“She’s being modest,” Joss said. “Anytime I’ve hung out with Maia and Shannon, all Maia talks about is you and Logan.” Something glittered in her eyes, something like amusement, and I wondered for a moment if she’d picked up on Maia’s desire to see me and Logan as a couple.
“Well, all I know is that it is a special kind of person to take a kid under their wing that isn’t theirs.” His gaze drifted across the room, and I glanced over to see whom he was staring at.
Elodie.
Joss lifted Braden’s hand to press a light kiss on his knuckles. He looked down at her and pulled her tighter to his side before focusing those pale eyes on me again. “Logan is a good friend. Maia was a massive shock for him and I’m grateful for what you’ve done for them. If you ever need anything, Grace, you let me know.”
I felt like I’d just been officially welcomed into their fold by the Godfather. I blushed and mumbled my thanks.
“I know what you could do.” A face appeared beside me, and I slanted a look to the side to see Ellie had come up behind me and popped her head into the conversation.
I grinned at the mischievous look in her pale blue eyes. Huh. She and Braden had the exact same eyes.
“And what’s that?” Braden’s face had softened with affection as he waited for his sister’s answer.
Ellie slid her arm along my shoulders. “Did you know that this beautiful lady is single?”
Joss snorted at the mortified look on my face.
“Point being, Ellie, other than to embarrass Grace?” Braden said dryly.
“James Llewellyn-Jones,” Ellie whispered.
Braden frowned. “My lawyer?”
She nodded. “He’s gorgeous, he’s successful, he’s single, and he’s here. Perhaps an introduction would be in order.”
My heart started to beat hard with embarrassment. “Oh no, really, you don’t have to do that.”
Joss was scowling at Ellie now. “Really. You don’t,” she said pointedly, widening her eyes at Ellie, as if trying to send her a message. I just didn’t know what that message was. Apparently, neither did Ellie, who appeared adorably confused by Joss’s eye gesturing.
“What’s going on over here?” Jo sidled up to us, grinning.
“I thought Braden could introduce Grace to James. The lawyer.” Ellie grinned back.
Jo immediately glowered. “Or not,” she said pointedly.
“What the hell am I missing?” Braden asked them.
“Nothing,” Joss assured him. “Your sister just has stupid ideas.”
“We knew that when she decided to marry Adam,” he said.
“I heard that.” Adam stepped up to the group. “And my rebuttal is your wife is the one with stupid ideas. She allowed you to breed. Three times.”
“Hey, our kids have got more of me in them, so there’s no worries on that account,” Joss said.
“Bull. Beth, yes, Luke, no. That kid is Braden’s spit and we all know it. The world is fucking doomed. You better keep your eye on wee Ellie,” Adam said with a teasing gravity.
“Oh, don’t worry. I’m grooming her to be just like me.” Ellie smiled at her husband.
Braden looked at Adam. “You’re right. The world is doomed.”
For whatever her reasons, Joss slipped me out of Ellie’s matchmaking clutches and guided me across the room in the opposite direction of James Llewellyn-Jones to refill my champagne.
Twenty minutes passed during which I was introduced to a bunch of people whose names I would never remember since my memory bank had been filled up on the names of the Carmichael & Co. Clan that evening. Ellie didn’t badger me about the lawyer she wanted me to meet, so I assumed she’d been talked down by either Jo or Joss, who both seemed strangely opinionated on the matter.
It was just a coincidence then that when I reached for the last vol-au-vent someone else did too.
“Oh, I’m sorry,” a masculine voice said, and I followed the hand that had been reaching for my pastry up to a pair of lovely gray eyes. They belonged to a good-looking man around my age. “I insist you have it,” he said, giving me a teasing smile.
I really wanted that vol-au-vent. “Then I insist I do too.”
He laughed, watching me as I took the snack and started to nibble at it.
“I’m James.” He continued to smile at me.
I swallowed the tasty little morsel, blinking rapidly. “Not Llewellyn-Jones?”
He raised an eyebrow. “I’m famous?”
I smiled weakly, searching the room for Ellie, who had obviously put him up to this. I found her, but instead of looking gleeful to see James talking to me, she looked stricken. She shot a look across the room at Jo, who was shaking her head in annoyance at her.
What the hell was going on with that lot?
“Is something the matter?” James said, looking over his shoulder to follow my gaze.
“No, not at all. Braden mentioned your name earlier. That’s how I knew who you were.”
“Saying only good things, I hope?”
I felt uncomfortable, awkward for some reason, like the two of us were under a magnifying glass. I did my best to hide the feeling. “Well, there was some mention of tax evasion and terrorism, but other than that…”
He grinned. “And can I ask what your name is?”