigh and cross the room to pick it up.
“Love you, babe,” she says with a grin. “Eek! It’s moving! It’s moving, hurry!”
How she can see that speck of dust move five millimeters in the dark from that distance, is beyond me.
Must be some radar or sixth sense or something.
I quicken my pace because I’m thinking there’s nothing worse for a relationship than losing visual of a spider.
On closer inspection, I guess it could be an entire centimeter closer to the frame on the wall?
Lunging forward I trap the little dude with the cup like the superhero I am.
After shoving the brochure between the cup and the wall, I verify I’ve won the battle and press the brochure on top to secure it.
“Okay, I have it trapped. Can you open the window?”
She nods slowly, clearly not wanting to move but knowing she’s out of options with me on Spider Guard Duty. “Just stay there until I open it,” she warns.
I try to keep a straight face and fight the ten-year-old in me who wants to pretend to throw it at her. Mom would be proud when I manage to stay put.
She pulls open the blinds and studies the glass. “I don’t think it opens.”
I scan the frame as well. “It probably doesn’t. Hotel windows usually don’t.”
“Crap.”
She crosses her arms and commits way more brain cells to this dilemma than can possibly be healthy.
“It’s fine. I’ll just flush it,” I say, moving toward the bathroom with my prisoner.
“No!”
“Huh?”
“Casey, you can’t!”
“Why not?”
“You’ll kill it!”
“Well, yeah?”
“You can’t kill it! It wasn’t hurting anyone.”
Shit, is she going to cry? Over a damn spider she hates? Even worse, it’s the freaking cutest sight ever.
“Okaaaay?” Cute or not, I’m still at a loss. “What do you want me to do with it then?”
“Um…” Her teeth sink into her lip again as she considers. “I guess you’ll have to take it down to the lobby and put it outside.”
“What? No fucking way,” I mumble.
“Language.”
“Sorry, but come on. You want me to carry this thing down four stories, through the lobby, and out to the parking lot?”
“Well, not the parking lot. It might get run over. Maybe the flower bed? There’d be lots of places to build a web and plenty of food and maybe some friends…?”
Her grin is because she knows I’ll follow her orders. Maybe one day I’ll be able to resist her, but it’s not looking good for this century. At least she has the courtesy of looking adorable when she bosses me around.
Even so, I’m pretty sure I’m growling on my way to the exit. She maintains a wide arc as I move across the room. Once I’m safely in the corridor, she hoists her suitcase onto the bed and starts unzipping it.
“You’re not coming with me?” I ask.
She glances over, clearly surprised. “Are you kidding? Lock myself in a small moving box with that monster? Not a chance.”
“Hey, Case.”
“Hey, Luke.”
I glance at his cup as I step off the elevator. “Coffee?”
“Kind of. Some soy milk thing for Holland.” He glances at mine. “Spider?”
I nod.
He nods back.
“Well, good luck,” he says, moving past me into the elevator.
“You too, man. See you at dinner.”
“Yup.”
I navigate the lobby like it’s totally normal to walk around with a spider in a cup covered by a channel guide.
I’m a firm believer that not showing fear is half the battle.
The staff at the door seem a little more suspicious than the others I’ve passed, though, possibly because after saying hello I beeline for the flowerbed.
“Can I help you, sir?” A security guard asks before I reach the promised land. By help he clearly means send you back where you came from and sir is crazy man with a spider in a cup.
“Nope. Just taking care of business.” Well, that certainly didn’t help.
He raises a brow. “Sir, there are restrooms in the lobby.”
I force a laugh and shake my head. “No, no. Not that kind of business. I have a spider.” I hold up the channel-guide-cup-trap because… yeah.
“Sir, we’d ask you not to release wildlife on hotel property.”
“Oh it’s not wildlife. Just a spider.” I bend down to get to work. This conversation is going nowhere.
“Sir, for the safety of the guests, please do not release your pet on our property.” He’s got a hand on the radio, ready for action. I already see the headlines:
Rebel Rocker Unleashes Killer Spider Dot.
“Ha! No. It was on the wall in our room. I wanted to flush it but… never mind. Here, look.”
He steps back when I approach with the cup out-stretched. Still, he can’t resist a peek and leans to unsafe levels in order to inspect my contraband. By his look, he’s not impressed.
“Sir?”
I pull the cup back and—shit. “Um… Well there was a spider in here.”
He nods, his expression shifting from irritation to pity. “Of course there was, sir. Have a nice evening.”
“Thanks,” I mutter and trudge back to the entrance. I’m careful to toss the empty cup in the trash bin. The last thing I need right now is a litter citation.
Read An NSB Wedding…