The Wedding Affair (The Affair Series Book 2) (6 page)

He looked down at Samantha and encouraged her with a nodding smile. She hesitated then made a funny face. As her eyes comically rolled, she drawled, “What he meant to say was, Andi and Kyle, thanks for including us in your special day. We wish you love, laughter, and a happily ever after. Salud!”

Well, damn! The girl could think on her toes. He liked that.

After a few more silly toasts, Kyle looked at Samantha and smirked. “Disappointed about the board shorts?”

Her answering snort of laughter was the cutest thing he’d heard in forever.

“Private joke?” Ryan teased.

Kyle smirked some more and then focused all his attention on Andi who was prattling on and on about wedding shit. For the moment, he and Samantha were on their own.

She surprised him by taking the lead. “In what world are you a graphics designer? Did
GQ
run out of pages or something?”

In anyone else’s mouth—particularly Ms. Coconut Breasts at the Bar—her words would sound like a come-on. But Samantha Evers struck him as the sort of woman who would have to Google come-ons and then put the best ones in a list on her phone. Where they’d forever sit unused because she just didn’t operate that way.

No, her question was entirely straightforward. Add ‘delightful’ to the list of her many attributes.

“Design is in my blood, and
GQ
is not all it’s cracked up to be.”

“What’s that mean?” Her eyes were a vibrant smoky blue.

“Which part? What I feel or the other thing?”

“I think you know.”

Somehow, this unexpected enchantress had gone straight to the heart of him. It was unnerving and exhilarating at the same time.

“My folks will tell you I was a design prodigy. Something about blowing their minds with an Etch-a-Sketch.”

She chuckled and sipped at her champagne.

“I’m the obnoxious guy who scribbles stuff on napkins and paper bags. Once I got my hands on a computer, well. . .
pfft.
”

“Okay.”

He felt his brow rise without any conscious effort on his part.
Beautiful, funny, and damn smart too.
No way was she easily pushed off topic.

Ryan shrugged. After a long sip of the chilled bubbly, he met her curious gaze. “People clutching a MacBook with awesome design skills are a dime a half dozen. The market was saturated with guys like me. Around the time I was coming to the conclusion that my life was going to be about scraping by and humping for clients, providence tapped me on the shoulder.”

This time, she was raising her brows.

“In my senior year in college, I got sucked into doing one of those cheesy calendars. College hunks or something like that. Later, whenever I needed a quick infusion of survival funds, I’d take some modeling jobs. One thing led to another and before long, I was standing next to the Tivoli fountain in an Armani tux having my picture taken.”

“I knew it!” Samantha’s laugh was contained so only the two of them were involved.

He smiled. It was the first time he smiled thinking about that time of his life in god only knows how long.

Samantha’s laughter grew infectious, and she moved close enough to grab his wrist. “Please tell me there’s an underwear ad out there somewhere starring you.”

What? Shocked, he exploded with laughter.

“What’s so damn funny?” Kyle asked now that Ryan had drawn his attention.

“She wants to know if there’s an underwear ad.”

The table erupted in rollicking laughter as a series of awful, ribald jokes around the teeny tiny designer’s underwear in an ad campaign he’d starred in got tossed around.

“Wait, wait!” Andi yelped after blowing her nose and wiping away tears of laughter. “Here,” she said as she whipped her cell phone out of thin air. “I keep it in my pictures.”

Kyle groaned at her admission and slapped a hand over his eyes.

Just as Ryan drawled, “Seriously?” she held up her phone and shoved it in Samantha’s face.

Her reaction was as funny as the jokes. Barely managing not to spew champagne like a fire breather, she very nearly choked on her drink. Her eyes widened and bugged out as she squinted at the tiny picture on the screen.

Ordinarily, by this time, when he was under intense scrutiny for something he’d done as a young twenty-something, Ryan would be chafing as irritation wracked him. He wasn’t embarrassed by the photographic endorsement of his manly attributes. Not at all.

What ground his gears was the pantomime of ogling that broke out and how a single photo automatically separated people into two distinct groups. Guys who basically wanted to punch his lights out and women who wanted to fuck him.

All those feelings were nowhere to be found at the moment because he was completely wrapped up in what the expression
being on pins and needles
really meant.

Kyle loaded up his drawled comment with an assload of sarcasm. “Easy, girls. Age deflates a balloon, if you catch my drift.”

Ryan shot him a
fuck you
death glare, downed the rest of his champagne, and went back to waiting for Samantha to do what every woman did.

After a good long look at Andi’s phone, Samantha sat back and carefully placed her champagne flute on the table. She didn’t look at him and kept her face averted, but he could still make out the blush staining her cheeks.

“I think the cat’s got her tongue.” Andi snickered. Fanning herself with diva-ish flair, she went a step further. “Either that or she’s burning up.”

Samantha shot out of her seat and stood up so fast, he moved back to give her room.

“Andrea,” she barked like a drill sergeant. “Ladies’ room. Now.” A sharp snap of her fingers and the way she pointed had Andi responding to the command. Without a glance at either man, both women locked arms and stomped along the pathway to the restrooms.

He watched their retreat and committed to memory the delicious vision his quiet beauty made. When she had stood up, he saw that the shimmery golden top had an open back and was part of a sexy dress with a short flouncy skirt that bounced and swayed as she walked.

The temptation of legs that went on for miles emptied his brain of rational thought. Her shoes, heeled strappy things, were the icing on the cake of his desire for the cute, quirky stunner.

As they disappeared from view, his head whipped around and he pinned his cousin to the spot with a fierce stare.

“Is this a setup?”

“Honest to god, Andi. When were you planning to tell me Kyle’s cousin is an underwear model?”

“He’s a designer, Sami. A graphics designer. And a damn good one too. The modeling thing was a long time ago.”

The half-assed shrug and the way Andi leaned close to the mirror as she inspected her lipstick set her back a bit.

Hesitating, as her mind tried to make sense of the unfolding events, she crossed her arms and began to pace back and forth.

The facts were clear. Andi was playing matchmaker. And maybe Kyle too. A feeling of familiar exasperation swirled inside her. Why did everyone think a hookup was the answer?

Andi finished primping and turned to watch her. Sam caught the brief flash of a smug smile playing around her freshly lipsticked mouth and stopped to give her a look.

The
look. The one that said, ‘Uh-huh. Nice try.’

“What is your problem, Samantha? Get a grip, girlfriend. Look around. We’re literally,” she exclaimed with deliberate emphasis, “in paradise. Palm trees, hot bare-chested men bringing our drinks.” She motioned with her head. “The beach beyond the trees. A beautiful tropical night and a river of champagne.”

Sam arched a brow, pursed her lips, and went for full outrage mode as she slapped her hands to her waist. “And where exactly is this going in your imagination?”

Throwing some peeved arm waving into the mix, Andi exhaled sharply and stared her down.

“This is my wedding. Love is in the goddamn air if I say it is! Understand?”

After a reflex nod of agreement, Sam was biting her lip to keep from laughing.

“He’s a great guy, Sami. Funny. Smart. Started his own business. Works hard. All those things you have on your perfect guy checklist. I don’t get it. Does being hot as shit automatically disqualify him?”

Either her friend was being deliberately obtuse, or bridal insanity had overtaken her. One of those two things had to be true.

“Andi,” she snapped. “Where does this prime candidate live? Hmm?”

“Well, he lives near St. Augustine.”

Sam cocked her head but said nothing.

“And you’d know this, by the way, if you’d ever come visit, or better yet—leave that stupid shithole you insist on living in and come back to civilization.”

“That’s not the issue, so don’t try to deflect me. You know damn well what this is about. Reality is black and white. I live in California. Ryan lives in Florida.”

“So?”

“Oh, for god’s sake, Andi. Cut it out. I’m not that girl, and you know it. Seriously, girlfriend. I can’t think of anything more cringe-worthy or desperate than wedding guest sex. Sucky fucky for shits ‘n’ grins is not my style. I don’t care how hot the guy is.”

“Watch your mouth, missy,” Andi spit out. “Nobody said anything about sucky fucky wedding guest sex. He’s not a sex toy, y’know.”

Oh, my god. Really? Somehow, with one snarky reaction, Andi managed to turn the whole thing around and make it sound like Sam was being a bitch.

Her eyes narrowed, and she glared at Andi’s amused face.

“Look,” her friend said in a reasonable tone that suggested Sam was overreacting, “he’s hot. No other way to say it. But you’re a modern day Aphrodite even though you like to pretend otherwise.”

The only thing she had to contribute was a skeptical smirk.

“Sweetie, he honed in on you like a bee to a flower. Kyle said he’d never ever seen him react that way before. That has to count for something. And he hasn’t taken his eyes off you for more than a few seconds.”

Andi eyed her curiously for a minute then murmured, “That’s not the behavior of a man looking to score a wedding affair.”

Wedding affair. Ugh. They made movies about such things and the women always came off as bimbos and sluts. The guys did too—mostly—which was exactly why these things were not her cup of tea.

But she heard the point Andi was making.

“Just get to know him, babe. I mean, you two are going to be attached at the hip for the next couple of days anyway. Once the wedding is over, and all of this is behind us, then you can think about what comes next. Stop borrowing trouble, Sami. Let loose. Have some damn fun. You never know what’ll happen until you give life another try.”

S
tanding buck-ass naked on the private lanai of his ocean view room, Ryan took in the spectacular scenery and downed a cup of Kona coffee. He’d been up since o-dark-thirty, the result of a restless night, so how much coffee he consumed might decide how he handled the morning ahead.

After checking to be sure that an adequate cushion was present to protect his balls from the unforgiving wicker of a chair at the small patio table, he dropped into the seat and set the coffee mug down.

Growling like a bear, he tried shaking off the sluggish remnants of his sleep-deprived state by scraping his fingers back and forth against his scalp.

The ocean crashing ashore became the background accompaniment to the harsh noise from dragging a surprisingly heavy ottoman up to his seat. Propping his legs on the cushion, Ryan crossed his feet at the ankles, leaned back, and let out a deep sigh.

Then, with a groan mixed with frustration and disgust, he inspected his morning hard-on through narrowed eyes and reached again for the coffee.

For an erection lasting more than four hours
. . .

Pfft.
What a joke. No little blue pill required for this apparently permanent state of affairs. Nope. All he had to do was spend two minutes thinking about Samantha Evers and every ounce of blood in his body went rushing to his dick.

She was his own personal erectile facilitator.

Erectile facilitator.

He laughed out loud. Holy shit but that was funny.

Immediately, his mind switched to design mode as a tableau of erotic drawings featuring an enormous shaft,
his
, being worked over by a mind-melting pair of lips,
hers
, dominated his thoughts.