Total pages in book: 77
Estimated words: 72586 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 363(@200wpm)___ 290(@250wpm)___ 242(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 72586 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 363(@200wpm)___ 290(@250wpm)___ 242(@300wpm)
Her pissed off energy seemed to seep into the air around her.
Honestly, it was kind of adorable watching her. She was a small woman, and something about small things rampaging and raging admittedly tickled at my amusement.
Even with much longer strides, I had to pick up my pace to keep up with her as she stormed into the elevator, down the hallway, and even stormily used her keycard. To her frustration, it hadn’t worked until I helpfully showed her she was holding it backwards.
Now she was rage-packing her suitcase with her ass pointed right at me.
Accident? Maybe. But I had my hands stuffed in my pockets as I fought my natural impulse to stare at the absolutely mouth-watering view that put the Rockies to shame. Yeah. With a woman like Emma, you could save a few bucks booking hotel rooms. Why would you give a shit what was out your windows when you’d want nothing more than to stare at her?
“Are you going to offer to help?” she asked, voice muffled as her ass wiggled with the force of her packing. She was trying to gather all of her things from her room—which was definitely way nicer than mine. If she thought she was pissed now, I wondered how much worse it would be when she saw the comparatively shit room I’d been given.
“Did you want help devouring this welcome platter of food and champaign? Because it looks like you were doing pretty well on your own.” I grinned, picking up a piece of cheese with a small bite taken from it. I popped it into my mouth and chewed. Tasty. “This thing looks like a pack of wolves went at it.”
Emma whirled, still crouched as she glared with one hand in her suitcase. "This is your fault," she said, turning back to shove more clothes into her bag with impressive force. "All of it. If you hadn't shown up playing hero—"
"You'd be fending off Dick right about now.”
"I could have handled Dick just fine on my own."
The joke was right there. So easy. So perfect.
I bit my lip to stop from speaking, because I only needed one look at her face to tell me humor wasn’t going to soften her. No. There was real hurt beneath her anger, and it was very possibly a bridge between us I wouldn’t ever be able to mend.
"Since when are you a 'family friend' anyway?" she demanded, turning to face me. "Because I think I would have remembered someone like you hanging around family gatherings."
I kept my face carefully neutral. "Your mother—"
"My mother?" She dropped the shirt she was folding. "What about my mother?"
Shit. I probably should’ve been more vague. "I just meant—"
"Did she hire you?" The color drained from her face. "Is that why you're here? To wreck another wedding? To wreck my little sister’s wedding?"
I met her gaze, keeping my expression neutral. "Maybe I knew you’d be here. Maybe I wanted to see an old friend."
"We're not friends." The words had an edge sharp enough to draw blood. "Friends don't destroy each other's careers."
"I didn't try to destroy—"
"Save it." She yanked open another drawer and dumped the contents in her concerningly stuffed suitcase. “Tell me why I shouldn’t go to Mr. Wellington right now and tell him exactly who you are and what you do."
“Well…” I hesitated, wishing there was a way to word this that wouldn’t sound like a threat. “Because he’s probably going to want to know why the wedding planner didn’t notice someone like that on the guest list? And now he’ll also wonder why you’re dating me. At the very least, he’ll wonder why you didn’t tell him the moment I showed up back there.”
Emma’s face scrunched in an adorably terrifying mask of anger. “So you’ve entrapped me. Perfect. Was this all part of your plan?”
“No,” I said. “I happened to overhear some creep hitting on a girl. I stuck my head in and was coming over to help even before I knew it was you. But considering our… history, we should at least be pretty good at making it look like we’re attracted to each other. So I’d call it a happy accident.”
“Okay,” she said, voice slow and dangerously quiet. “Maybe I should just ask why I shouldn’t strangle you in your sleep tonight? Hm?”
“That is probably a better question,” I admitted. “But even if I was working this wedding, which I’m not…” Liar, liar. “It’s not like I ruin every wedding. People hire me to investigate. Sometimes, there’s absolutely nothing going on, and I just enjoy the free drinks and festivities.”
“I’m not going to believe you aren’t working this wedding for a second.”
Smart girl.
“Well,” I said. “That’s your choice. But I’m just here to have a good time and watch an old family friend get married.”