Wedding Series Boxed Set (3 Books in 1) (The Wedding Series) (36 page)

“No.” But the whispered word didn’t carry any weight of denial. Tris feared it was simple vanity, but something in her was thrilled. Still, she rallied enough sense to protest more strongly. “We don’t even seem to be friends the past couple of days.”

She would have ruined the cool effect of that statement if she’d let fall the tears that filled her eyes so unexpectedly.

“You’ve been giving him a pretty hard time, you know.”

“Me? I haven’t done anything.” Except a single comment about robbing the cradle.

“I know it’s nosy as hell, but I figure a cousin’s got a right to ask—besides, this is my wedding week, I get to be nosy if I want to be.” Tris gave a rather damp chuckle at his reasoning, but amusement quickly faded at his next words. “What did you guys fight about yesterday?”

“I wouldn’t really call it a fight…” Paul gave an impatient grimace and she decided not to argue semantics.

“It was silly really.”

“What did you say?”

Tris considered telling him it was none of his business, but she’d never been very successful at holding out against a determined assault from her cousin Paul. This time, she didn’t want to hold out. She told him. And when he asked what Michael had said, she told him that, too.

“Geez, you two take the cake, Here you are accusing him of making up to Judi when he’s doing his damnedest not to want you, and he’s accusing you of going after Grady when you’ve finally, totally recognized the fact that you don’t want Grady Roberts!”

She stared into her nearly empty glass and tried for a light tone. “That’s presuming your crazy theory about Michael’s feelings is right. I mean, he’s never . . .” She let it trail off, but her question was obvious.

“Told me? No, not in so many words. But I’m right. If you don’t believe me—” He broke off. When she raised her head to see why, he was staring at the window, whose dark surface reflected their images. “I wish Bette were here,” he muttered to himself. “I probably shouldn’t have told you any of this, but I have. So I might as well go all the way.”

He turned to face her, his face almost stern. “Why don’t you test it out? You women know all sorts of ways. See if I’m right about how he feels about you—but only if you want me to be right. You wouldn’t be the person I think you are if you played around with the emotions of a man like Michael. He’s seen enough reasons in his lifetime not to believe in love, don’t give him any more.”

“You really respect him, don’t you? I always knew you liked him, but I never realized you admired him.”

“He’s the man I want standing next to me at that altar day after tomorrow when I tell the whole damn world that Bette’s mine and I’m hers.”

“I . . . I don’t think I've ever heard you talk the same way about Grady.”

Paul shrugged. “Grady’s Grady. I love him like a brother, maybe better. He’s been part of my life as long as I can remember. Sometimes I think that if he’d had a few hard knocks now and then, just enough to make him grow up a little . . .” He shrugged again. “But I don’t expect him to be any different than he is.” He stood up, stretching his back with his arms high over his head. “And if there were such a thing in a wedding as a best buddy, I’d have chosen Grady in a flash. But that wasn’t what was called for. Think about that, little cousin. Think about what Michael Dickinson will be at my wedding.”

The best man
.

He dropped a hand on her shoulder and leaned over to say three more words before walking away. “Think about it.”

Michael watched Tris flick off the kitchen light and shifted his position on the top step leading to his room over the garage. What could Paul have said to her that left her staring into space like that after he left the room? For that matter, what had they been saying to each other during that whole, intense conversation?

Not that it was any of his business. As long as he’d seen Tris return safe and sound, he could tell that badgering voice in the back of his head that wouldn’t let him sleep exactly where to go. Maybe it would listen now. It sure wasn’t the kind of voice to listen to reason. Not even when he’d pointed out that she was a grown woman, out with her parents, for heaven’s sake, and that there had been nights, months, years when she could have been out all night long in Washington, D.C., and the badgering voice hadn’t known a thing about it.

Logic made no dent.

The voice had lowered a decibel or two when he’d pulled on a pair of sweatpants and come out to the steps where he could see the back of the house. But it hadn’t quieted totally until he’d seen the kitchen light go on and saw Tris head to the refrigerator. There’d been that heartbeat-suspended instant when a man’s form appeared, but he’d started breathing again and walked back up the steps he couldn’t remember descending when he recognized Paul.

Now, pondering that long conversation between cousins, he wondered if his relief at the sight of Paul had been misguided.

Paul Monroe could be a dangerous man. He seemed so easygoing and uncomplicated on the outside, but he noticed things. And he knew things about Michael that no one else did. Like how he felt about the fact that his mother and father totaled seven marriages between them. Like how he felt about Tris.

Michael drove his right hand through his hair. This week wasn’t going the way he’d planned, not at all. He’d thought he’d simply see a friend. Instead, he’d discovered that the ghost of a long-ago emotion not only continued to haunt him, but seemed to be as vital and alive as ever. Maybe more so.

Only now he and Tris weren’t even friends. And Paul was dropping crazy ideas in his head about forgetting being friends with Tris, forgetting driving other thoughts of her out of his mind. About the heated possibilities that whispered in his blood when he felt her arm around his chest, the touch of her breath on his ear, the rub of her leg on his.

He rose quickly from the step, as if to escape such thoughts. And closed the door firmly behind him, as if to close out the influence of Paul Monroe. Crazy. And dangerous.

“And they say women are always late,” Bette grumbled, shifting from one foot to the other in the Monroes’ front hall. Tris gave her a sympathetic look. The day before the wedding, the bride was entitled to a jitter or two, especially with a groom like Paul. After last night’s conversation she’d been feeling a little jittery herself. Even after deciding, as morning’s light seeped into her bedroom, that ignoring his preposterous theory was the only possibility.

Paul had insisted on adding one last activity to the week’s agenda, a volleyball game with their group plus longtime friends who’d arrived for the wedding and local friends. He said, with some logic, that he and Bette wouldn’t have enough time to visit with everybody as much as they’d want to at the reception, and with the rehearsal dinner tonight, this was the only opportunity. Aunt Nancy had refused to have the impromptu party in her backyard the day before the wedding, so the word had gone out to meet at a nearby park.

But now Tris, Bette and Judi stood in the front hall waiting for the three men to make an appearance.

“Grady said he wanted to take a nap, Michael said something about taking a shower after he’d been out running and Paul was muttering something about his lucky ball when he disappeared into the attic,” Judi offered.

“Oh, no.” Dismay sounded in Bette’s groan. “I promised Paul there’d be no set schedule all week, but today— We’ll never get there, and that means I’ll never get him to come home, and then we won’t have time to get ready for the rehearsal and if we don’t have a rehearsal they probably won’t let us get married tomorrow. Not to mention that we’ll be late for the rehearsal dinner at the country club and they’ll throw out Paul’s parents after thirty-two years of membership.”

“No way, Bette. And no matter what happens, you know Paul won’t let you get out of this wedding.” Tris's teasing brought a vaguely dreamy look to Bette’s eyes for a moment before it seemed to spur her to action.

“I tell you what, each of us should go corral one of them. I’ll lure Paul out of the attic if I have to tie him up and drag him. Judi, why don’t you—.

“Go find Grady, and I’ll get Michael,” filled in Tris. She didn’t like the prospect of sending Judi off to Michael’s private room over the garage. But she might have spoken with too much emphasis, because the other two women looked at her with surprise.

“Okay, We’ll meet back here as quickly as possible.”

At the steps to Michael’s room, Tris hesitated.

They still hadn’t healed over the harsh words spoken on the sailboat. The odd thing was that in all the years of their friendship, they’d never had a fight before. Neither seemed to know how to proceed now. She resolutely ignored the whispered memory of Paul’s suggestion on that score.

She’d started this week looking forward to recapturing the old days with one significant difference—Grady’s view of her as a kid. She hadn’t expected so many other changes. She saw Grady, and even Paul differently now, probably saw them more accurately and certainly felt closer to them. That was all to the good. But the break in her relationship with Michael . . . there wasn’t anything good about that.

She wanted to be friends again.
Friends
. That was all.

She straightened her shoulders and marched up the steps, knocking loudly on the door.

“C’mon in. The door’s open.” The words were muffled, but decipherable.

She pushed open the door and stepped into the room, which was dominated by a king-size bed and had windows looking toward the deck and the water. Once inside, she could hear the shower running. She swallowed nervously as she realized he hadn’t closed the bathroom door all the way. All she could see at the moment was steam billowing out, but when that cleared . . .

The water was turned off. “Who’s there?”

“It’s Tris. Bette sent me to hurry you up.” Only a slight revision of history.

“Okay. Tell her I’ll be there in a minute.”

With the water off, the steam started to dissipate, and through the half-open door she could make out movement reflected in the fogged mirror. Something that looked like broad shoulders and a tanned back. She remembered how she had felt the heat and hardness of that back when they posed on the library steps. She’d told herself at the time that she was aware only of the feel of his chest under her arm, but her body had been attuned to the way that position had brought her breasts up against his back. She’d tried to ignore the tightening, filling sensation she’d experienced, but the memory was stronger than her will. Even now she felt the hardness against her softness, felt the tenderness, the . . .

Abruptly she pivoted away, bumping into the counter of the tiny kitchenette before making her way to stand by the love seat, looking out the windows.

His words and tone had given her the option to leave him to follow on his own. But she had a chance to try to mend the break in their friendship. She wanted to take it. She would take it.

“Michael.” The word came out through her tight throat as a mutter.

“Tris? Are you still there?”

“Yes.” Silence filled the room, as palpable as the moist air. “I . . . I, um, wanted to talk to you. I’m sorry, Michael. About what I said on the boat. I shouldn’t have said that. I don’t know what got into me. I know you’d never do anything to hurt Judi.” She felt a small stab at her conscience; she was fairly sure the possibility of his hurting Judi hadn’t been the sole cause of her words. She heard the bathroom door open wider and thought Michael stepped into the room, but she didn’t look around.

“I’m really sorry, Michael. And I hate this awful coldness between us. I feel . . . I don’t know— Lost?” She swallowed at the burning in her throat and tested out a wry smile on the glass in front of her. It wobbled. “I’m used to thinking we’d always be friends.”

She knew Michael had come up behind her before he touched her shoulder. “I’m sorry, too. I was out of line, way out of line, saying those things. I hope we can forgive and forget this whole thing, because I haven’t much enjoyed the past few days.”

“Oh, Michael, me either.” She turned to face him and stopped. He stood in front of her, the same Michael she’d known, trusted and counted on for all these years, yet somehow different. His hair, usually so unruly, was slicked down by the shower’s water, taming it, molding it to his head and revealing more of his bone structure, showing more of its strength. Showing the skeleton of a strong and fine man.

Her gaze slipped lower and she saw he wore no shirt, just a pair of cutoffs that hung low on his slim hips. The water had curled and darkened the hair that marked a path down his chest. She remembered the dressing room curtain pulling back and her mental tracing of that path. All she’d have to do now would be to raise her hand to span the six inches that separated them. Just to touch him. Just to know the feel of him.

She never knew if she’d actually started the movement when he turned away and went to the dresser. She thought he yanked a drawer open with unnecessary force, but she couldn’t be sure. Expelling the breath she’d been holding without giving way to a sigh—would it have been shaky or wistful? —took all her concentration. Because his back was to her, she couldn’t read his expression, but his voice sounded calm and even.

“Well, I’m glad that’s taken care of. Now we can play on the same team without my having to worry about being spiked from behind by my own teammate.”

Count on Michael to say the right thing to put her at ease. She appreciated that, but at the moment it also irritated her. But why? Because she wanted to be kissed, not put at ease. Why hadn’t he kissed her?

She became aware of his eyes on her. Dismissing her disturbing thoughts, she chuckled. “If we’re talking about forgiveness, isn’t it about time you forgave me for that? It was an accident, you know.”

“Forgiveness was no problem,” he said, pulling on his second sock and reaching in a drawer for a shirt. “But forgetting’s something else. I had a bump on my head for weeks. It’s human nature to remember attacks from behind like that.”

His last words were muffled as he pulled a T-shirt over his head. She ignored what might have been a twinge of disappointment at that covering of the smooth muscles and planes of his back.