Inked Ever After (4 page)

“I somehow doubt we’ll need to stock up on hot dogs to bribe
the groom this time,” Elle said.

“And wait until he sees you bathed in the moonlight, looking
like a fairy-tale princess,” Annie said with a sigh.

Elle smirked. “Speaking of fairy tales, Annie, what’s this I
hear about you and a gigolo named Luigi?”

StudsRus.com, the most prestigious escort agency in Boston,
had hosted their yearly gala last week. The girls had managed to buy an
invitation for Christy’s birthday after her vow to get professionally laid, but
once Cole had heard about it, he’d put a damper on the whole plan, so they drew
straws to decide who should go instead. Annie had won.

“What do you mean ‘speaking of fairy tales’? Since when do
fairy tales include gigolos?” Annie asked.

“Well, since most fairy-tale princes are either gay or
weirdly attached to their mommies, I think Walt Disney should seriously
consider their inclusion,” Sophie answered.

“Damn right.” That was Holly, who, pointing at Annie, turned
to Elle. “Our home girl scored. Big-time.”

“Wow.” Elle whistled, impressed. “Give me five.”

“Guys, guys,” Annie said with a grimace. “It really wasn’t
like that. We just, I don’t know, clicked, and one thing led to another. It
wasn’t intentional.”

The eye rolling was unanimous. “Uh-huh.”

Annie shook her head in dismay. “I should have never said
anything. You make it sound like it’s some sort of…life accomplishment.”

“Well, it kind of is. How many people of the nonfilthy rich,
non-Botox category do you know who can bag a world-class gigolo without paying
for his services? You, my friend, are the stuff of legends,” Holly stated.

“You’re kidding me, right? I’m thirty-five. The only serious
boyfriend I’ve had this century dumped me for a man. I don’t seem to be able to
pass the three-date mark with any half-decent guy, and I just had a one-night
stand with a gigolo.”

“As I said, the stuff of legends.”

“No, our girl here marrying James Bowen under the moonlight
is the stuff of legends,” Annie, the hopeless romantic, replied.

Holly wasn’t that easily derailed. “Right. Are you bringing
him to the wedding?”

“Hello, one-night stand, remember? Besides, I didn’t get his
contact details.”

“Can’t be that difficult to find him. How many studs named
Luigi can one escort agency have, huh?”

“Holly has a point,” Elle mused.

“We should Google it up.” That was Sophie.

Annie groaned. “You and your Googling is what got us here.
We should—”

Tate let her mind wander off, the girls’ relaxed banter
calming and dulling the sharp emotions racing through her to somehow manageable
proportions. Until Annie catapulted her back to reality.

“Tate?”

“Sorry, what?”

“I asked, where are you spending your last night as an
unmarried woman?”

That caught her off guard. “What do you mean?”

“You can’t spend it with James.”

Oops. She hadn’t really thought of that.

“Can’t I?” she asked, her voice barely audible.

Her bridesmaids all shook their heads, and her heart skipped
a beat. Several dozen beats actually. Any relaxation she might have achieved by
listening to the girls chatting about gigolos and fairy tales flew out the
window.

Elle turned to her, concern etched in her face. “Mom called
yesterday. She wanted me to remind you to get the dress delivered to the house.
She wants us to spend the night before the wedding there.”

Oh frigging hell. This was getting worse and worse.

How hadn’t she seen this one coming? After all, it was
tradition for the bride to leave for her wedding from her childhood home.

She cleared her throat and made a conscious effort to keep
breathing and seem unaffected by the news.

“Okay.”

When James and Tate had told her mother about the wedding,
she’d jumped the gun and assumed they’d have it at home in Boston, in the
backyard of the house, like Tate had always dreamed. The little fact that the
wedding she’d always dreamed of was a total impossibility because her dad and
brother were dead and she had trouble staying upright when she was in her
parents’ house, her mom kind of ignored. Well, Tate seldom ended up with her
head in between her knees anymore—which she had James to thank for—but still,
hardly the most appropriate place for the ceremony. Tate had completely
blanched at the idea, and James had known that was a no-go. He’d pushed for
them to get married in Alden, in his father’s backyard, and he’d won. Her mom
hadn’t been too happy, but in charm and arrogance, no one beat James. That had
allowed Tate to breathe easier, although only marginally.

Short of orchestrating an alien abduction, she didn’t know
how to bail out from spending the night before the wedding at her parents’ place
without her mom being deeply hurt. Not to mention that if Tate knew the woman,
she had already arranged for the car, the makeup artist, and the hairdresser to
come to the house on the wedding day.

Elle broke the deafening silence. “Sure?”

She nodded, forcing a smile on her face.

Elle wasn’t that easily fooled, Tate knew, but she let it
slide. “Are we set on this dress, Sis?”

She nodded again.

“Good. What if we tackle the bridesmaids’ dresses next? I
think red could be a good color. What do you think, Tate?”

“Sure,” she got out. “That would be great.”

And so the conversation dissolved into colors and textures
and hats, for which she was damn grateful because she was about to pass out.
Or, more specifically, about to hyperventilate and then pass out.

“I’m gonna go and take this off,” she said to no one in
particular. Doing her best to ignore the fact that the whole place was spinning
and closing in on her, she turned toward the fitting room, her heart in her
throat, her eyes already welling.

Somehow, she made it to the cubicle without losing her
composure. Once there, her legs buckled and she braced her shaky hands on the
mirror, fat tears rolling down her cheeks. Oh no, she couldn’t lose it now. She
willed her heart rate to slow down, but it wasn’t working. Her ears were
roaring, her breathing erratic. Unable to fight it anymore, she broke down in
sobs.

She couldn’t do this. It was so hard—so damn hard. And so
fucking unfair. They should be here, dammit, giving her shit, not dead in the
cold, hard ground.

The more she tried to stop crying and get a grip on herself,
the more convulsively her chest heaved and her eyes leaked, and soon she was
shaking and raking in breaths as if she’d run a hundred-yard dash. And getting
no damn air in. In between her tears, she glimpsed the sparkle coming from
Grandma Rosita’s pearls, those light spheres now bricks around her neck,
choking her. She reached for them, but her clammy hands shook too much to
unclasp the necklace. Never mind how badly she needed air, she couldn’t bring
herself to yank it.

She lifted her head and stared at the mess of a person in
front of her.

Enough
, she
admonished herself.
Get your big-girl
panties on. No more breakdowns. No more crying.

This was supposed to be the happiest time of her life, and
yet here she was, having her own—hopefully private—panic attack/sobbing fest in
the fitting room. How she was going to get through all the wedding arrangements
without totally losing it, and more importantly, without James finding out, she
didn’t know.

“Princess, you ready?”

Crap.

What was James doing there? He was supposed to pick her up
from the bridal shop, but he was a good half hour early.

He couldn’t see her like this. Tate had been hanging on by
her last thread for a while already, but she’d been hiding it, soldiering on,
not showing how wretched she felt inside. There had been some sticky situations
lately, but she’d managed to muddle her way through without too much damage.
Except two days ago in the shower. That hadn’t gone too well. Still, if he saw
her now, he’d definitely know something wasn’t right, and there was only one
thing that terrified her more than the wedding, and that was James getting the
wrong idea. Or worse, hurting him. She was madly in love with him, no two ways
about it. Long gone were her early doubts and fears. James was the real thing,
and no day passed that she didn’t count her lucky stars he was in her life,
because really, at this stage of the game, nothing made any sense without him.
Not a single thing. Whenever she was feeling off, all she had to do was search
for him. He’d look at her, smile, and everything was right in her world again.

She did want to marry the man. It was just the
getting
married part that was doing her
in.

But telling James would mean worrying him, and she didn’t
want to, especially with stuff he couldn’t do anything about. Besides, it
wasn’t his fault she was still so broken.

“Coming,” she heard him say, his voice and his footsteps
getting closer and closer.

“You can’t come in,” she all but shrieked. “I’m…I’m…wearing
the wedding dress.”

His cocky chuckle came through loud and clear. “Well, you
better get undressed fast then, princess.”

Shit. Shit
. She
looked around in panic, madly wiping the tears on her face, trying to slow down
her breathing and fix her smudged mascara. With no time to change or properly
cover the dress, and more worried about using those last seconds to slip her
happy mask on, she did the only thing she could: she let the garment drop to
the floor and stood in her underwear, one arm covering her bare breasts, just
in time for James to open the door. Hopefully the cute lingerie would distract
him from noticing the dress—or the blotchy face.

His approving gaze roamed over her body. “That’s my girl,”
he murmured as he reached for her. “Told you I was coming in. I always do,” he
added, raising his eyebrows, his lips quirked up in a roguish smirk.

In spite of herself, she burst into laughter. Yeah, he
always came in; there wasn’t a fitting room in Boston that could resist him.
She could attest to that. Fooling around in a fitting room was one of the many
raunchy fantasies he’d cajoled her into trying. Several times actually. That
they never got caught was a miracle; not only did she have trouble keeping
quiet when his hand—or worse—was between her legs, but heads turned wherever
James went. How he made it in without all the females following him was a
mystery.

As his gaze locked with hers, his expression hardened.

“Princess—”

Not knowing what to do, Tate covered his eyes with her hands
and went for a chirpy tone she hoped didn’t sound fake. “James, you can’t see
the dress. It’s bad luck.”

“Not watching the dress, baby.” He moved her hands away and
looked at her for the longest time. She tried ducking to escape his scrutiny,
but he tipped her head back with a finger on her chin and forced her to
withstand it.

She offered him a tight smile, biting her lower lip so it
wouldn’t tremble, and braced herself for the interrogation.

But it didn’t come.

His jaw clenched several times. “Doing wedding stuff this
morning?” he asked, his gaze lowering to her necklace.

She nodded.

Then he just asked, “You all right?”

She plastered on a smile. “Of course.”

“Of course,” he repeated slowly, his expression tense. “And
that?” he asked, motioning at her with a jerk of his head.

“This? It’s nothing. I just got something in my eye. My
eyes, actually,” she corrected.

His face got harsher. He took a step closer, and she heard
her gown getting ruffled.

“Baby, the dress!” She was far more worried about keeping up
the charade than the fate of the garment. Not that a size-ten footprint on the
cloth was going to be easy to explain.

“I don’t give a shit about the damn dress,” he growled, his
savage tone dripping with disapproval and impatience.

“Please, James.”

He stared at her. He must have seen the look of desperation
in her eyes, the one she was fighting so hard to hide, for he let out a long
sigh. “Fine. Hop up, princess,” he said, encircling her waist and lifting her.
Before he could move her aside, she wrapped her legs around his hips and threw
her arms around his neck.

James cursed, tightening his hold on her.

“Baby.”

With her still in his arms, he reached for the dress and,
without looking, tossed it out of the way to the corner where all her clothes
lay.

She stayed like this for a long while, hugging him for all
she was worth, her face nestled in the crook of his neck, soaking in his warmth
and his strength. Being able to breathe again. She could feel his erection,
thick and hard, against her core, but his touch was not sexual. He held her
gently, protectively, one hand open and cupping the back of her head, the other
splayed on her back.

God, she loved this man so much. His mere presence infused
her with fortitude. With him around she felt cherished and protected beyond
anything she’d experienced before.

“I love you,” she whispered.

“Tate,” he said against her hair. “Look up.”

She didn’t move.

“Not too fond of repeating myself, baby.”

She lifted her head. His face was carved in tight lines, but
his eyes were gentle. And damn compelling. He curled his hand around her neck
and brushed her lips with his thumb.

“You need to stop hiding and give me your mouth.”

And she did. Soft, tender kisses and deep, hard ones, until
she was boneless and dazzled and her mind was full of only him. As she opened
her eyes, she stole a glance at them in the mirror, and her breath froze in her
lungs. What a view—him with his black T-shirt, his faded jeans, and those sexy
cowboy boots, standing tall and solid, his broad shoulders taking more than his
fair share of the room, and her in pearls, fuck-me heels, and satin lingerie
all wrapped around him.