Wedding Party Collection: Once A Bridesmaid.... Avril Tremayne

Fifty Shades of Leo—but no wife. No steady girlfriend, even, right? No...love...perhaps?’

      He felt his jaw clamp. God, he’d love to show her fifty shades of Leo. She wouldn’t be looking at him in that curious bird way at the end. ‘That’s not the point,’ he ground out.

      ‘That’s exactly the point. What’s wrong, Leo? Not enough room in there?’ She leant over and tapped her fingers on his chest, right over his heart. Into his heart, it felt like. ‘I don’t think you should be lecturing me just because I have sex without love the same as you do.’

      ‘You’re supposed to want them both.’

      She tossed her head. ‘Well, I don’t. I won’t. Ever. And glowering at me isn’t going to change that.’

      ‘I’m not glowering. I don’t glower.’

      ‘Oh, you so do. It’s kind of cute.’

      ‘I’m not cute.’

      ‘Sure you are—in that I’m-a-typical-male-hypocrite kind of way.’

      ‘I’m not a hypocrite either.’

      ‘Go and get yourself nicely monogamised and I’ll believe you.’

      ‘Monogamised isn’t a real word.’

      That twitch at the side of her mouth.

      Leo felt his temper surge. ‘And I am monogamous.’

      ‘Yeah—but one-after-the-other monogamy doesn’t count if there’s a hundred in the pipeline.’

      He wanted to haul her out of her chair and... And what?

      And nothing, that was what. Nothing.

      ‘Ben’s coming back so I’ll leave you to it,’ he said. ‘I’ve got some dessert coming out for you.’

      She bit her bottom lip. ‘Oh, dear—I really will need to start a diet tomorrow.’

      Leo got to his feet. ‘Just get Ben to kiss you twice.’

      Sunshine grabbed his hand to keep him where he was.

      His fingers curled around hers before he could stop them—and then his fingers stiffened. He pulled his hand free, flexed his fingers.

      Sunshine’s eyes flickered from his hand to his face. There was doubt in her eyes. And concern. And a tenderness that enraged him. He didn’t need it. Didn’t need Sunshine-bloody-Smart messing with his head or his goddamned hand.

      ‘Why are you upset with me, Leo?’ she asked softly.

      He was unbearably conscious of the scent of her. Jonquils. A woman who’d just stuffed herself silly with meat shouldn’t smell like flowers, so why did she?

      ‘I’m not upset with you,’ he said flatly. Liar. ‘I’ll email you a map for Monday.’

      He strode back to the kitchen, furious with himself because he was upset with her.

      But that was the ‘what’ of the equation. What he couldn’t work out was the ‘why’.

      What? Why?

      Oh, for God’s sake!

       THREE

      TO: Jonathan Jones

      FROM: Sunshine Smart

      SUBJECT: Wedding of the century

      Quick update, darling...

      Invitations are underway—wording attached. We’re going with smart/cocktail as the dress code, although obviously I will be wearing a long dress as befits my bridesmaid status.

      Off to check the venue in the morning. It shows every indication of being divine.

      Next we’ll be working on the menu, but having now eaten at two of Leo’s establishments I have no doubt it will be magnificent.

      I wish I could meet a chef. Well, obviously I HAVE met one now, but I mean one with jumpable bones!

      Sunny xxx

      PS—Leo rides a motorbike! And, no, I still haven’t done it, but soon.

      TO: Caleb Quartermaine

      FROM: Leo Quartermaine

      SUBJECT: Coming along

      Sunshine has the invitations under control and I’m attaching the save-the-date we’ve decided on. If I don’t hear from you in the next day or so I’ll go ahead and get this out as per the War and Peace-sized invitation list.

      Meeting Sunshine at South in the morning. And if she raises any concerns you’ll have to arrange bail for me because I’ll kill her.

      I’m growing my hair—hope you’re happy. And I am apparently having a pair of shoes custom-made for me. Was that your idea? Because I WILL get you back.

      LQ

      ‘Wow,’ Sunshine said out loud.

      South had to have the best position of any restaurant in the whole world.

      Well, all right, she hadn’t been everywhere in the whole world, and she was sure there must be oodles of well-situated restaurants all over the planet—in fact she would look up ‘most scenic restaurants in the world’—but it was spectacular.

      The restaurant was perched on the edge of the cliff. But in some mind-blowing engineering feat the entrance to it was positioned actually over the cliff and doubled as a small viewing platform. The floor was transparent, so looking down you could see a landscape of trees curving steeply to the beach. Looking directly forward, you could see the deep blue of the ocean; looking to the side and backwards gave you a view into the restaurant. No tables and chairs in there yet, but the space was sharp and clean, with a seemingly endless use of glass to take advantage of the view.

      She breathed in the ultra-fresh air. It was windy, and her hair was flying everywhere, but she didn’t care. This venue was perfectly...perfect for a wedding celebration.

      Perfectly perfect. That had been Leo’s description of the private room at Q Brasserie. He’d been annoyed with himself over the way he’d described it, which had made her want to hug him, because it was just not something to be annoyed about.

      Not that he was the cuddly teddy-bear type you could pat and jolly out of the sullens. He was impatient and standoffish and most of the time just plain monosyllabic cranky. There was no reason at all to feel that he needed to be hugged more often.

      And yet...she wanted to put her arms around him right now.

      Wanted to be close to him, held by him. Comforting. Comforted.

      Dangerous, debilitating thought.

      It had to be the proximity of the ocean messing with her head. For which she should have prepared herself before her arrival. Instead here she was, not knowing when or how hard the jolt would hit her—only knowing that it would.

      So she would force it—get it done, dealt with, before she saw Leo. She didn’t want to slip up in front of him again.

      She took a breath in. Out. Looked out and down, focusing her thoughts... And even though she was expecting it to hit, the pain tore her heart. The memory of Moonbeam was so vivid she gasped.

      Moonbeam had believed she belonged to the ocean—and Sunshine had always felt invaded, overrun, by the truth of that when she was near the coast, even when she was far above the water, like now.

      One of her most poignant memories was of their last time at the beach. Darkness, rain, and Moonbeam exulting as she raced naked into the waves. ‘This is where I’m me!’ Moon had yelled, and Sunshine, laughing but alarmed as she tried to coax her out of the freezing, dangerous, roiling surf, had called her a crazy Poseidon-worshipping