Just Friends: A Summer Fling With A Billionaire Heir

by Cynthia Dane

Zack didn’t get what the problem was. Perhaps it was because he had never been to an Indian wedding before, so everything was new and interesting. He may not have understood what was said beneath the elaborate arch, nor did he know the couple very well, but he did know that this was already the best wedding he had been to since his best friend Seth got into a fist fight with Miguel a year ago.

  (He had been to two other weddings since then.)

  “So what do you think?” Rachel whispered forty-five minutes in. “Lost your mind yet?”

  Zack hadn’t wanted to say anything, but everyone else around him muttered about whatever ailed them even though the ceremony looked like it was wrapping up. “No. It’s quite nice, actually.”

  “It is, isn’t it?”

  An elderly man stood up to stretch his legs. A woman let out an exasperated sigh and turned to someone else to chat – in English – about how much she practiced for the dance number. A child, asked to sit still for way too long, broke out in silent tears.

  “I don’t think everyone shares our sentiments, though.”

  Rachel grabbed his hand. “Fuck them. Who cares? It’s one of the nicest weddings you’re ever going to see.”

  “Trust me when I say that I’ve been to plenty of ‘nice’ weddings in my life. This tops them all. Although…” He knew exactly what he was doing when he said it. “I like to think my wedding one day will be pretty loose and casual. Definitely don’t want a wedding ceremony that lasts longer than a few minutes.”

  More blush. Rachel tried to yank her hand away, but Zack held the power now. There was no way he was letting her warm hand go. You dragged me into this wedding, Rachel. I’m not going to let your hand go until the couple rides off in their carriage or in their limo or whatever. He was going to hold true to that, too.

  The groom placed red powder on his bride’s forehead and fastened black beads around her neck. The hall erupted into applause. Rachel announced that it meant Sita was now a married woman – oh, and it was time to follow the couple to the reception hall. That was the real party! Rachel told him that he better know how to bhangra.

  Zack was mostly ecstatic to stretch his legs and join the throngs of happy people praising the decorations, the DJ, and the food set out at four different stations. Rachel insisted that he try out the Indian ice cream before the party really got underway.

  “Ladies and gentlemen,” the MC announced from the middle of the squared off dancefloor, “allow me to introduce to you the newly married Mr. and Mrs. Patel!”

  A loud, boisterous song erupted from the stereos. Clapping commenced above everyone’s heads. Cheering, yelling, and shouts in Hindi bounced off the walls as the newly married couple bounded out from a side door wearing their change of clothes: matching Western attire of a white tuxedo and a creampuff-looking cocktail dress that twinkled beneath the twirling disco lights.

  “Oh my God,” Rachel said. “This is going to be amazing. Everyone’s been practicing their choreography for months.”

  Zack had half a piece of flatbread in his mouth when the couple busted out their practiced dance moves to the tune of a familiar song. “Wasn’t this song playing in that movie we went to see in the park?”

  “Yup! It’s the big dance song!”

  “This is awesome.” Zack had to hand it to Sita and her groom. They didn’t have dancing bones in their bodies, but the amount of practice they put into their elaborate Bollywood routine shined through the four minutes they were on the floor. Their smiles were bright enough to blind the crowd. But not bright enough to scare off their immediate families, who stepped onto the dancefloor at the end of the first song and joined them for the second. “I need to come to more Indian weddings!”

  Later, Zack would discover that these carefully choreographed performances were a highlight of most weddings, not something that only happened when people felt like it. There were entire dance studios – including right there in America! – that did nothing but prepare Indian brides and grooms for their first dance together. This is the kind of shit I want at my wedding. For the past two hours, like a stereotypical young woman with nothing else to dream about, Zack had been imagining a quiet ceremony on the beach with the sand between his feet and cool linen against his skin. Now he wondered how he could swing a private ceremony with a big party like this at the reception.

  He looked to Rachel, who grinned at the dances and clapped to the beat. She was in no hurry to join in once the floor was opened to all guests, however.

  Zack would have to change that.

  She only put up the smallest fight before he swept her up into his arms and twirled her like a princess in the middle of the dancefloor. Her laughter overcame the blaring Bollywood music that occasionally blended in and out with the hottest Western tunes, including a powerful Shania Twain ballad that Zack hadn’t heard in years. He was so used to weddings featuring live jazz bands and lounge singers flown in from LA that he had forgotten how fun a wedding could be with a great DJ and a floor big enough for dancing.

  “I didn’t know you could dance!” Rachel shouted over the music.

  “I can’t! Honestly!” He only stopped dancing with Rachel when she claimed she was getting too dizzy to stand. Even after she stepped off the floor to get some punch and water, Zack continued to dance, swayed by the music.

  A certain woman caught his eye. He didn’t hesitate asking Sita’s great-aunt to dance to Charli XCX.

  ***

  Rachel only had so much dancing in her. Her weak ankles begged her to take a break before she pushed them to the point of no return, so she excused herself from Zack’s sweaty embrace and decided to refuel and catch up with some of the guests she knew.

  She was not prepared to hear a group of aunties scream and point at what a stranger did on the dancefloor.

  “Can you believe it?” one woman yelled in Hindi. “He got Dita to dance!”

  It was no secret that Zack had a million admirers that night. But what the young single women lacked in confidence, their aunts and grandmas made up for in unabashed flirting. It was a good thing great-aunt Dita was a widow and her family didn’t follow the more rigid customs of how a widow should behave. Because that was some serious dancing she and Zack were up to while everyone clapped around them.

  Parvati, in her neon orange saree and bouncing gold jewelry, nearly mowed Rachel over in excitement. “Holy shit!” she cried, ignoring the disproving looks in her direction. “I can’t believe he actually came! And look at that! Girl, you’re gonna have to beat off every North Indian auntie in New England to get close to him again!”

  Rachel laughed. “He’s too charming for his own good!”

  “I’ll say! My aunt didn’t even hesitate! She’s probably thinking this is gonna be the last great dance of her life!”

  Great-aunt Dita had such a fantastic I dare y’all to stop this face that no one dared to separate her from Zack’s gyrating body. As soon as the music died down and suddenly boomed a hot bhangra number, two more aunties ran forward and insisted on sharing Zack for the next three minutes.

  “Good thing I’m danced out. Did you try the curry yet? It’s delish.”

  Parvati let out an exasperated sigh. “Girl, you brought the hottest date to my sister’s wedding! You…”

  One of the aunties whispered something into Zack’s ear. He bent back up from her short stature and pointed Rachel out. Both aunties nodded in approval before going back to dancing with him.

  “Uh oh.”

  Rachel knew what that meant. She didn’t need Parvati to tell her.

  Sure enough, a flood of aunties rolled by Rachel and Parvati, coyly suggesting that not only was Parvati the next to get married, but that Rachel might beat her to it. This was all said with knowing winks and elbow jabs to the side.

  “I can’t decide if I’m happy that you’re taking the attention off me,” Parvati began once they were alone again, “or if I’m jealous that you get a guy like Zack. For a while there, I thought Sita was going to dump her
fiancé and go after Zack!”

  Rachel scoffed. “I don’t have a guy like Zack. It’s not like that. You know it.”

  “Girl, you’re boning him on the regular.”

  “We’re not having intercourse. That’s different.”

  Parvati clenched her fists in disbelief. “On what planet? If you’re getting off together and touching each other’s junk, it’s sex! Hate to break it to ya.”

  Rachel didn’t respond to that. She was too busy gazing at Zack and the way he danced with Parvati’s young cousin who was barely out of high school. She was so giddy with excitement that she kept tripping over his feet and apologizing for being a klutz. The ever-gracious Zack brushed her off with one of his most charming smiles. They ended their dance with a hug and the cousin prancing off before her mother could chastise her for dancing like that with a grown man.

  “If you don’t lay claim to him, half of Little Mumbai is going to start praying that he marries one of their daughters by the end of the year.”

  “I thought ‘Little Mumbai’ was obsessed with inter-Indian marriages only?”

  “Trust me. They’ll make an exception for a rich, handsome, young stud like him. They’ll say he was sent by the gods.”

  “It’s not like that,” Rachel said again. “We’re friends fooling around together. He’s seeing other people. I went on that awful date with that girl.”

  Parvati put a hand on her friend’s arm. “And what happened when that date ditched you, hm? Zack swept in and you ended up fooling around some more. You told me all about it!”

  She’s right about that. Rachel wasn’t able to contain herself the day after her terrible date. Parvati had assumed her friend got lucky with the lovely lady. Instead, she was treated to a story about swimming pools and the number sixty-nine. The only thing that continued to shock Parvati was the fact that Rachel and Zack had yet to go all the way.

  “Do you see the way he looks at you?” Parvati shook her head in disbelief. “I’m not getting my hopes up on your behalf when I say he’s got it bad for you. That’s not the way a man looks at a woman he’s fooling around with.”

  Rachel stiffened. “Then what is it?”

  Parvati didn’t hesitate. “That’s the way my new brother-in-law looks at my sister.”

  There’s no way he’s in love with me. Rachel would never entertain that thought. Not seriously, anyway. She knew better than to think a man – let alone one like Zack – could possibly love her in that capacity. Maybe he would love her for a night. A week, if she was lucky. A month, if they truly clicked. Let’s be real, he’s only into me because he’s holding out for PIV. Rachel couldn’t maintain the smile she had only a few minutes ago. Watching Zack sweep across the dancefloor with Parvati and Sita’s mother in her amber saree was like watching TV from another planet.

  If she and Zack truly ended up together, it would end with nothing but paranoia. Every woman would want a piece of him. Rachel would be dealing with that jealousy for the rest of her life. Could there really be enough trust in the world for her to give that part of her heart to a man like Zack? What if he broke it because it was too easy for him to stray? Rich men, handsome men… they both had that going for them. A rich and sexy man like Zack was a giant catch, yes… but he was also one helluva liability to Rachel’s already fragile heart.

  Besides, she would never be able to rely on him. That was like walking brazenly into disaster.

  I owe so much money to the nursing home… That’s what the meeting had been about last week. And when Rachel was done crying herself out on the way home, she had allowed Zack into her bed for the rest of the night. They hadn’t done anything except cuddle and go to sleep.

  See? Just friends.

  Rachel caught Zack’s glance the moment the song ended and his partner wandered off to blush with her friends. A classic Bollywood love song – “Suraj Hua Maddham” – began to play. A hundred women crossed their fingers in hopes that he would ask them to dance.

  He held his hand out to Rachel while Parvati urged her forward.

  “Oh my God, Rachel,” she said. “This guy crashed my place of work to ask for your number! And that was weeks ago! Dance with him!”

  She stepped forward and tentatively placed her hand in his.

  “Out of all the women I’ve danced with tonight,” he said, taking her into his arms and swaying back and forth in time to the music, “and let me say that I’ve had my pick of some of the most gorgeous post-menopausal women this side of the Atlantic…”

  Rachel squeezed his hand, the other draping across his shoulder. His grip sent shivers down her spine. “That last woman you danced with was the bride’s mother.”

  “Like I said, out of all the beautiful women I’ve danced with tonight, I have to say that you’re the one I’m most excited to be seen with.”

  “Those aunties are convinced that you and I are getting married. I think they’re testing me to see if they can set you up with their daughters. Or themselves. Some are lonely widows.”

  “Let them think whatever they want. We came together, anyway. Or did you forget that I’m your plus one?”

  “How could I forget that I came with the biggest star of the wedding?”

  “Hopefully I’m not upstaging the bride and groom.”

  Rachel stole a glance at the happy couple slow dancing, lost in their own blissful world. “Don’t think they mind. Now, if you dance with the bride, her husband might have to kick your ass. He’s already had his shoes stolen once today.”

  “His whatta?”

  “Basically, the bride’s family is supposed to steal his shoes by the end of the night.”

  “This is seriously the best wedding I’ve ever been to.”

  “You mean that? I would think those weddings you go to in Bali or castles in Ireland would be way cooler.”

  “You’ve seen one Irish castle, you’ve seen them all. So…” Zack twirled his partner around, her blue skirt fanning out for half a second, “your place or mine tonight? Come to my place and I’ll make sure your dress is dry cleaned by tomorrow afternoon. My family has an account with the fastest, best place in the city.”

  Rachel wanly smiled. “If you could drop me off at home, that would be great.”

  “You’re trying to tell me that you’re at a wedding and don’t wanna get naughty afterward?”

  “Wasn’t what I had in mind, no.”

  He brought her closer, voice plummeting into her ear. “I could put it in your mind, if you want.”

  “I’m sure you could.”

  “You’re challenging me, aren’t you?”

  Rachel couldn’t help but chuckle. “Maybe a little.”

  “What do I have to do to get your hot ass in my bed tonight, Rachel Taylor?”

  “Stop talking, for one. Sometimes your actions speak louder than words.”

  Zack mimicked zipping his mouth shut before wrapping both arms around Rachel. She hesitated before bracing both hands against his broad shoulders.

  See? That’s all he cares about. Fooling around. Playing pretend in front of a crowd. He’s not really…

  She was dipped backward before she had a chance to protest, let alone process what was happening. When she popped back up again, it was to see his calming countenance in a sea of talking heads and chewing mouths.

  Rachel had been fighting it for weeks. The attraction. The desires. The need to hold him and feel his heart beat next to her own. Basking in his warmth and even warmer scent. Feeling his body against hers, wondering when, if ever, they could become closer. Kisses and fooling around had never been enough. She knew it. He knew it. Even with a hundred climaxes shared between them, none of it was enough as long as they knew it was foreplay.

  But every time Rachel entertained the idea of taking it all the way with Zack – which included calling him her boyfriend – she remembered the promise she had made to herself.

  Wasn’t it curious, though, that this man walked into her life that same day?

&nbs
p; She had been fighting it for weeks: the fact that she was pretty sure she loved him.

  God, wasn’t that frightening? Loving him? Of course she loved him. Why wouldn’t she? This was the man who had been by her side for several weeks, seeing her ups, her downs, and hearing some of the sorriest stories he could ever hear. He saw me crying about my mom. He saw how scared I am of everything… not just the water, but of losing my mom and hot having the money to take care of her…

  Rachel needed him as a friend more than anything else. To lose him now would be like losing a part of herself.

  But she also wanted him as her lover. A lover she could see herself waking up beside for the rest of her life.

  That was love, wasn’t it?

  There’s no way he could ever feel that way for me.

  Zack must have caught on to her energy, for he tipped her head back and kissed her.

  “Nope. Can’t hold it in any longer,” he said. “I wanna talk. Talk, talk, talk.”

  “You can’t stand the silence.”

  “I can, if there’s something worth contemplating.”

  “Like…”

  Zack tightened his hold on her. “Like how much I like being with you.”

  “So it’s not worth contemplating right now?”

  “If you’re here, I’d rather tell you.”

  The song came to an end. Rachel stepped away, teeth firmly on her bottom lip. “I want some cake. How about you?”

  “I’d love to take a break from being the most sought after man at the wedding, yeah.”

  His words were both silly and divinely honest. So much so that Rachel continued to reel from them even after they stumbled to one of the buffet tables and sampled the cake. Especially after Zack insisted on feeding some to her, making sure his fingers remained in her mouth far longer than was kosher for a public wedding.

  “Just want to make sure I don’t get any on your nice outfit,” he said with a wink.

  “I should smear some of this on your face.”

  “Save it for our wedding.”

  Rachel froze while he asked to sample one of the other cakes. The chef behind the table happily handed over the chocolate cake drizzled in strawberry glaze.