Love Me Sweet (A Bell Harbor Novel)

by Brogan, Tracy

  Fontaine sighed. “Isn’t she lovely? You two are so gorgeous you should have your own action figures. I’d play with you all day long.”

  Tyler chuckled, and Grant felt a wave of nostalgia for his little brother who was grown up and about to get married.

  The day went on and was full of sweet, sentimental moments, one right after the other. Grant pulled out his camera and tried to capture it all. His brother Scotty, proud and patriotic in his military uniform, sharing a story with their sisters, who had both grown into beautiful young women. Tyler looking nervous but eager as he buttoned his tuxedo jacket before the ceremony. Their mother in a pale green dress, her arm laced through Carl’s as they walked into the church. Friends and family, everyone smiling. It was a good old-fashioned Bell Harbor lovefest.

  A collective emotion pulsed through the congregation as Tyler and Evie said their vows, clear and certain, followed by a happy group sigh as the bride and groom shared their first kiss as husband and wife. Grant’s chest swelled with pride, but he couldn’t claim it because he’d missed the evolution of this relationship. He’d missed his siblings growing up, their hardships and their triumphs. By his own design, he’d checked out of the family.

  Even today, his camera created a distance, as if he were watching it all from afar, but for the first time in a long time, he wanted to be in the thick of it. Not on the sidelines but right in the middle. Years worth of homesickness plowed into him like a rhino, and suddenly, desperately, he wanted back in.

  Chapter 8

  THE MOST ANONYMOUS GIRL AT a wedding reception is often the one in thick glasses, and tonight, that was Delaney Masterson. No one paid her the least bit of attention. Not the guests, not the servers, not even the wedding photographer. They were all polite, of course. Cordial, friendly, but for the most part, she was invisible—and she couldn’t have been happier about it. For the first time since Pop Rocks had debuted, she was out in public and completely free from observation. No entertainment reporters, no paparazzi, no fans, no haters. Tonight she was in heaven. Pure, nobody-knows-me heaven. It was liberating to shed the costume of reality star, and in the strangest way, she felt more honest tonight than she had in a long time.

  Grant introduced her to people as simply Elaine, and no one seemed to question it. Why would they? Under what circumstances would the daughter of rock star Jesse Masterson and supermodel Nicole Westgate show up at a wedding in Bell Harbor in the middle of winter? She wouldn’t. But Elaine Masters might.

  It didn’t hurt that the drinks were flowing freely, or that everyone, from the bride’s elegant best friend Hilary right down to the elderly woman in a plaid taffeta dress collecting names for the guest book, was focused on the newlyweds. Tyler and Evie were adorable, and so obviously in love Delaney found herself sniffling with emotion on more than one occasion.

  Now here they were at dinner, with Grant in the suit that looked every bit as good as she’d imagined it would, and her in the plainest, beigest sweater she owned, and a brown skirt. She was woefully underdressed—on purpose. She hadn’t brought many fancy clothes from home, and even if she had, it wouldn’t be much of a disguise if she showed up for the wedding in a three-thousand-dollar Dior dress. She couldn’t have afforded that dress on her own, of course, but being a stylist had some nice perks. Namely expensive hand-me-downs.

  The meal was nearly over when the toasts began. She got sniffly again as Scotty, the youngest Connelly brother, stood up and talked about meeting his sister-in-law for the first time, and how he’d known right away that Tyler’s life would never be the same.

  “This is my brother,” he said of the groom at the end of his speech. “He’s taught me a lot about how to be a good man. He’s kept me out of trouble, and he lets me beat him at tennis once in a while. So, although I’m the best man tonight, I think everybody here knows Tyler is the best man every day, and he’s definitely the best man for Evie.”

  Delaney stole a sideways glance at Grant as everyone in the room clapped and then clinked their glasses before drinking. The dining tables were small and only the best man and maid of honor were sitting with the bride and groom, which meant this Connelly brother was relegated to sitting with Donna and Carl. His expression as he gazed at Tyler and Scotty was unreadable, and his ever-present camera sat untouched on the table. Something made her reach over and squeeze his wrist. He was the oldest. It should have been him standing up there as best man, but he smiled at her and she wondered if she was overthinking things. She pulled her hand back into her own lap.

  “So what’s it been like living with my brother?” Aimee asked, much later in the evening, after the dinner dishes had been cleared, the drinks had been refilled several times, and the dancing crowd had grown louder and wilder. Delaney was standing with Grant’s sisters near the bar, nursing a watered-down gin and tonic while the music, fast and pulsing, sent her heart thumping along with the rhythm.

  The strawberry-blonde sister seemed a little unsteady on those four-inch heels, no thanks to several glasses of wine, but Wendy, the other sister, was next to Delaney, sipping from a bottle of water. Her brown-eyed gaze was speculative. Delaney had the sense she was being sized up by that one, like a python measuring its next meal. Hiccup.

  “Living with Grant? It’s been fine,” Delaney answered, adding a deliberately vague tilt to her head. “He’s not there much.”

  “He’ll be around a lot more now that the wedding stuff is over,” Wendy said. “We’re heading back to school, Scotty is going back to base, and Tyler and Evie will be on their honeymoon. You’ll have him all to yourself.”

  Why did that sound like a dare?

  “Well, once he gets my rent money back I’ll move someplace else. In the meantime, I’m sure we’ll both keep ourselves busy. I’ve been learning to knit.” She hadn’t meant to add that last part, but this girl’s stare was very unnerving.

  Wendy arched one dark eyebrow. “Knit? You mean, like . . . with yarn?”

  Delaney hiccupped. It’s quite possible she should have come up with something a little more substantial. Something a little more . . . anything. Learning to knit was not exactly a life goal, nor was it involved enough to fully occupy her days. She’d only had one drink, but apparently it had been enough to muddle her mind.

  “Did you say knit?” The guest-book attendant in the black-and-green taffeta dress shoved her way into the conversation, parking herself right in front of Delaney. The woman was sixty if she was a day, but her curly hair was held back from her face with a sparkly headband that any six-year-old princess-in-training would have loved. “I find knitting simply delightful,” she continued. “My dear friend Anita taught me how to make the most elegant toilette covers. I could show you how, if you’d like.”

  “Hi, Dody,” Wendy said, taking a sip of water. “Have you met Elaine?”

  “Why, I don’t believe I’ve had the pleasure, but aren’t you a pretty thing? I heard all about you from my son, Fontaine, of course. He’s the wedding planner, you know. Aren’t these decorations simply scrumptious?”

  Delaney nodded. “Um, yes. Scrumptious.”

  “I know, aren’t they?” Dody said excitedly, as if it had been Delaney who brought it up first. “Now, about knitting. Did I hear you say you knit?”

  Delaney glanced at Wendy, wondering if either of Grant’s sisters found this woman a little kooky, but neither of them seemed alarmed.

  “Um, yes. In fact, I’m making baby hats to donate to charity, and I’m thinking about working on an afghan, next.” Yes. An afghan. That beefed up her alibi.

  Wendy stared. Drunk Aimee tilted. Dody squinted. And Delaney heard her own voice adding, “Well, I mean, when I’m not working, of course.” She said that about five seconds too late to be convincing.

  “Uh-huh.” Wendy took another sip from the water bottle. “And what kind of work do you do?”

  She couldn’t very well tell them she made
soap, because if they’d ever seen an episode of Pop Rocks, they very well might make the connection. “I’m a . . . travel . . . agent.”

  Shit. That was a terrible choice. Why hadn’t she just said she was a bank teller? Damn mind-muddling gin and tonic. Damn vulture-eyed staring sister.

  “Oh, that’s so exotic,” Dody exclaimed. “You must go to the most amazing places. Tell me, where is the most fabulous place in the entire world to travel to?”

  “Um, Disney World?” Hiccup.

  Oh, God. Another terrible choice! Plus she’d sounded like she was asking instead of telling. The evil-eyed sister was getting her all confused.

  “Disney World?” said Wendy. “Of all the places in the world, that’s the most amazing?”

  “Well, I mean, for a family vacation. If you want exotic locations, your brother could probably answer that better than I could. I mean, I’ve seen brochures for all sorts of fabulous places but he’s actually been to some of them.” She needed an escape hatch right about now. Just one big chute in the center of the floor for her to jump into.

  “You remind me of someone,” Wendy said, her brows pinching together like crab claws.

  “I was just thinking that very same thing,” Dody exclaimed.

  Oh, shit. Escape hatch! Escape hatch!

  “Me? Oh, I have a very common face.” Delaney pulled her bangs down on her forehead.

  “I disagree. I think you have a very distinct face.” Wendy crossed her arms and studied her more overtly.

  Yes. It was official. Delaney liked the wobbly drunk sister better.

  Dody stepped forward and practically looked up Delaney’s nose. “She looks like a young Elizabeth Taylor, don’t you think?”

  Delaney leaned back.

  Aimee cocked her head to the side and puckered her lips in intoxicated contemplation. “Hey, yeah. You remind me of somebody too. She looks like that one girl in that movie with the guy. Which movie was that, Wendy? The one with the guy and the . . . aliens?”

  “No, not that girl,” Wendy answered as if she knew just which movie. It was like that with sisters, that verbal shorthand. Under any other circumstances, this would make Delaney laugh because it reminded her of her own siblings, but this wasn’t the time for that. This was the time for a distraction. Maybe she could spill her drink, or subtly knock the wobbly sister down.

  “I’m telling you, she looks like a young Elizabeth Taylor,” Dody insisted. “Or maybe I’m thinking of that model with the long legs. Oh, or that girl who works at the post office. You know, that snippy one who wouldn’t let me send a fifth of tequila to my pen pal in prison?”

  Delaney’s laughter sounded fake even to her own ears. “Well, I’m not a model, I’ve never been in a movie, and I’ve never worked at a post office either. So I can’t be any of those women.”

  “But you are the woman living with Grant Connelly, aren’t you?” Another woman stepped forward, this one a tall, slender blonde, and Delaney couldn’t decide if she was glad for the interruption or not. But all at once there were six or seven more women surrounding her, and she decided she was decidedly not happy about their interruption. They were all very attractive and dressed in far nicer clothes. She should have worn the Dior. Or better yet, she should have stayed home in that igloo of a house she’d rented because they were all glaring at her as if she were the weakest hyena standing around the fresh carcass of a dead zebra.

  She wished her gin and tonic was full. “I’m not living with him, living with him. I’m just living at the same place. Grant and I . . . we’re just roommates.”

  Escape hatch! Escape hatch! She glanced around the room to see if she could find him, although adding him to this mix would likely be no help at all.

  “I lost my virginity to Grant Connelly,” a slender brunette declared wistfully, twirling a lock of hair.

  Nope. Having Grant here would be no help at all.

  They all turned to gaze at the speaker. She tugged at the neckline of her snug blue dress. “What? Am I the only one?”

  “Nope.” A different brunette, this one in a push-up bra, raised her hand. “Not the virginity part, but, well, you know.”

  Two others raised their hands slowly, looking at each other.

  “Spring break?” one asked.

  “New Year’s Eve,” the other answered, and then they collapsed into coed-caliber giggles and hugged each other like pageant queens. No shit. Delaney had stumbled into a Grant Connelly sexual conquest recovery group.

  “Doesn’t she remind you of someone?” Wendy asked, tapping a finger against her lips, not seeming to care in the least that all these women had apparently banged her brother.

  “I lost my virginity at a wedding reception,” said Dody. They all turned to look at her and she casually fluffed her hair. “Well, not this one, of course. It was my own. And of course, it wasn’t Grant because he wasn’t born yet.”

  “I’m telling you, she looks like the girl from that movie,” Aimee said, listing to the left and then the right.

  All eyes darted back to Delaney, like spectators at Wimbledon.

  She’d taken her fake glasses off at dinner because she couldn’t see her damn knife and fork, and now she felt completely exposed. Not that those silly glasses had probably done much good, but they were something. Then again, why should she feel vulnerable right now? Other than his own sisters and the taffeta-wearing granny, she might be the only woman within ten feet who hadn’t slept with Grant Connelly.

  “She looks like Jeanine Baxter from Channel Six news,” Lost Virginity Girl said abruptly, and suddenly they were all nodding emphatically, even Wendy and Aimee.

  “Yes! That’s who she looks like,” Wendy exclaimed, wiping her hands together as if that was a mission accomplished. “Thank you. It’s been driving me crazy since dinnertime. OK, who needs a drink?”

  That was it? The inquisition was over? Everyone turned toward the bar except Delaney and the busty brunette. The woman stepped closer and leaned in, as if to whisper, but her voice was seagull sharp and loud enough to hear over the music.

  “So how is it, really? He’s been in the jungle so long he must be like a man just getting out of prison. Is it primal?”

  “I have a pen pal in prison,” Dody said, turning back around.

  Delaney bit back a chuckle and was just about to make her second denial of conjugal relations with her housemate when the man himself appeared. Grant had taken off his coat and loosened his tie. His shirtsleeves were cuffed up to his elbows, and he appeared flushed and flustered.

  “Hey, Lindsey,” he said to the brunette with much the same falsely jovial trepidation one might display when welcoming a tax auditor into their home.

  “Hey, yourself, stranger. Long time no see. Are you in town for long?” She held her wineglass against her cleavage suggestively.

  He smiled without showing any teeth. “Oh, you know, all my plans are really up in the air right now.”

  “Hmm. You know what else is fun to have up in the air?” Her whisper was every bit as shrill as before. “My ankles. Call me.”

  Delaney let out a shocked bark of laughter as the woman sauntered away and Grant pressed a hand to his face.

  “That girl used to be in my Sunday school class,” Dody said. “Wicked as a jaybird, even back then. You should stay away from that one, Grant Connelly.”

  “Thank you, Mrs. Baker. I think that’s good advice.”

  “Of course it’s good advice. I’m incredibly wise.” She ambled off, taffeta crinkling.

  “That is good advice,” Delaney added. “In fact, there might be a whole coven of wicked women for you to keep away from.” She pointed toward the bar. “All those lovelies were just explaining to me how well they knew you. Biblically. I thought you Catholic boys behaved better than that.”

  Grant turned to see the cluster of his old conquests a
nd had the decency to blush.

  “That’s . . . wow . . . sorry.”

  She should probably be appalled at his sexual history, but if he was a black kettle, she was the pot, and she had the video to prove it. “You don’t have to apologize to me. I’m just the human shield between you and your family, remember? And I think I’ve done my job admirably.”

  He smiled at her, with teeth. And dimples. That was a real smile. One he hadn’t shared with the ankle-waving brunette. “Yes, you have, and thanks. I appreciate it. You’ve been awesome. I think I have to do the rest of the fence-mending with my relatives on my own, though. That’s what I came over here to tell you.”

  Delaney felt a sudden shift in her mood, like a balloon wilting from lost oxygen, or one of those toys where you push the bottom and the legs collapse.

  Grant loosened his tie a little more. “You’re welcome to stick around as long as you like,” he said, “but I’m going to spend the night at my mother’s house tonight. Scotty and my sisters will both be there, and Aunt Tina too, so I just feel like I should be a part of that. I can drive you home if you want, since the roads are bad, but the power should be back. A couple of our neighbors are here and said it went on about an hour ago.”

  The balloon went completely flat, and shriveled. He was telling her she could leave. Not that she should leave, of course, just that she could. Her value to him had depreciated as his value with the family increased. It made her feel a little used, but that was silly. She hadn’t really wanted to come to this thing in the first place, so why feel glum that he didn’t need her anymore? It didn’t make sense, except that being surrounded by so much love made her realize she missed human beings—when they weren’t snapping photos or trying to twist her words for a magazine article. She certainly missed her own family.

  That was hardly Grant’s problem, though.

  “Oh, I can get myself back to the house. It’s not very far.” She wanted him to insist she stay, but he pulled a folded napkin from his pocket.