by Moira McTark
Lara stopped mid-step, her eyes darting briefly over to her sister. She looked nervous. Suddenly, he felt like a jack-off. Even if she was the prissy witch from Vegas, she was still a person, a woman with family and he’d just humiliated her in front of two of them.
Dette’s gaze shifted back and forth between them, her smile looking a little less easy. “It’s like that commercial, with the fake names. What happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas. Isn’t that what you told me, Lara?”
Lara, Eve, whoever she was, smiled stiffly. “Sure. Just like that.” Cocking her head to the side, she glowered down at him.
Her eyes were intense, more so than he remembered. And the look she burned into him left him feeling smarmy and low. Almost like he’d betrayed her in a way he didn’t totally understand.
After a beat, she shook her head dismissively. “Isn’t there supposed to be some sort of camaraderie between tourists? An understanding of sorts? I guess they’ll have to change that slogan to nothing stays in Vegas.”
Adam was shaking his head, chuckling as he rocked on the balls of his feet. “Lara, never would have pegged you for the type. Cal, looks like you’ve already met her after all, sport. But at least the introductions, as much fun as they’ve been, can come to a close. I don’t know about any of you, but it’s after five and after this…a stiff drink is definitely in order.”
Crossing to Adam, Dette draped her arms around his neck and nuzzled into him. “I’m positively parched. A cocktail sounds wonderful.”
As they rounded the corner, heading out to the terrace, she threw a quick smoky glance back at Cal and erupted in a bubbly overload of laughter. His back tensed at the sound—these sisters had a lot in common.
With Dette, Adam and Keith gone, Lara seemed to let off some of her bravado. She walked past him, her gaze averted. Good. His disappointment was following true to nature, taking the testosterone path to manifest in a flash of anger rather than hurt. He was pissed, at her, at himself, in general.
His instincts had gone to shit. No wonder Adam was trying to steer him clear of her. Cal had spent one dreadful night with her—apparently in the role of Eve—and he’d been ready to chew his arm off the next morning to get away. Talk about a mistake. And one he sure as hell was not going to repeat, obviously she’d been scamming him for weeks. Playing the sweet girl, pretending that ugly side he saw in Vegas didn’t exist. He should have known it was too good to be true. Online she could convince him she was anyone she wanted to be. What an ass he’d been to think he could really know someone—think he could fall for them…
Cal reached out to grab her, needing to clarify in no uncertain terms that, internet promises or no, there would not be a second round to the Vegas nookie fiasco. She’d played him for the fool long enough. After that show of open hostility on the stairs though, he was pretty sure it wasn’t going to be an issue.
His hand grazed her arm, catching above her elbow, and suddenly his mind was blank except for the smooth feel of her skin beneath his palm. His grip eased, skimming down to her hand. She stopped and looked back at him, a question softening her green-gold eyes. Then, in a blink, they turned hard and unreadable.
Shaking his head slightly, all thoughts of telling Lara to forget about hooking up were tamped down by blood pounding through his head and chest, racing lower in his body.
Lara looked down at their joined hands.
With an uneasy laugh, he let go. “I’m sorry.”
He didn’t even know why he was apologizing. For grabbing her? For the disaster they were together in Vegas? For being so wrong about who he thought she was—then or now? He didn’t know which. For wanting to back her against the wall—for wanting to get inside her the second he touched her? Whatever it was, the abbreviated apology was as far as it went.
And it seemed Lara couldn’t care less. Without a word, she turned and walked from the room.
Raking his fingers through his hair, Cal spun around feeling like the cast and crew of Candid Camera was going to pop out at any second. As his gaze tracked past the open hallway leading to the East wing of the second floor, he caught sight of a blonde in a red sweater, who had to be another sister or close relative based on her resemblance to Lara and Dette. She was staring down at him, her arms crossed over her chest and a scowl etched across her face.
What the hell had he gotten himself into?
Chapter Three
The chimes of toasting glasses filled the cool evening air as friends and family mingled over cocktails at small black iron tables around the field-stone terrace. As the sun set, lights suspended overhead began to glow against the darkening hues of the evening sky. With only five days until the wedding, it was a time for celebration and talk of plans to come, but, camped out at the bar, Lara could only think of one thing.
Caleb Daniels had slept with her sister.
Never in her life had she felt more humiliated, more disappointed, and more of a fool than right now. She’d walked out of Dette’s room before she knew who he was, and by the time she realized it was Cal standing in the foyer with Adam, it was too late to run and hide. If he hadn’t been blocking her path to the door, she might have fled the house and state of Massachusetts without a word of goodbye to anyone. Taken her shame and snuggled up with it in the privacy of her own apartment.
She’d been an idiot to invest any feelings into a sham internet relationship. It was ludicrous. How easy it must have been to omit certain details about his lifestyle and tastes, and what a fool she was not to bother questioning. Of course, what was he supposed to have said? That he made a habit of one-nighters in Las Vegas? Probably not. Regardless, Cal wasn’t the man she thought she’d been dealing with. How could she have really expected to know who he was, though? She’d never even met the man.
And, she thought, hanging her head into her hand as the burn of embarrassment crept up her neck for the thousandth time in the past ten minutes, she’d had sex with him…sort of. She’d never even considered doing something like that before, but she’d done it with him.
She’d placed her heart on the line and made herself vulnerable in a way she never believed she could—and he’d probably been laughing the whole time. But then what did that moment in the foyer mean? She’d felt the spark, the connection. She wanted to ask him flat out if he’d felt it too, but even if he had, so what? Even if he’d been as serious about their relationship as she had, he’d slept with Dette! Of all the women in the world, why her?
It certainly wasn’t the first time a guy had shown interest in both of them. So close in age, they’d been sifting through the same sandbox of guys in high school and college. But Dette always got the guys. Not that Lara was one to compete. If someone was sniffing around Dette, it all but ensured that Lara wasn’t going to have enough in common with him to make the challenge worth the prize. She’d thought it would be different with Cal. Her sister was getting married and this man presented himself as someone who didn’t care for the glitz. But then Dette had been his taste after all. In a city with over thirty-two-million visitors annually, he’d picked Dette’s glamour and flash for a roll between the sheets.
Asshole.
Lara tried to keep her eyes on the glass clutched in her hand, tried not to steal another long glance at the back table by the pool. But it was impossible. She knew he was there. And damn him, why did he have to be so incredibly sexy? Since he’d touched her, every nerve in her body had been battling against her doubting mind and screaming out for more. Dragging the air in through her nose, she scrunched her eyes shut and leaned back against the tiki bar. Don’t look at him, it’ll only make things worse.
“What the hell are you doing?” Bitty’s voice pierced the darkness.
Lara squinted one eye at her, hoping to keep the sexy cause of all her troubles out of her periphery. “I can’t begin to explain what’s happened today, Bitty, don’t even ask.”
“Are you drunk?”
“Please. My stomach is so tied in knots, I’m barely choking down
my ginger ale.”
“If you’re not shit faced then I’m wondering what this Popeye business is.”
Popeye didn’t sound attractive or inconspicuous and when Bitty demonstrated her squinty impression, Lara’s cheeks flamed.
She was being stupid and probably looked like some sort of stalker too. Watching from the far side of the terrace, pretending her attention was anywhere other than on him. It was pathetic. Lara straightened and looked her cousin square in the eye. “I’m fine.”
“Sure, that’s definitely the vibe I’m getting from you right now. Fine.” Bitty was staring her down. She was good at it. As a trial lawyer, she had the skills to elicit information she desired, and it seemed she was intent on using them to find out what Lara had gotten involved in.
But Dette’s future was on the line, so Lara was going to have to squirm in the hot seat for now. Playing dumb was a good place to start. “What?”
Bitty’s eyes narrowed. “Oh nothing, I just find it fascinating that while you were ogling your best man at the window, you didn’t recognize him as the guy you boinked in Vegas last month…until Dette reminded you. And I’m really interested in why you changed your clothes and hair at four o’clock this afternoon making yourself look shockingly like your trouble-come-hither sister. So I ask again, what are you doing?”
“Keep your voice down,” Lara whispered between clenched teeth. Heart racing, she scanned for anyone who might have overheard and then grabbed her cousin and pulled her away from the crowd a few paces further. “I know Dette hasn’t always been fair to you, that she’s made some mistakes we’d all like to forget about, but do you really think I’d be doing this if it wasn’t important?”
“Lara, I don’t know what to think. You were on cloud nine waiting for your Cal to show up. Then, the first chance you get to speak to him, you act like someone you are not and pretend to be his crappy fling from Vegas. If Dette made this bed, she should be the one to sleep in it.”
“You think it was crappy between them?” Lara’s hand flew up to cover her eyes. As if the quality of their sex was the thing that mattered. Still, she needed to shake her protective cousin off her guard. “Bitty, there’s more to this one than Dette’s bad judgment.”
Bitty raised one disbelieving eyebrow at her and tapped her foot. “Is there?”
“Yes, you’re just going to have to trust me.”
“Here’s the problem with that, Lara. When it comes to Dette, you walk around with blinders on. She plays you, every chance she gets. Remember when she broke your mother’s vase and she said you did it—”
“No, I agreed to take the fall for that one, she wouldn’t have said it if—”
“She throws you under the bus, every time it drives by. How about the time she wrecked the car because she was drunk, and she made you say that you were driving?”
“She would have gotten a DUI—” Lara shook her head. With Dette, it was never as simple as Bitty made it out to be.
“Yes! Because she drove drunk and crashed a car. She’s not a victim, but you never see it that way. Dette is in trouble all the time, because Dette likes trouble. She likes it wrapped in designer clothes, she likes it at the most exclusive clubs, but no matter how she dresses it up, it’s still trouble. So, this time, why don’t you just let her have it?”
“This time, she’s getting married.”
Bitty’s head dropped forward in a slow nod. “Okay, but you are making a monumental mistake sacrificing your happiness for hers. She wouldn’t do it for you.”
A dark spot of memory flashed fleetingly through her mind.
She was a little girl, crying softly against Dette’s shoulder in their parents’ empty room. Dette whispered into her ear.
“Shh, I’ll get them back for you. Don’t cry. I’ve got a plan for so much trouble, they’ll have to come home.”
Lara met her stare. “That’s not true. You don’t understand.”
Bitty shook her head. “No. You’re the one who won’t understand.” She gave Lara’s arm a soft squeeze and walked back to the guests on the terrace.
A breeze blew through, making the lights strung over the terrace dance. It was a beautiful evening, but Lara had lost her interest in the whole party. She walked back over to the bar and set her ginger ale down. There were a million things to do to get ready for Saturday. Maybe if she went inside and worked on some of them, she’d be able to distract herself from the disaster of her day and save a little stress for everyone else in the week to come.
Lara looked over at Cal seated with two of her uncles and some of Adam’s relatives. He leaned back in his chair, his warm easy laughter echoing across the terrace. She lost all thought of leaving. How could laughter sound sexy? Everyone around him was laughing too. So he was as funny in person as he was in his emails. Lara was never going to forgive Dette for this.
As she watched, Cal leaned forward, grabbed his beer and looked up, catching her eye. Finishing the last swallow, he pushed back from the table and headed her way. Her stomach clenched and the skin tightened across her body. Desperate for something to take her attention off his approach, she grabbed her glass off the top of the bar and took a long sip.
“Interest you in some sex on the beach?”
Lara choked on her soda, nearly spraying a gulp out her nose. “Excuse me?”
Cal looked at her uneasily. “Your drink…in Vegas you said that’s all you ever wanted but, maybe, that was just a come on?”
Heat rose in her cheeks. Dette. “Probably.”
The silence between them hung in the air for a moment until Cal cleared his throat and glanced around at the guests surrounding the pool. “Funny, seems like whenever we’re actually together, we don’t really have anything to talk about, but emailing we hit it off. Maybe we should get our cell phones out and text message each other from across a table.”
A smile curved at one side of her mouth. So, he really hadn’t clicked with Dette in Vegas. And he really had clicked—over the keys anyway, with her.
She looked at Cal’s thick fingers wrapped around the neck of his empty beer bottle. “I don’t know. I have a hard time believing you can manage to dial a phone with those fingers, let alone text a conversation on one of those tiny phones.”
Cal flexed his free hand and chuckled. “You know what they say about guys with thick fingers?”
Lara rolled her eyes. “They wear big gloves.”
A wide grin split Cal’s face and Lara suddenly felt every muscle in her body loosen. She turned to face him, smiling in return. Maybe their relationship didn’t have to be over, maybe what had happened wasn’t as bad as she thought…
Cal held her gaze. His eyes were blue, intense, with tiny laugh lines etched into the corners.
They were eyes she could get lost in, eyes she was lost in. Butterflies danced in her belly and blood raced past her ears. She opened her mouth to speak—
“Reunions always make me cry. Don’t they get to you guys too?”
She hadn’t even noticed Adam and his posse of snickering groomsmen approaching the bar.
He rattled the ice in his empty glass before tossing a cube into his mouth and chewing it while he talked. “Maybe you two should get a room. I mean another room.”
Keith flanked Adam and cast a wink her way. “I don’t know, Lara, I’m seeing you in a whole new light here. It’s not half bad from where I’m sitting.” Then the others were joining in as well.
Lara closed her eyes, wanting to die of embarrassment. “Funny, guys.”
Suddenly Cal’s smooth voice cut through the barrage of jokes coming from the gaggle of men behind Adam. “Yeah, it’s crazy how you can meet someone in one city and then run into them states away within the same month. Small world.”
He was diffusing the situation, suggesting by the ease in which he faced the innuendo, there was nothing sordid involved. He was defending her. Or Dette. Or something. Her hero.
Whatever it was, Adam seemed to get the hint and, slapping Cal
on the shoulder, walked past to refill his drink.
Lara smiled at Cal, who was watching her intently. She mouthed the words to him, “Thank you.”
His brow furrowed as he looked at her, like he saw something that didn’t make sense.
Blinking quickly, Lara turned away, hoping to block whatever telling clue he was seeing. This was no good. She had to get away from him. “I’ve got to go. There are some…things that need my attention,” she finished lamely.
Without giving herself time to make the situation any worse, she backed away from the congestion of groomsman and started around the pool toward the house. She felt the heat of his eyes on her back and, swallowing hard, turned to look. Cal was watching her like he didn’t want to see her go. His lips quirked and—she tripped over the leg of a chair, swung around in what could only be considered a flail, rolled her heel, and caught herself just before going down. It was hideous.
Ow! She glanced back and Cal was already moving. Throwing a hand up behind her, she gave a short laugh and shook her head. “Just my pride. I’m okay.”
“You sure?” He asked from a few feet away, concern furrowing his brow.
She nodded. “My pride and maybe my toe. But mostly pride, just pretend you didn’t see it.”
“I didn’t see anything, I don’t even know what you’re talking about.”
That disarming smile of his had heat coursing through her body and a slow smile curving on her lips. He was cute. With a sideways jerk of his head back toward the party he held out his hand, inviting her to return. Her gaze slid over him and she wondered what the harm would be? Taking one step though, clarity slapped back into place. There was Dette, hands on her hips, a scalding stare burning across the terrace directly into her.
Lara’s smile crumbled. The harm was Dette’s future and potentially her own heart. She turned and walked stiffly back to the house. She needed to keep her distance. She needed to keep her head. She needed to go.