After The One (The One Series Duet) (37 page)

“Now if you would turn your attention to the bride and groom…” Bryce directed.

“What the hell?” I muttered through the clenched teeth of a fake smile. My fingers dug into the material of Julian’s tuxedo jacket as I felt everyone’s eyes, and every camera in the room, on us. “Ummm…”

Julian pulled me in tighter. “Yeah, I have no idea.”

We both stood there looking clueless for about thirty seconds. “I thought we were going to cut the—”

My sentence was interrupted by DJ Dre, looping the repetitive chorus of Rihanna’s “Birthday Cake.”

The “oohs” and “ahhs” from the crowd erupted over the hard-hitting beat as they parted. A man pushing our exquisite wedding cake was followed closely by our wedding planner. My body relaxed as soon as I saw her beaming face.

She thought of everything!

I didn’t want to say what I was thinking since I had a microphone on, but when I looked up at Julian, he smiled back at me knowingly.

“I love you,” I whispered giddily.

“I love you, too.”

The cake was rolled to the middle of the dance floor so it could bathe in the spotlight with us. After the men and women operating the cameras were in place, the crowd closed in. The radius between us and the four hundred guests of mostly people I didn’t know was about five feet. I searched the crowd until I saw my parents, Julian’s parents and our actual close friends lining the perimeter. I smiled and gave them an excited wave.

“That came out better than I thought,” Julian declared as he stared at the five-tier cake in front of us.

The famed L.A. bakery, Sweet Tooth, had exceeded our expectations when they designed our wedding cake masterpiece. The square layers of cake covered in white fondant gave it the sleek appearance. The edible sugar musical notes were added to make the traditional cake more unique.

I nodded, looking around as everyone seemed to be snapping pictures of the cake. “It’s gorgeous and it seems to be a big hit.”

I looked up toward our family and friends to catch their reaction only to notice the tail end of them being ushered behind Tori and a few really pretty women that I knew starred in the show,
Hot Hollywood Housewives.

My head swiveled around and I felt the hair on the back of my neck stand up.
Where did our family go?

Julian picked up the knife to cut the cake and paused, seeming to notice the look on my face. “What’s wrong?”

“Our family.” I only managed to get out two words as I felt the gentle swell of anger and frustration well up inside of me.

“They’re right over…” His sentence trailed off and his eyebrows furrowed as he looked to the section of the crowd where our loved ones were. “They were just over there.”

“Cut the cake,” the event planner urged us with a stage whisper.

I still craned my neck to find our loved ones to no avail.

“Where do you think they are?” I asked quietly, ignoring the planner.

“I don’t know.” His brows furrowed and his jaw tightened. “They wouldn’t have missed this.”

“Smile,” a producer hissed from one side of the cameraman.

“Cut the cake,” the event planner repeated with a little more urgency from the other side of the cameraman.

Julian and I shared a look before I placed my hand over his as he guided the knife through the bottom layer of the cake.

Everyone cheered as we cut into the rich white dessert with the lemon buttercream filling. The slice was placed on a monogrammed plate and we paused, allowing the camera to capture the image. When our eyes locked, my heart thumped.

I forgot that we were in front of a bunch of people. I forgot that we were on camera. I forgot that our family and friends had disappeared. I forgot about everything except for the man that looked at me as if I were the only woman in the world.

My lips parted and I let out a breath. Julian’s eyes seemed to hone in on my mouth so I licked my lips.

“Zoe…” The strained tone in which my name rolled off of his tongue made my body react.

I closed my eyes briefly as I pressed my thighs together to dull the ache that he created with just my name.

Shit,
I swore internally as I tried to think of places to which we could sneak off without the cameras. He’d just stoked a fire in me that was not going out anytime soon.
This is going to be the longest fifty minutes of my life.

Julian nodded slowly as if he could read my thoughts. I grinned.

“Less than an hour and then you’re mine,” Julian mentioned sexily. He looked around and then smirked.

It wasn’t until he broke eye contact that everything came rushing into focus—the music, the crowd, the cake.

I glanced over at the event planner whose eyes were as big as saucers. She tapped at her watch and mouthed the word cake.

With a smile tugging at the corner of my lips, I refocused on the task at hand. I reached onto the plate and broke off a piece of cake.

After breaking his piece and holding it between his thumb and forefinger, Julian licked his lips and lifted his eyebrows. “Open wide!”

I bit my lip to stifle the laughter that bubbled up inside of me. My shoulders trembled unable to keep it together. “I’m not even going there,” I commented with a suppressed giggle.

There was a mischievous glint in his grey eyes as he brought the cake closer to my mouth. “Yes, you will.”

All of the breath left my body. Every single one of my nerve endings were on fire.

Julian chuckled as we fed each other pieces of the mouthwatering cake. The crowd cheered, the music thumped through the speakers, and I could almost feel the wedding planner and producer breathe a sigh of relief as if to say “finally.”

“Mmmm,” I moaned, my eyes involuntarily closing as the flavor coated my mouth. I swallowed. “That is amazing.”

When I opened my eyes, Julian was staring at me as he licked the icing off of his forefinger. Before the wedding planner was able to push the cart away, Julian reached for the cake and dragged his finger across the decadent filling.

“Single ladies? Single ladies? Where are all of my single ladies?” DJ Dre yelled as the music switched to an up-tempo, hard-hitting beat of a song that celebrated female empowerment.

I was impressed that Andre didn’t immediately play Beyoncé’s hit after that intro. When I opened my mouth to make that comment, I was distracted by the icing on Julian’s finger and the look he was giving me.

Even though there was a flurry of movement and the spacious event space was filled with noise, Julian held me frozen in place with his stare. My heart raced.

Without a word, he lifted his finger and trailed the lemon buttercream filling across my bottom lip. With his other hand, he grabbed a fistful of my hair and tilted my head back. The greys of his eyes were darkened and I could both see and feel his desire for me.

There was a distinct throbbing between my thighs as I struggled to breathe normally.

As he moved his face toward mine, I was intoxicated. My eyes shut just as he brought his mouth against mine. He nibbled and sucked my bottom lip and ran his tongue against the sugary lemon filling.

I felt it everywhere.

Kissing him back, I wrapped my arms around him, melting into his hard body. Drunk off of desire, I opened my eyes woozily as I felt him press his forehead against mine. Soft puffs of air breezed over my skin as we stood in silence.

“Lovebirds, are you ready?” DJ Dre screamed into the microphone.

Julian waved his hand in the air dismissively as he kept staring into my eyes.

I put my hands on the side of his face. “I love you,” I giggled.

He grabbed one of my hands from his cheek and kissed the inside of it before reciting Pablo Neruda’s Sonnet XVII.

From deep in my gut, a flurry of butterflies turned into bats. He’d given me butterflies before, but nothing ever like that.

“Oh!” I gasped. My hand flew to my stomach and my eyes widened. “I think the—” I cleared my throat. “I think the poem was really moving.”

“You know I didn’t write that one, right?” Julian joked before seeming to understand what I was saying. “Oh, oh, oh shit!”

I nodded excitedly.

He scooped me up into his arms and spun me around. After putting me down and making sure my feet were solidly on the ground, he yelled to the crowd, “She’s my wife!”

Everyone went wild.

“Have you ever seen two people more in love? Let’s hear it for the happy couple!” DJ Dre called out. After the crowd cheered, he continued, “Now let’s get the single ladies on the floor!”

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw our family. Shaking Julian’s arm, I pointed excitedly and we jogged over to them. We were barely there long enough to hug them before we were called back onto the dance floor.

The rest of the reception highlights were scheduled back to back—the bouquet toss, garter toss, father-daughter dance, and mother-son dance flew by. The only event that stood between us and the end of our obligation to
The One
was the speeches.

“We have a few people who would like to say a few words about Julian and Zoe,” DJ Dre alerted the crowd, quieting them down from the raucous laughter incited by Julian and his mother’s unconventional dance.

When I saw my mom and dad approaching the DJ booth with Julian’s parents, I grinned even though I knew none of them wanted to do an on-air speech. The wedding planner handed me a glass of nonalcoholic champagne. I rolled the stem between my fingers as I lifted the sparkling cider toward my beautiful mother as she held the microphone.

“Hello,” Elise Jordan greeted the crowd. “We are the parents of the bride and groom.” After everyone finished clapping, my mom turned to us and continued. “We got together the other night and discussed how we’ve never seen either of you as happy as the two of you are when you’re together. Remember that. Hold on to that. They say that reality TV couples don’t make it. And that’s true. But you two aren’t a reality TV couple. You two aren’t the byproduct of a manufactured romance. Zoe, Julian… you two are a real couple who met and fell in love on TV. But the real romance wasn’t when you were on the show or even the years you’ve had together. The real romance was today. The commitment to choosing one another every day for the rest of your lives is romance. We love you both individually and as a couple. Congratulations!”

My mom lifted her glass as the rest of our parents shouted out well wishes, congratulations, and I love yous.

The guests applauded as they left the DJ booth to embrace us.

Next, Omar approached the stage, flanked by James and Scott. The catcalls and shouts from the women in the audience overpowered any other sound in the room. It was so loud that Andre had to make an announcement to quiet down.

“Hi, I’m Omar—”

They squealed.

“I’m James—”

They shrieked.

“And I’m Scott—”

They screamed.

Omar, James, and Scott were undeniably good-looking and in their tuxedos, they looked like the ad for some high-priced clothing line. But the crowd reaction was a bit of an overreaction. I looked around Koko to see Keisha and Lenny’s expressions. I started to crack a joke, but my brother interrupted me.

“Had I known this was going to happen, I would’ve gone up there with them,” Zach quipped.

Julian and I chuckled.

“Thank you for the warm welcome,” Omar started with his mix of humor and graciousness. “We aren’t going to take up much time. We just wanted to come up here as a group to say congratulations. Julian has been my best friend since he moved to California eighteen years ago. We met Scott freshman year in high school and we met James junior year in college. There are a lot of stories we could tell, but since this is going to be on national television, we decided to save those for later.”

Omar smirked as everyone laughed. “Julian is a good man. He’s one of the best men I know and I’m honored to stand up as his best man today. I know he will be a good husband because there is nothing he wouldn’t do for that woman right over there. Zoe, I knew Julian was in love the first time he told me about you. I was a bit skeptical because it was a reality show and let’s face it…” He lifted his hands and shrugged. “The track record isn’t so good.”

The audience laughed again.

“But I reserved my final verdict because we’d never heard Julian talk about a woman like that before. I know I’d never heard him more sure about anything in his life. But again, it’s a reality show.” He paused. “But the moment I met you, I knew I was looking at my best friend’s future wife. And seeing you two together, there was no doubt in any of our minds that our best friend had found what he was looking for. So Zoe, thank you for being the best thing to ever happen to Julian. To the happy couple!”

I clanked glasses with all of those around me before I brought my sparkling cider to my lips. My eyes watered a bit. Not because I didn’t know that Omar and the guys loved me for their best friend, but because I was so happy to be surrounded by so much love.

Julian dropped his arm around my shoulder and a kiss against my forehead. I looked up at him and grinned in response.

I heard James and Scott take turns saying they loved us and congratulations before the three of them exited the stage to the same enthusiastic catcalls as they entered.

Koko slapped me on my ass and by the time I looked over my shoulder to where she was standing, she was making her way on stage. I peeked over at Lenny and Keisha to see if they were going on stage with her, but neither of them moved. They just flashed me huge smiles.

“Good evening, everyone!” Koko chirped out to the crowd after a thunderous applause. Her delicate features showcased her happiness to both the moment and the response she’d just received. “As some of you may know, I’m Koko…the maid of honor and best friend of the bride. I’m not going to bore you with all the details of how we became best friends when we were thrust together as roommates freshman year of college. I’m getting the stink eye from the planner so I know I have to keep this short and sweet.”

I laughed and looked around for Peri who was standing near Koko’s parents, grinning from ear to ear. She didn’t know Koko at all before the wedding weekend, but there was an odd excitement about her expression.