“Can I get you a drink, um…?” Damn. He really could not recall her name.
“Feather,” she finished for him.
How could he have forgotten anything that silly? “Feather. Right. Let me get one of the waiters.”
Feather downed several more Cosmopolitans (which was exactly what he would’ve guessed she’d drink) as she gossiped about Steffi and the other bridesmaids. “I think Steffi should’ve cut back to about five attendants and only picked the really good-looking ones, y’know?” She sat up straighter, only slightly wobbly. “A person has to have standards.”
What was he supposed to say to that? Sure, have all the standards you want. Who cares? He raised his glass to his lips, preferring not to comment.
“Did you know that Steffi and I are soro…soror…sorory sisters?” She tried to get a grip on her drink, giggling when it sloshed over its rim and splashed red liquid onto the white linen tablecloth. “Oopsie! What was I saying? Oh, yeah—me and Steffi. We are just like that.” She squinted, trying to focus long enough to put her index fingers together. “Like that.”
“I got it.”
Tipping over to one side, she propped herself up on an elbow. “You are so cute, y’know?”
“Uh, sure. Whatever.” When she waited expectantly, he hastened to add, “And you, too. You’re beautiful. But you already know that.”
“Well, duh. Come on, don’t I see myself in the mirror? Like, news flash.”
Okay, not even for a few hours could he put up with this. He started to rise.
“Hey, where you goin’? Am I invited?”
He tried to remind himself that he wasn’t looking for conversation, just one night of guilt-free seduction, nothing too taxing, nothing too clingy, just fun and a few fireworks. What was he going to do otherwise? Go back to his room by himself, drink the other half of the bottle of Scotch, and fall into a depressed stupor. Yeah, that sounded enticing.
Feather gave him a sly wink, winding her tongue around a cherry she’d plucked from someone else’s drink. After fooling with it for a few seconds, she popped it out of her mouth with the stem neatly tied in a knot. “Everybody has to have a talent,” she giggled.
Ian sat back down.
“LUCIE,” DELILAH ANNOUNCED, “I think we need to find some guys and fast. You and I—and especially you—need a fling.”
“A fling?” By this time, Lucie had ditched her shoes under the table and rolled up her sleeves, and she was feeling much better. She’d also switched from champagne to strawberry margaritas, and she swirled sugar onto her tongue while she considered her fellow bridesmaid’s idea. “You mean like a one-night stand? Why exactly do I need that?”
“Dying on the vine, my dear. Dying on the vine. I mean, here we are, bridesmaids at this big, ugly ol’ wedding with a million guys running around, and what are we doing? Talking to each other.” Delilah shook her head sadly. “We need to get out there and find us some guys. You know, for overnight. Or maybe not even overnight, just a couple of hours. Heck, just a couple of minutes!”
“You are so bad,” Lucie returned in a stage whisper. She said with determination, “If I’m doing it, I’m not settling for a couple of minutes. Not tonight.”
“You go, girl!”
“Darn right.” Lucie lifted her chin. “Did I tell you it’s my birthday? And not just any birthday. The big 3-0.”
Delilah’s mouth dropped open. “Get out! You’re thirty? Today? Okay, now I know I’m right. Lucie, honey, you are in dire need of a little nookie, a little fun, some snap and crackle, y’know? I mean, good grief.”
“I don’t know….”
“Oh, come on!” Delilah’s speech picked up speed and volume as she gained enthusiasm. “Go for it! Have a fling! You’ll never turn thirty again. Besides, you’re a bridesmaid. It’s what bridesmaids do. Look around you—everyone is pairing up.”
Through the mist of a few too many alcoholic beverages, Lucie surveyed the rapidly thinning crowd in the ballroom. “Oh, my god. You’re right. There are trysts forming before my very eyes!”
In fact, directly in her line of vision, she saw Ian, the handsome best man, sitting very close to Steffi’s maid of honor, the one with the silicone-inflated cleavage and legs up to her chin. From here, it looked as if the two of them were getting cozy. Very cozy. Yuck.
And if she looked the other way, her gaze hit snippy little Steffi, out on the dance floor in her white lace wedding dress, clinging to her handsome groom like there was no tomorrow.
Steffi, twenty-one and married to a drop-dead gorgeous guy in his thirties. Her hideous maid of honor, also twenty-something, also attached to a gorgeous guy in his thirties.
And here sat Lucie, thirty and alone. “Well,” she said with spirit, “isn’t that a kick in the pants?”
AS IAN TRIED to decide where he was going with this, Feather made her move. Bending in close enough to give him a full view of her dangerously round breasts, she slid a hand onto his knee, teasing the edge of his kilt. She whispered, “Are you feeling what I’m feeling?”
“What are you feeling?”
“Hot. Hot, hot, hot.”
He smiled. Okay, so he was human, and when a woman put her hand under his kilt, he had the obvious reaction. “Maybe.”
“I know you’re as turned on as I am,” she mouthed. “Tell you what—just give me your key, and we’ll take this upstairs.” As he made no move, she pouted and tried, “Come on, Ian. Everybody knows the best man and the maid of honor are supposed to make it on the wedding night. It’s kind of a…” She winked at him. “A tradition.”
He told himself not to be an idiot. She might not be the swiftest boat in the fleet, but Feather was a beautiful, willing, sexy woman. Was he really going to turn her down?
Not on your life. He reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out the key. The number 2-0-3 caught the light of a nearby candle as he slipped it across the table.
Feather offered a triumphant smile, nabbing the key and sticking it quickly into the small plaid handbag looped around her wrist. “You go ahead,” she said in a breathy voice. “I’ll just freshen up and then I’ll be right with you.”
As she toddled off in the direction of the ladies’ room, Ian pondered the odds of her actually making it up the stairs to his room. Fifty-fifty, he decided. But hey, that was like letting fate decide whether a horizontal tango with Feather was meant to be.
He grabbed the bottle of Scotch on the table, stopped by the front desk for another key to his room, and strolled up to the second floor, still in a very dark and cynical frame of mind.
If Feather made the climb or if she didn’t, it was no big deal to him.
“IT’S WHAT HAPPENS at weddings, Luce. It’s like they pump something into the air. All the sexual tension, the weepy till-death-do-us-part stuff, everyone thinking about honeymoons and garters and sloppy kisses and white lace and roses and…Well, the open bar doesn’t hurt, either.”
“Okay, so everyone else is doing it. That doesn’t mean I have to,” Lucie protested. “I’m just not that kind of person.” She hiccuped delicately. “Besides, my father would have a fit.”
“What’s he got to do with it?” Delilah argued. “And why would he even have to know?”
“He wouldn’t, I suppose. It’s just…he’s very hung up on toeing the line, not making waves, not doing anything that would embarrass him.”
“Let