4. Chapter 4 #2
Kayla's smile wavers slightly, but she shrugs. "Well, if you change your mind."
She drifts away, and I look back across the terrace.
Only this time, it’s not a college roommate or fraternity brother heading Darcy’s way.
It’s Todd Langford.
The groomsman I sent to his room last night—minus super and plus one broken, bleeding nose.
I see him before Darcy does—moving through the crowd. His eye is still a spectacular shade of purple and yellow. But where my eye bears the mark of a weak punch, Todd’s face is a testament to a beat-down.
His nose is swollen and bandaged, his left cheek red and split from where my knuckles landed last night.
And he's heading straight for Darcy.
I'm moving before I consciously decide to move.
Kayla says something as I pass her—I don't hear it; my entire focus narrows to the trajectory between Todd and Darcy and the three seconds I have to close the distance.
I intercept him ten feet from where Darcy stands with Bria, stepping directly into his path.
He stops.
"Shaw," he says. The Scotch on his breath could strip paint.
"Todd."
"I want to talk to—"
"No, you don’t."
"I just—"
“I said no.” I lean in slightly. Not threatening. Just clarifying. “If you take one more step in her direction, the invoice I send Monday morning will be nothing compared to the cost of reconstructing your left jaw.”
I can see the fury rising in his face.
The man's neck literally turns fuchsia, but his gaze goes to Darcy, then back to me, and apparently, having decided his face has suffered enough for one weekend, he gives in.
"Yeah," he mutters. "We're done here."
“I thought so.” I fish my cell phone from my tuxedo pocket and shoot a text. “Your car will be waiting out front for you in five.”
He blinks. "How did you—"
"I'm thorough. Goodnight, Todd."
He slinks away, mumbling. When I look up, Darcy is already watching me.
Alone now, she looks even more devastating.
Her blush-pink lips are parted, the smoky eye makeup around her hazel eyes blending with the night sky.
She places her empty champagne glass on a passing waiter’s tray before walking toward me.
The air around her seems to shimmer; the warm weather suddenly sweltering as she stops three feet from me, pointed chin cocked.
“Having a little chat with Todd?” she asks quietly.
“More like handling a situation."
“Ah, I’m assuming seventy percent handled or so.”
I grin. “More like one hundred.”
The oxygen around us seems to have gone still. The other guests—Bria, the fraternity brothers, even Kayla—melt away, leaving us at the terrace edge where the lights are dimmer and the music quieter.
"Thank you," Darcy nods. "Again."
“Like I said, handsy groomsmen are terrible for networking,” I say. “Even worse for commerce."
"You're still defending this as a business decision."
"It's a consistent position."
She almost smiles. "You know, most people would have just asked him to leave."
"Most people get different results."
A beat passes; the music settles into something slower. Around us, couples move onto the dance floor—Quinn and Jessica, Wyeth with someone I don't recognize, half the wedding party paired off and swaying.
Suddenly—
“Are you leaving?” Darcy asks, hazel gaze unblinking.
“I never said—“
“Because I am. Right now.”
"It's eight thirty in the evening, Miss Madison."
"I know what time it is. I just don't care." She sighs, long and harsh. “Being a maid of honor was a lot. I’m just glad to have survived it.” She swipes a hand at her dark locks, eyes drifting in the distance. “I’ve smiled enough. I've pretended enough. I need to not be here anymore."
I look at her for a moment—the confetti still in her hair, the exhaustion around her almond-shaped eyes. She looks the particular kind of tired that comes from holding it together for seventy-two hours straight.
I nod once. “As you wish. This way.”
We walk back through the reception—past Quinn and Jessica, who are too wrapped up in each other to notice—past the string lights and the bar and the photographer who has finally put his camera down.
The corridor to the guest rooms is cooler—quieter. The ocean sound is louder here, filtering through the open windows, our footsteps echoing on the tile.
We don't talk.
There's nothing to say that won't make this worse.
We stop at her door. She finds her key card and swipes it. The lock clicks open, and the Most Difficult Woman Alive abruptly turns to look at me, one hand on the doorframe.
For a moment, neither of us breathes.
The hallway is empty. The reception is far enough away that the music is a faint pulse, and we stand approximately the same distance apart we were in the chapel when Rodrigo asked if I would take this woman and I said yes without thinking.
"Thank you," she says quietly. "For walking me back. And for the Todd thing. Again."
"You keep thanking me for things that are basic human decency."
"You keep doing them like they're tactical operations."
"They are tactical operations."
“I have a feeling you look at most humane acts as operations.”
"I told you I’m consistent."
"You're something, that’s for sure.” She studies me for another moment, something shifting in her expression. "Goodnight, Declan."
"Goodnight, Miss Madison."
She doesn't move. Neither do I.
I’m too busy trying not to notice that Darcy’s generously voluminous chest is rising and falling hard and fast.
"You should go to your room,” she says so softly I barely hear it.
I nod. “I should."
"Before we do something we'll regret."
"What makes you think we'd regret it?"
Her breath catches. "Because we’ve done enough damage to each other and other people at this wedding, don’t you think? Anything that happens between now and then just makes it more complicated."
"I'm very comfortable with complicated."
"Of course you are."
"Are you?"
She looks at me for three full seconds. Then she steps inside and closes the door.
For several interminable moments, I do the math on several things simultaneously and arrive at one conclusion—the knowledge that I handled that as well as could be expected.
That I’ve done the best I could as best man, as a billionaire business owner who’s suddenly found himself married to a woman he’s known for exactly three days.
A woman I’m currently having impure thoughts about.
Thoughts that include sliding that rose-gold dress down her body inch by inch.
Discovering if her skin tastes the way it smells — warm, clean, faintly sweet. Finding out what sounds she makes when she's not arguing with me, when that sharp tongue is occupied with something other than telling me exactly where I can shove my tactical operations.