Serena was winning so far—they all knew that—and was in a wonderful mood.
Everyone was happy Lisa was bringing a stand-in for her groom in Afghanistan. She’d decided on her father, who was from Johns Island and had never stayed at the beach, even though he lived a few minutes’ drive away. He planned on making the group his prize Frogmore Stew, a Lowcountry specialty, one night. Henny was kind enough to give him his own suite, too, and as he was a disabled veteran, they put him on the first floor, facing the beach.
They’d just gotten to dessert when Carol put down her spoon. “I’ve loved hanging out with y’all, but throughout this dinner, I have to admit, I’ve felt very uncomfortable.”
There was a beat of silence.
“You did?” Greer asked, feeling concern. “I’m so sorry.”
“Me, too.” Lisa swallowed a bite of carrot cake. “I couldn’t tell.”
“I couldn’t, either,” said Toni, putting her spoon down by her chocolate mousse.
“What’s wrong?” Serena asked softly.
She and Greer exchanged a worried glance over their cappuccinos.
Carol hesitated, then whispered, “I want to stay single.” It was hard to hear her with all the background noise in the restaurant, but her sad expression said it all.
Greer was genuinely surprised. Her new friend had looked so happy with her partner. “Wow,” she said. “That’s big news.”
“It is,” Carol said. “I was thinking about breaking up with my fiancée already, but now I know for sure, after sitting here and seeing all of you look so in love.”
The women started talking at once, trying to comfort her.
“Are you sure?” everyone asked in one way or another.
“Yes,” she said with shiny eyes, although no tears fell. “And I don’t want to continue in the contest.”
“But you can stay in as a partnerless bride,” Lisa reminded her.
“It would be tacky coming off a split-up, though,” Toni said.
“That’s for her to decide,” Greer said. Toni obviously wanted one less person in the competition.
“If you did stay in, you’d stand no chance,” said Lisa, “with the way the rules discriminate against partnerless brides.”
“Oh, my God, partnerless brides really are becoming a thing,” Serena murmured to Greer, who actually felt a little bit proud she’d coined the phrase.
They talked about Carol’s dilemma a few more minutes, and then she smiled. “I feel much better, actually, making my decision. I’m sticking to it. Please don’t feel bad for me.”
Lisa put her hand over hers and squeezed.
“You said we all look in love,” Toni said to Carol. “But we know Greer isn’t.”
She was always bringing that point up.
* * *
Greer sat up straighter. “Carol was only speaking in general terms.” She turned to Carol. “You had a lot on your mind that you wanted to share.”
“I meant what I said,” Carol said. “All of you, including Greer, look and act in love. And I was thinking, ‘one of these people is not like the others.’ It wasn’t Greer. It was me.”
“But…” Greer could hardly speak. “But I’m not in love. Not yet. I don’t know when it will happen … or even if.”
Carol chuckled. “You could have fooled me. Look at her, everyone! Look at the sparkle in her eye! And the way she’s”—she got a little choked up—“she’s happy. It’s so obvious.” She sighed. “And I’m not. Not like you four, at any rate.”
So everyone started looking at Greer.
Greer widened her eyes. “Hey, I was happy before this contest, okay?” But she knew something was slowly changing in her, and it had everything to do with getting closer to Ford.
“You’re right,” said Toni to Greer. “You’re not any different than you were at the beginning. I don’t care how awesome you and your convenient groom looked together at the bake-off, especially when you were making out.”
Serena eyes Greer speculatively. “You do have a crush on Ford. Who wouldn’t?”
“Yes, well”—Greer scratched the side of her nose—“he’s cute, I’ll give him that.”
“He’s way more than cute,” Serena said. “He’s got it all. Looks, smarts, talent, and … and.…” She stopped talking. A blush spread across her cheeks.
“Wesley’s such a nice guy,” Greer reminded Serena.
“Of course, he is,” Serena agreed, and raised her finger to attract the waiter. “Sometimes, though, I wonder if I’m just inventing this love between us. Out of desperation or something. And I can’t help comparing him.…” She shook her head. “Forgive me, ladies. I’m so sorry I have to go now. I have a little more packing to do.”
The other women looked at each other.
“Serena,” Lisa said, “Are you sure you don’t want to talk about it?”
Serena smiled. “I’m fine. We’re fine.”
“It’s natural to have doubts sometimes,” Carol said. “You wouldn’t be human if you didn’t. It’s when those questions keep torturing you that you know you need to step back.”
Toni and Lisa agreed.
Greer did, too, even though her circumstances were different. She couldn’t say she and Ford were a couple. They had a fake engagement, and everyone knew. She couldn’t say they were in love, either. But wasn’t every relationship a constant walk of trust? The stress of always keeping your heart open could sometimes get to a person.
Even if she’d wanted to take Serena aside to reassure her, she couldn’t. They gathered around Carol to say a special good-bye. She wouldn’t be coming to the beach.
“Wish me luck, ladies,” she said. “This isn’t going to be easy. But I know it’s the right thing to do.”
Wesley arrived then and watched the women share a big group hug and a promise to get together sometime in the future for lunch, when Carol was ready. When the final good-bye was made, he and Serena walked rapidly away. Serena was holding tight to his hand.
Greer took off in the opposite direction to walk home—alone—to the Baker House. Walking by herself in Charleston had always been such a pleasant experience for her. But that night, she felt lonely, for the first time since she could remember. She immediately wondered what Ford was up to, especially as she’d begged off posing for the portrait so she could go to dinner with the other contestants. This weekend at the beach, they could make up the time, she’d told him.
She decided to call Ella. Now that Macy was married, she was less inclined to call her out of the blue. It had been a year, but Macy and Deacon were still in the honeymoon phase, and no telling what they were getting up to at ten P.M.
“How are things progressing with the portrait?” Ella asked.
“He’s getting antsier, less happy about it instead of more,” Greer said. “I have no idea if that’s typical of artists, and when I tried to ask him, he gave me a vague answer.”
“Artists.” Ella sighed. “They’re so complicated.”
“They sure are.” Greer stepped from the curb to cross the street to Colonial Lake.
“So how’s the sex?” Ella asked.
Greer laughed. “You’ve got a one-track mind.”
“Of course. I still can’t believe you guys haven’t gone all the way. But I get it, what with him being so wrapped up in his ex and her pregnancy.”
“It’s just better for me this way,” said Greer. “Last time I was at the studio, we went up to the roof after he finished working. The stars were out, he brought up a blanket, and we had some wine. We talked a lot about the portrait.”
“And?”
“And then we had our best sex-capade yet.”
“Lucky!”
Greer laughed. “It was so awesome to be outside, right there in the city with no one the wiser.” She remembered the cool sea breeze on their skin. Any laughter, sighs, and moans they’d made blended into the nighttime sounds coming from the streets below.
“You might be the queen of al
gorithms at work and a math whiz,” said Ella, “and you might act like a surrogate mother to your clients, putting their needs before your own, as we are wont to do at Two Love Lane, but gosh, Greer, you deserve this so much.”
“Thanks.” It was true—being with Ford made her realize she needed to be kinder to herself. She thought of the way he observed her from behind his easel, with nonjudgmental, appreciative eyes, and when he held her close and lavished tender, passionate kisses all over her body.
“I think you like him,” said Ella. “I mean, really, really like him.”
“I do,” said Greer. “And it makes no sense at all.” She paused a beat. “I mean, we don’t fit the algorithms.” She and Ella had checked that past weekend, using every bit of information they had to get a decent compatability reading.
“What have I always said?” Ella asked. “Love knows no logic. Number crunching doesn’t always predict who falls in love, and it can’t explain why.”
“I’m not in love,” said Greer.
“Oh, yeah?” Ella chuckled.
“Hey,” said Greer. “Are you laughing at me?”
“No.” Ella’s tone was airy. “I just like seeing you out of your comfort zone.”
“I’m fine,” Greer said, but her friend had already hung up.
Greer’s new bedroom had definitely taken her out of her comfort zone, with its pink and diamond accents and its Elvis pics. She threw her purse on her pink armchair. “What’s going on with me?” she asked Fern. Greer couldn’t hide anything from Fern. She sure looked beautiful in her big pink bow.
You love him, Fern said without speaking, without moving a single leaf.
“You, too?” Greer scowled at her favorite housemate, then crawled into her much softer bed and looked up at the ceiling, at the silly Baywatch poster Jill had put there. She admitted to herself that she’d gone past the crush phase with Ford. On the roof of the old cigar factory, fooling around like a carefree chick in her young twenties instead of the thirty-year-old businesswoman she was now, she’d never felt happier.
But if she was so happy, why were hot tears falling steadily from her eyes into her ears? And why were sobs choking her throat? Ford was only here temporarily, and he might be a father. He had never told her he loved her, had never acted like they had anything particularly special beyond friendship and a mutual physical chemistry.
Where was the soul-mate stuff? Had they ever genuinely connected that way?
The honest answer was yes, twice, but both times had been fleeting. They’d connected at the auction when he’d left, and she’d never forget how he’d nodded to her, and she’d acknowledged him—as if the souls of two strangers were saying hello. It happened again when he’d proposed to her onstage. She’d seen something in his eyes that moved her, that made her feel it was just the two of them, and the world was far away.
But apart from those two occasions, they’d never examined what was between them. They’d only focused on their own agendas—which was smart. It was also practical and showed a lot of maturity.
“To hell with maturity.” She sat up on her elbow and wiped her tears with her arm. “If this is love,” she told Fern, “I’m miserable. I want to fall out of it as fast as I can.”
Fern’s leaves drooped. She was indifferent, maybe even amused, the same way Ella had been.
“Love’s supposed to be great,” said Greer, and pulled a pillow over her head.
But she couldn’t hide, even in her sleep. She dreamed she and Ford were making out in the pink armchair. They had the best sex she’d ever had, and when she woke up the next morning to get ready for the last challenge of the La Di Da contest, she wondered if he’d stick to their promise not to touch each other at the beach.
He could try, but she was one “Working Diva Without a Man” who wasn’t going to keep her hands off him anymore. The walls were coming down. She’d rather have mindless, fabulous sex with Ford than worry about shielding her heart from him. That was boring.
After seeing Carol break up and Serena express mild doubts about Wesley, and then Jill being mixed up about her boyfriend, Greer realized everything in the love game was risky. It was useless to protect herself.
Life was short.
And Ford was hot—too hot for his own good.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
Ford packed up his easel, his canvas, his paints, brushes, and solvent and headed to Greer’s house in Drake’s SUV to pick her up. It was time to go to the Isle of Palms for the La Di Da beach weekend. He was so used to not being invited up to her apartment that he was shocked when she told him through the intercom that she needed him to come up.
“You parked in a good place?” she asked.
“Yes. I got lucky.” Parking in Charleston was difficult. And he wasn’t used to driving with the steering wheel on the left, nor did people in the U.K. have the massive cars Americans drove. It had taken him a few minutes to parallel park between a Beemer and a Honda Accord. By the time he was done, he was sweating.
The buzzer sounded and he opened the door, went up the elevator, and knocked on 3-A. No one came. He knocked again.
“Just a minute,” she called from inside.
Thirty long seconds later, she opened the door. She wore a pretty floral robe that skimmed her thighs. “Come on in,” she said.
“Sure.” He walked in, and she shut the door behind him.
“Hey,” she said, and when he turned around again, she was completely naked.
She was gorgeous and sexy, and he wanted her like he’d wanted no other woman. “You look incredibly hot,” he said, and pulled her close. Her hour-glass figure was made to be adored.
She shook her head and smiled. “Let’s go see my room.”
“Wait,” he said, and kissed her first, a long, slow kiss that he didn’t want to break.
She didn’t, either, judging by the way she clung to his neck. But when he slid a hand down to her rear and pulled her against his erection, she pushed her hands on his chest. “Wait,” she said, sounding a little breathless. “Let’s go see my room.”
He was happy to follow, but he wasn’t going to make this easy for her. “I thought we weren’t supposed to fool around. You texted me. You told me to forget it. You said you had to look for the real thing. Love with a capital L.”
“I never mentioned love,” she flung over her shoulder.
“You might as well have,” he said. “You said you needed to find a real partner.”
“Okay, so I did,” she said.
But before he could answer, he was assailed with pink. Leopard spots. Diamonds galore. Baywatch.
Elvis!
“This is…” He looked around. Even the fern wore a huge pink bow. “Colorful. Uh, spirited.”
“Welcome to my loving space,” she said with a shy smile.
Her loving space? The polite Englishman in him came to the fore. “It’s enchanting. In its own way.”
“This used to be my living space,” she explained. “But now it’s my loving space, thanks to my friend Jill at Erospace Designs. Eros. Get it? The god of love.”
“Oh, that’s clever. I was thinking aerospace, as in NASA.”
“It’s a play on words.” She gulped. “I’m her guinea pig client. She removed all my bedroom furniture and redecorated this way, claiming that my sex life would take off. And I have to say, even though I was highly skeptical, it did. That very same night she put in the furniture, I kissed you at The Rooftop.”
“And that was some kiss. Do you think this”—he spread his arm wide—“is responsible for our incredibly good chemistry?”
She laughed. “Who knows? It’s fun, at any rate.” She took his hand. “I want you in my bed, Ford. No more stopping.”
He picked her up right then and there and tossed her on the bed. She gave a cry of delight as he pulled off his shoes and trousers.
“Spread your legs, cupcake,” he said.
“Cupcake? I can’t believe you called me that,” she said with a l
augh, and bounced in place. Then she did as she was told.
He reveled in the view as he unbuttoned his shirt. “We had our reasons for holding back.” He bent, pulled his wallet out of his trousers on the floor, and removed a condom. “But I can’t think of any right now,” he said, pulling the latex sheath on. “I can’t think of anything but you and how perfect you look on your leopard-spotted bed. I’d love to make love to you.” He crawled on top of her, and she shuddered a little in his arms.
They already knew each other’s bodies so well, knew exactly how to bring each other to the ultimate pleasure.
“No foreplay,” she murmured in his ear. “I’m ready.”
He teased her with his fingers, and she whimpered. “Yes, you are,” he murmured. He couldn’t hide that he was, too. He bent low and lathed her nipple with his tongue.
She groaned. “I’m tired of being mature.”
He smiled into her warm, woman-scented flesh. “It’s a burden sometimes.”
“I don’t care anymore,” she murmured, and ran her hand down his side, then cupped him with warm, eager fingers.
Exquisite torture.
“About what?” he managed to say.
“About protecting my heart.” She wrapped her hand around his erection. “It’s not really living, and I want to live.”
“Good God, so do I,” he said, gritting his teeth.
“I want you inside me.” She was beginning to sound more herself. Sure, not strained, the way she had been when he’d first arrived. “I want to be filled with you.”
“You’re beautiful,” he said, his voice like gravel.
The clock ticked behind them.
He looked down at her, and her eyes were smiling.
“This,” he said, and entered her, plunging deep.
She closed her eyes, turned her head to the side. “Ford,” she whispered. “Ford.”
He began a slow stroke, in and out. There was something different about making love to her properly. He felt even more protective of her. He also liked her that much more. Something locked into place that had never locked into place before.
A Wedding At Two Love Lane Page 20