Seduction, page 10
“Groomzilla,” Bee whispered to me. She cleared her throat. “So where is Matt? What very important business did he have that he couldn’t be here?”
“It’s not business. Business I would understand,” Rob said. “He’s hanging out with another friend.”
“Tanner?” I asked.
“Don’t say his name in this vehicle,” Rob said.
I laughed. “Seriously, Rob, what is your deal with Tanner?” I’d met him a few times and he seemed perfectly nice. Matt had been hanging out with him more and more because…well…he was the last of our friends that was single. I got it. Being the seventh wheel constantly couldn’t have felt great.
“He’s weird,” Rob said.
That was kind of rude. “Aren’t we all a little weird?”
“I’m not weird,” Rob said. “I’m normal. He’s not a normal person. He’s something…else.”
I laughed. “Something other than human?”
“That’s not what I said. But…maybe.” He rubbed his chin like he was actually considering the idea that Tanner was some supernatural being.
“It’s not Halloween yet. You’re getting a little ahead of yourself.”
“I just think that when your best friend is getting married you should ditch your other, lesser friends.”
“I think it’s nice that Matt still has a single friend to hang out with.” I looked out the window and willed myself not to pee my pants.
“I don’t,” Rob said.
Mason laughed. “Dude, you can’t be Matt’s wingman anymore. And every single guy needs a wingman.”
“I could still be his wingman. Daphne wouldn’t mind, would you?” he asked.
She just stared at him. “Seriously? Yeah, I think I’d mind a little.”
“Huh. Interesting. I wouldn’t actually be flirting with anyone. Just pumping up Matt.”
James laughed.
“What?” Rob said.
“I’m sorry, that just sounded really sexual. Pumping Matt.”
Rob laughed. “Yeah, I guess it did. And now Tanner is pumping him up instead of me.” He grabbed Daphne’s hand. “So much has changed.”
“You’ll live.”
He leaned over and kissed her.
Ian pulled up in front of the country club. A parking attendant rushed over to open up the doors for us.
“Is Justin already here?” Rob asked.
“Yeah he’s been here for hours getting some stuff ready,” I said. I’d offered to let him drive down with us but when he said he wanted to leave at 4 am I politely retracted my offer. 4 am? Was he mad?
“Should we start with a tour of the outside?” Rob asked. “When Daphne and I had dinner here, it was dark. I’d love to see the golf course.”
“You can start wherever you want,” I said and climbed out of the car. “I’m going to the restroom.”
“You just went to the bathroom at that rest stop.”
“Yeah, which was over an hour ago.”
He just stared at me.
“You try being pregnant.”
He laughed. “No thanks. I like scotch too much.”
Very funny. I left everyone behind as I rushed into the country club. I waved to the hostess but didn’t hear anything she said as I went toward the bathrooms.
I pushed into the women’s room and sighed when I reached a stall. My poor bladder. I really needed to stop eating so much watermelon. It never stayed with me for long. Especially now that I was pregnant.
I heard the door open and close right before I flushed the toilet. I waited a beat for whoever it was to go into a stall. Despite having years of experience socializing at events I attended with James, I still hated small talk. I waited a few seconds before stepping out of the stall.
“What are you doing?” I asked. “This is the women’s room.”
James smiled. “Like we weren’t just making out in a restroom a couple nights ago.”
“Don’t remind me of the Parrot Palace.” I washed my hands and grabbed a paper towel.
He stepped up to me, brushing a loose strand of hair behind my ear. “If you needed to use the restroom, why didn’t you just tell Ian to stop somewhere?”
“Because I already made you guys stop at a rest stop and I could tell everyone thought it was annoying.” Children were the ones that were supposed to demand a road trip stop every hour. Not a grown ass woman.
“So you just held it?”
“Yes.” I knew it was silly.
“On the way back I’ll make sure we stop twice, okay? I’ll say it’s me.”
“They’re going to think you have a bladder infection.”
“I don’t care what they think. I need to make sure my pregnant wife doesn’t accidentally pee her pants.”
It was such a ridiculous statement to come out of my husband’s mouth. I would have laughed if it also wasn’t super sweet. “So did you follow me into the bathroom to tell me I’m silly? Or did you have something else in mind?” My eyes fell to his lips. I was pretty sure my sex drive was out of control. James didn’t seem to mind though.
“As tempting as that is…I think we should save the fun for the sex altar tonight.”
“Oh we’re actually doing that?”
“Of course.”
“So what exactly is it again?”
“I told you, you’re going to have to wait to find out.”
Damn it, I really needed to find out what happened on a sex altar. Bee would know. “Should we join everyone else?”
James put his arm out for me.
I wrapped my hand around his bicep and let him guide me out of the restroom. He didn’t seem at all perturbed by the fact that a few club members gave us weird looks when we walked out of the women’s restroom together. But I sure felt my cheeks turning red. Really…how did he never get embarrassed? I looked up at him as he escorted us outside.
“You’re so handsome,” I said.
He smiled down at me. “And you get more beautiful every day.”
“You mean larger.”
“That is definitely not what I just said.”
“But it’s true.” I put my hand on my stomach. “Where do you think they wandered off too?”
“It’s not true,” he said, ignoring me. “You’re not getting larger. You’re growing a little human. And you look beautiful doing it.”
“Try taking me on a sex altar in four months and you might think differently.”
“If you like tonight, I’ll absolutely take you on a sex altar again in four months. And five months. And right after the baby is born. Well…whenever you can have sex again after that.” He pressed his lips together. “How long do we have to wait?”
“I’m actually not sure.” I had done very little research about stages of pregnancy beyond the one I was on. I was worried I’d see something and freak out. I really didn’t want to know anything about the actual birth. It was just going to drive me insane. Just the thought of a head coming out of me already made me shiver.
“Well, now I’m curious.” He pulled out his phone.
I laughed. “Come on, we need to go find everyone else.” I grabbed his arm and started walking. They weren’t by the tennis courts or the pool. Or at the outside bar, which I was a little surprised about. I thought for sure they would have stopped there. Where are they?
“A month,” James said. “Six weeks at the most. That’s not that bad.” But his face said otherwise.
“Not that bad? What is the longest we’ve gone without having sex?”
“I don’t know…a few days?”
“Six weeks is a lot longer than a few days.”
He smiled, one of his cocky grins that made my knees weak. “Well, it doesn’t say anything about your mouth.”
I laughed and hit his arm. “So you expect me to pop out a baby and then fill our nights with me giving you tons of head?”
“That doesn’t sound so bad to me.”
“Hm.” Honestly it didn’t sound that bad to me either. Especially if I could cover him in chocolate syrup again. Speaking of which…I had not done a great job of cleaning up the mess we’d made. Ellen was definitely going to be suspicious when she came to work tomorrow. But it wasn’t my fault that I was bad at cleaning. She never let me touch a mop when she was around.
I should have confessed to James that giving him head for six weeks didn’t sound that bad to me. Instead I just smiled up at him. “I guess we’ll see how you behave.”
He laughed. “And when have I ever behaved badly?”
“Oh, I don’t know. You made a pretty big mess last night.”
“If I recall, I actually cleaned up your mess.” His eyes trailed down my body.
I laughed. “And then proceeded to cover the rest of our dining room in chocolate syrup.”
“That was not my fault. You started it.”
“You started it.” Wait…had he? I actually didn’t remember who squirted who first.
“We can agree to disagree.” His phone buzzed and he looked down at it. “Apparently they found the spot they want to get married,” James said. “They’re out back on the golf course.”
“Awesome.” I walked over to a golf cart and climbed into the driver’s seat.
“You’re driving, huh?”
I couldn’t even remember the last time I drove a car. Ian usually drove us everywhere, and when he didn’t, James was always behind the wheel. And I’d never driven a golf cart. But I had five months to live it up. I wasn’t going to waste a second of it. I smiled up at him, trying to raise my eyebrow like he always did. “Unless you want to race me.”
“They don’t go that fast, baby.”
“Scared?”
“No. But you should be.” He climbed into an adjacent golf cart and started the engine.
I turned on mine too. There was no roar of an engine. If anything it was more of a sputter. I looked over at James’ golf cart and realized it was a much newer looking model. I was just about to protest when James yelled, “Eat my dust!” He pressed down hard on the gas and sped off.
“Hey! Cheater!” I pressed down on the gas too and lurched forward. I made a sharp turn to follow him on the cement path. What the hell did he mean that these things didn’t go fast? The wind was whipping through my hair as I swerved again to chase him down. James was used to his fancy cars with zero-to-whatever horsepower in two seconds or something. This was plenty fast for me.
The golf course was hilly and every time I took a turn, I felt like the golf cart was going to flip over. But James was in front of me and his never flipped. So I had to be safe…right? Damn, how was he still ahead of me? I was freaking flying.
I pressed down harder on the gas and finally managed to pull up next to him. James had to shift right so I wouldn’t slam into the side of his golf cart.
“Are you trying to push me off the course?” he yelled through the whipping wind.
I actually wasn’t. I just wasn’t great at driving this thing. But that’s what he got for not letting me drive for the past couple of years. I almost sideswiped him again and he veered off into the grass to escape my onslaught.
“Where are you going?!” I turned off onto the green too and tried to catch up to him again.
“Shortcut!” he yelled back to me with a laugh.
What shortcut? We hadn’t even decided on where we were racing. Wait, where were we going? Had Rob said which spot they’d chosen? Damn it, James had tricked me. He probably knew where Rob and Daphne were.
I sped up again, but there wasn’t really any point. I had no idea where the end of our race was.
“Where are we going?!” I yelled at him.
He didn’t respond. But he did turn around and wink at me.
That dirty scoundrel.
His golf cart came to a stop and I almost drove right into the side of it. I swerved left to avoid totaling both the golf carts.
“You cheated,” I said and stepped out. “You didn’t count down from three to start, then you veered off the course like a crazy person, and you didn’t tell me where the stopping point was.”
“Sore loser.”
“You can’t be a sore loser if your opponent is a cheat.”
He stepped forward, his breath hot in my ear. “We’ll see if you keep backtalking me tonight when you’re tied down on the altar, completely at my mercy.” His warm breath tickled my skin. Or maybe I had goosebumps because of what he said.
He was going to tie me up on the altar? I really needed answers from Bee. I looked to my right and saw all our friends staring at us. They looked surprised by our spur of the moment drag race. But probably not as surprised as I looked. Because they were standing right by a very familiar looking willow tree. Our freaking sex tree!
Chapter 13
Sunday
“They’re by the willow tree,” I whispered to James.
“Yeah. We probably should have been out here to steer them away from that spot.”
You think? “We had sex there,” I hissed. “They can’t get married right there. It’s practically a sex altar.”
“Hardly. I’m not sure we’re going to have much of a say in this, though. Daphne looks so happy.”
He was not being helpful. I hurried over to them. My eyes glanced over to the little waterfall. I remembered stripping right there for James. Right before he took me under that willow tree and pressed my naked back against the bark and fucked me. I’m pretty sure I had yelled ‘Professor Hunter’ loudly enough for people to hear us on the terrace. This golf course was huge. What the hell were they doing right here? Why? Seriously…why?!
I cleared my throat. “Hey guys. Just starting the tour? That’s fun. Thanks for waiting for us. Let’s go this way. I think you’ll like what’s going on by hole 6.” I tried to get them to start walking. And it wasn’t a complete lie. There was a cute little bridge by hole 6. They could get married on that. Far, far away from our sex tree.
“No, we chose the spot,” Daphne said. “Isn’t it beautiful? The willow tree is going to look amazing in the pictures. We just knew it as soon as we saw this spot. And isn’t that waterfall so cute?”
“No. It’s…loud.” Yup, that made sense. “The water is definitely too loud for the ceremony. The guests won’t be able to hear your vows. That would be a travesty. Right, Rob? Because I bet you’re planning some hilarious vows.”
“Of course I am,” Rob said. “And I can hear you just fine right now. The water isn’t that loud, Penny.”
“It’ll be louder with all the people though. The voices carrying, mixing with that super loud water? No way. It won’t work. Where is Justin? He’ll have something to say about this.”
“He’s taking pictures.” Daphne pointed to where Justin was. He’d just immerged from underneath the willow tree. He was snapping tons of pictures with his phone while somehow also balancing a planner and taking notes.
“It’s so big under there,” Justin said and looked up from his planner. “Depending on the number of RSVPs, we might be able to have the ceremony under the tree.”
Good God, no.
“Wouldn’t that be amazing?” Justin said. “We could cover it with fairy lights. It’ll be magical and romantic.”
“I’m allergic,” I said. “I’m terribly allergic to willow trees.” I started scratching the inside of my wrist.
“I didn’t realize you had any allergies,” Bee said.
“Just this one. And it’s terrible. My face gets all red and puffy when I breathe in willow tree air.”
Mason tilted his head to the side as he looked at me. “You look okay right now, Penny.”
I tried not to glare at him. Thanks, Mason. Was there a way to make my face look red and puffy right now to make my point? I couldn’t think of anything. “That’s because…I’m not right next to it.” Smooth.
Justin sighed. “You’re ruining my vision with images of red puffy faces.” He shook his head. “Not under the tree then. We don’t want anyone’s face blowing up. And we probably will have too many guests anyway. But we can make a beautiful arch right here.” He stepped to the side and waved his hand through the air. “That should be far enough away. And you, Penny, can take an antihistamine just in case.”
Shit. That was a good fix. Damn you, Justin, for being so good at your job. “But what about the terrace? Have you guys seen that? I was thinking that would be really nice. And it’s already covered in case it rains. There’s a cute little firepit and everything.”
“A firepit?” Justin said. “Stop it with your backyard shenanigans. No, no, no.” He stepped forward. “If we put the arch right here, the beautiful couple will be able to look down the aisle and see that little waterfall.” Justin walked down the aisle he was imagining in his head. “It’s utterly divine. Pure perfection.” He spun back around. “I can see it. It’s happening, people!”
Daphne smiled and Rob pulled her into his side. They both looked so happy.
I swallowed down the lump in my throat. I didn’t want to mess up their happiness. So what if James and I had had sex right there years ago? No one needed to know.
“Allergic to willow trees?” James whispered as he wrapped his arms around me. “That would have been such a good save if allergy medicine wasn’t a thing.”
I sighed. “Do you think we should tell them? That might make them change their minds. I don’t want it to accidentally come out in a few years and for them to be pissed that we didn’t mention it.”
“Do you really think Rob cares if we’ve had sex right there? He’s not exactly ashamed of sex. He’ll probably just high-five you.”
He was right. Rob wouldn’t care. “What about Daphne?”
“Look how happy she is.”
Daphne and Rob had started dancing. He dipped her and then pulled her back up, her laughter flitting through the air.
I sighed. I didn’t want to ruin anything for them. “Okay, fine. But the bridge at hole 6 would have been perfect if you ask me.”
“Where would you get married if you were having your wedding here?” James asked.
I looked up at the beautiful willow tree. “Right here. But that’s because we have history with this tree.” I had very fond memories of us getting down and dirty here.
_preview.jpg)
