by Julie Miller
“Sorry about that,” Conor apologized, balling his handkerchief into his fist. “That’s just the way my mama raised me.”
Joe nodded, looking not at all threatened by any old habits Conor might have that involved his new wife. “Heard you took up drinking.”
One bender the night Lisa had dumped him, and suddenly he was an alcoholic. Conor shook his head. “Is that the rumor?” He nodded toward the doorway where Lisa had slipped out of the reception. “No wonder she’s so worried about me. I swear my only vice is coffee. Strong and black.”
Joe laughed, reminding Conor of the camaraderie they’d once shared. “That’ll eat a hole in your stomach.”
“Standard hazard of the job.”
“I also heard you left the Marshals Service.” Joe pulled back the front of his tuxedo to slide his hands into his pockets. “Does that mean you’ve found someone to settle down with in Kansas City?”
Even the accountant wasn’t above interrogating him. “I’m still a cop.”
“So that’s a no.” Joe’s deceptively casual stance never changed. “It never was a competition between us. You know that, right? I would never move in on your woman. I didn’t ask Lisa out until you two were done.”
His breakup with Lisa didn’t seem to bother Conor as much as it seemed to bother everyone else. But this big ol’ pity party, expressing all this concern for his welfare, was rubbing on his last nerve. “No hard feelings, Joe. Just take good care of her. And make sure she takes good care of you.”
“I will.” Joe extended his hand. His grip felt firm and familiar. “Take care of yourself, too.”
Conor congratulated Joe’s parents and then backed out of the line, turning toward the main reception area.
“Con?” He glanced back to see Lisa hurrying to Joe’s side. Her makeup was all neatly in place again as she called after him. “Save a dance for me, okay?”
Yeah. That wasn’t going to happen. Thankfully, the other guests moving through the reception line demanded the bride and groom’s attention. He wondered just how long he had to stay before anyone else accused him of falling apart or running away.
Longer than Conor had planned, apparently. When one of his mother’s former bridge-playing friends linked her arm through his and invited him to join her and her husband at their table, he resigned himself to at least staying through dinner. But several old friends of his mother’s were at the table, too, and all their efforts to “help him” soured the taste of the prime rib and mashed potatoes he’d taken from the buffet.
“How long are you going to be in town?” Mrs. Martin, one of his mom’s friends, asked as he picked at his cake. “My niece just had her heart broken by a boy she’s been dating since high school. I think you two might have a lot in common.”
Conor set down his fork as the sweet icing curdled in his stomach. Now their concern had graduated to fixing him up with other women? “I won’t be in town that long.”
“I could give you her number for when you come back.”
Once he sold his mother’s house, he wasn’t coming back. “Sorry to hear that she’s unhappy. But no, thank you.” Conor pushed his chair away from the table. “Would you excuse me?” Conor eyed the patterns of foot traffic around the reception hall, taking note of the easiest route to an exit door. Maybe he could get a cup of coffee to go?
And then he spotted one of those sparkly feathered hair clips moving through the chairs and round tables, momentarily diverting him from thoughts of escape. Short, brown hair. Caramel highlights. Cotton candy-pink dress hugging womanly curves he shouldn’t be noticing.
Laura Karr.
When she moved past a table where the guests were seated, he caught a glimpse of her face. Her mouth was creased with frustration as she hurried after the groomsman with the dark hair and glasses. She caught up to him at the edge of the dance floor, grabbed the back of his black tuxedo jacket and forced him to stop and face her. Although there was too much noise with the band playing and the conversations buzzing around the tables to hear anything, he could tell by their body language that it was a heated discussion.
Conor’s gaze narrowed as the groomsman glared down at Laura.
Was that a lovers’ quarrel? Including lover in the same thought as the tomboy next door jarred his equilibrium, but he could tell Laura was upset. Was that guy picking on Conor’s little tagalong buddy? Giving her grief? Why was he so eager to dismiss her?
Conor’s emotions had been on the fritz since receiving the invitation to the wedding. Hell, they’d probably been offline long before that, but he’d just kept himself too busy to acknowledge them. But something pinged on his that-ain’t-right radar and made him curious to know why his longtime friend seemed so distressed—and why Glasses Guy was so intent on shutting her down.
Rescue. It wouldn’t get him out of this place, but it might get him out of his head long enough to forget the awkward discomfort of the evening.
He strode into the crowd of guests. “I’m comin’, Squirt.”
Chapter Two
Laura Karr might be the one person here who’d treat Conor like the guy next door he’d always been—not like the prodigal son returning home, or some poor lost soul who needed to be saved. The groomsman smacked Laura’s hand off his sleeve, and Conor hurried his steps to reach her.
Smacked her?
Uh-uh. That wasn’t gonna happen.
Conor came up behind Laura in time to hear a parting shot from the curly-haired man. “Don’t mess with things you don’t understand.”
Over the top of that glitzy pink fascinator, Conor locked his gaze on to the dark eyes behind the man’s glasses. “Hey, Squirt.” He settled his hand at the nip of Laura’s waist, alerting her to his presence so he wouldn’t startle her, but also warning the other man that she had a friend who’d intervene if the argument turned any uglier. “Is there a problem?”
Laura’s frown transformed into a bright smile when she faced him. “Conor. I was hoping we’d get a chance to connect before you ran off.”
Great. Not her, too. “I came to the wedding, didn’t I? Even brought a gift. I’m not running anywhere.” He kept a friendly grin on his face, ignoring the fact that moments earlier he’d been sizing up the room for his best chance to do just that. Run.
“Sure, you weren’t.” A heavenward roll of her green-gold eyes told him she wasn’t fooled by either the words or the grin as her arms went around his waist in a welcoming hug. But he barely had a chance to complete the hug before she pulled away to stop the other man’s retreat. “Isaac, wait.” She tugged on Conor’s hand and pulled him forward to make introductions. “I want you to meet a friend of mine. Detective Conor Wildman, this is Isaac Royal. He was Joe’s groomsman today. They work together at the accounting firm.”
The man who’d walked Laura back down the aisle at the end of the service blinked rapidly behind his glasses. “Detective? You’re a cop?”
Conor arched an eyebrow at the dumb question. “Generally, that’s what the word means.”
“Conor’s with the Kansas City police,” Laura explained. “He moved to Missouri a couple of years ago.”
Since this seemed important to Laura, Conor extended his hand when the other man didn’t. “Isaac. Nice to meet you.”
Isaac Royal was clearly agitated about something. Did he have a reason not to like cops? Maybe he was just anxious to get away from whatever Laura had been pestering him about. His palm was sweaty when he finally reached out to shake Conor’s hand. “You, too.” He pulled away, adjusting his glasses on his nose. The corner of his mouth hitched up with a smile. “Heard what happened to you with Lisa. Women can be a bitch, right?”
Not the opening to a polite conversation Conor had been expecting. He bristled to his full height. “And some guys can be jerks,” Conor pointed out. “Whatever you two were arguing about, you’d better not be referring to Laur
a. And if you touch her in anger like that again, I will—”
“He won’t.” Laura stepped forward, not needing his defense because, apparently, Isaac’s snide remark hadn’t been about her, after all. “Give Chloe a chance to explain herself. Call her. She’s been absent all afternoon and evening. Aren’t you the least bit worried?”
“Let it go, Laura,” Isaac warned. “This is between her and me. Chloe made her choice.”
“But Lisa was counting on her. What if she’s counting on you? To save her?”
Isaac’s laugh held zero humor. “I’m done being her boyfriend when it’s convenient for her. I’m not picking up her pieces. That woman is not going to hurt me anymore.” Isaac excused himself, taking a shortcut across the dance floor and exiting into the hallway where the restrooms were located.
Feathers and bangles bounced as Laura fumed beside him, visually drilling holes through the archway where Isaac had disappeared.
Still clueless as to the source of the tension, but not liking how it affected his childhood friend, Conor sought some answers. “Everything okay? Do I need to have a man-to-man conversation with Mr. Royal?”
The set of her mouth was still tight even as she joked about his concern. “Just like you had a conversation with Scott Swearingen when I was in the eleventh grade?”
“A guy doesn’t tell a girl he can do better when she asks him to the prom.” Since no one had asked her, Laura had bravely taken the initiative and asked a boy to go with her. There were less cruel ways to say no than to belittle her for her not being the most popular girl in school. “I heard you crying up in the tree house that day. He was an immature jerk who hurt your feelings. What was I supposed to do?”
Laura nudged him out of the way of a row of line dancers sliding past them. “Maybe not go all big brother on his ass and embarrass me? You ambushed him in the parking lot after track practice, basically told him he was an idiot for not seeing the treasure behind my lack of boobs, straight As and wicked sense of humor.”
Conor had prided himself on not throwing a punch that day. “I called him worse than an idiot. And I never once mentioned your boobs.”
Although, mentioning them now, he found himself looking down at the shadowy cleft beneath the lace overlay on her gown—and just as quickly looking away the moment that most male part of him awoke with the knowledge that there was nothing teenagerish, tomboyish or lacking about Laura’s curvy shape now.
“Why do you think I was embarrassed? Do you think any other boy would say yes to me, knowing you were lurking next door, waiting to pounce on them, too, if they so much as looked crossways at me?” She raised her voice as the music crescendoed to its climax. “You should have at least offered to take me to the dance yourself. Now that would have been real chivalry.”
Conor dipped his head closer to hers to continue the conversation without shouting. Ignoring the subtly exotic scent that wafted off her hair and filled his nose, he reminded her of the facts. “I was home on spring break from college. The law frowns upon someone over twenty-one dating a high school kid. I couldn’t take you.”
“And I always thought that big, bad Conor Wildman was a rule-breaker. It was one of the tenets that my teenage adoration of you was based on.”
He grunted a laugh at the idea he’d been any teenage girl’s fantasy. “There are rules. And then there are laws. One of those, I don’t break.”
“Plus, there was that whole dating my big sister thing. That would have been awkward.”
Yep. There was that.
She inclined her head toward the line dancers shuffling their direction again. “I’m old enough to dance with you now.”
Had he imagined the hushed invitation in her voice just then?
He knew he hadn’t imagined that little gut-kick of interest stirring in the pit of his stomach at that surprisingly grown-up, completely feminine tone. Conor hoped she’d been unaware of just how provocative she had sounded.
She was putting him on, right? That had always been their routine—hug, laugh, listen, tease. He was the one who was screwed up, who’d been screwed over by life. There was no way Laura’s offer to dance was meant to sound like a proposition for something more. He’d been celibate and grieving, angry and heartbroken for too long to trust anything his flirt radar was trying to tell him. This was Laura. Same freckles. Same sass. Same smile—sans the braces. The comfort in that familiarity was what he needed to focus on. Not this whole weird awareness of the pretty bridesmaid he was experiencing tonight.
Conor remembered the easy banter between him and Laura. He didn’t remember any verbal innuendo or the voluptuous frame she’d poured into that candy-pink gown. And while it was a relief to find something normal about this long evening, he remembered he wasn’t the only person in this conversation. There were tactics to her rambling. “You changed the subject. What were you and Isaac arguing about?”
“I’m probably being paranoid.” Unlike Lisa, who fit snugly under Conor’s chin, the top of Laura’s head barely reached his shoulder. And that was in the heels she was wearing. Still, he had to admire that the differences in their heights didn’t deter her from tilting her chin to make direct eye contact with him as she spoke. “Isaac dates a good friend of mine, Chloe Wilson. Well, he used to. They’ve been on-again, off-again for a year or so. She lives in the apartment above me. I introduced them.”
“I take it, by the static I felt in the air between you two, that it’s off again?”
Laura nodded. “Chloe was invited to the wedding, too. In fact, she was supposed to help, but she never showed. I’ve called and texted, but she doesn’t answer. Isaac was ignoring me before the ceremony, but I finally caught up with him. He said they broke up for good this time—that she’s seeing someone else. Although, I hate to think about the guy she might have dumped Isaac for.”
“This new guy put up a red flag for you?”
Laura made a derisive sound that was more snort than laughter. “I wouldn’t call him reliable, that’s for sure. I’ve only met him a couple of times. He always has one or two other guys with him, like an entourage. I never spoke with any of them.”
“He’s a party guy?”
“If it’s his own party. He shows up when Chloe’s working. Makes her change plans when they don’t suit him. Maybe she didn’t come to the wedding out of respect for Isaac’s feelings. But she’d have called Lisa or me to let us know she wouldn’t be here. I’d bet money that Vinnie didn’t want her to come.”
“Vinnie’s the new guy?”
Nodding, Laura braced her hand on Conor’s arm and stretched up onto her toes, scanning through the crowd. Conor automatically followed suit, checking the diners and dancers, even though he didn’t know who he was looking for. “You don’t see a blonde about my size wearing ridiculously high heels, do you? I proudly accept that I’m never going to top five-three, but she overcompensates by wearing killer heels all the time. Even to run to the grocery store.”
“I don’t think I’ve seen anyone like that tonight.” To be honest, he realized that he’d been so focused on his own inner demons that he hadn’t paid much attention to any women younger than his late mother, besides Lisa and her sisters. A quick scan of the dance floor and dining area now didn’t reveal any young blondes tottering around on scary heels.
When Laura pulled her hand away, Conor wondered at the imprint of heat that lingered on the skin beneath his jacket. What was wrong with him tonight? There wasn’t anything that felt right or normal about this long-overdue trip home except for Laura. And now he was blowing this reprieve because she’d gone and grown up on him, and he couldn’t get comfortable in his own damn skin around her.
“Chloe doesn’t always make the best choices,” Laura went on. “I worry. I mean, Isaac wasn’t exactly trippin’ her switch, but he was steady, nice.”
The fading red mark on Laura’s hand made him question what
kind of temper Royal was hiding behind that geeky façade. But he’d go along with her for now. “In other words, boring. Let me guess, the new guy drives a fast car, spends a lot of money on her and looks like the lead in the newest superhero movie franchise.”
Laura laughed. “You’ve met Vinnie Orlando?”
“He sounds like a cartoon character.”
Laura butted her shoulder against Conor’s arm, smiling at how he must have nailed the description of a handsome party boy who could turn a woman’s head. “I guess I shouldn’t be surprised that she wants to date someone else. Isaac can be a little...controlling. With his budgets and schedules. Chloe’s a free spirit. She’s an artist. She paints some, but mostly sculpts in clay—animals, human figures, busts. She makes ends meet by waiting tables. She’s got a big heart, but she wants what she wants.”
“That doesn’t sound like a recipe for a successful relationship.”
“I always thought it was an ‘opposites attract’ kind of thing for her and Isaac. She brought him out of his shell. He offered her security. Her home life isn’t much to tell about. Her dad’s been MIA for years, mom’s in prison.” Laura’s sigh was audible above the pounding beat of the music. “Still, I thought she’d come today. She is a friend of the family.”
“It’s awkward when things don’t go the way you planned with the person you love.”
Hazel eyes swiveled up to his. “That rings a little too close to home, doesn’t it? I’m sorry.”
“It’s not your fault, Squirt.” Conor shrugged. “I’m not the man your sister needed. And try as I might to change things, we were never going to be. I wish I’d figured that out sooner. Could have saved a few dings to my heart and my pride.” He tilted his head down to her and winked. “She wants what she wants, too.”
Laura’s hand moved back to that spot on his arm, and Conor felt the squeeze of compassion through the layers of worsted wool and cotton he wore. Then she linked her elbow through his and leaned against his side in what he could only describe as an arm hug. When had Laura Karr become such a toucher? Or had he just never noticed that natural way she made contact with those around her before? “I’m sure today is hard for you. Lisa was so worried you’d crawled off into a dark hole after she announced her engagement to Joe. So soon after losing your mom? People here worry about you.”