It could have been worse. He could have agreed to Seth’s plan for the four of them to fly together, and been stuck in an airplane seat next to her for the last nine hours.
Because that would be torture—the same kind that made him try to avoid her every time he ended up back home in Necessity.
The kind that made his heart race, and his entire body come to attention.
This time, though, there was no avoiding her—not once they all got settled at the hotel. He might not see her tonight, but he was going to have to figure out how to deal with her for the next several days as they helped Seth and Kristin prepare for what Grant hoped wouldn’t turn out to be the biggest bust of a wedding ever.
I take that back. I clearly must be insane.
One
“The wedding coordinator is looking for you.”
A shadow fell across her, and Ava dug her toes into the heated sand at the end of her beach chair, imagining the glittering particles falling across her bright pink toenails.
Twenty-four hours.
She’d had twenty-four glorious, sun-drenched hours, during which no one had asked her for anything.
In that entire time, she hadn’t had to fetch, carry, deliver, or clean a single item.
No dirty tables to wipe. No menus, sticky with children’s fingerprints rendered in honey and decorated with biscuit crumbs waiting for her to scrub them. No napkins to roll, no silverware to sort. No coffee mugs to top off or extra gravy orders to fill.
Not a single person had said “Excuse me, miss, but could you. …”
Until now.
She counted the seconds in her head, waiting for Grant to speak again. That’s how much longer she had until she was back on duty.
… Eight. Nine. Ten.
Grant cleared his throat impatiently. “You awake?”
Finally, Ava cracked open one eye behind her sunglasses and peered up at her brother’s best friend. Best man, in just a few days. “Yeah,” she said. “Wedding coordinator. I’m on it.”
When she had agreed to be the only bridesmaid at her brother Seth’s wedding to Kristin Rittman, Ava had known it would come with some obligations, some of them not that different from her daily duties at the Chargrill back in Necessity, Texas. But in the end, she hadn’t been able to resist Seth—or his offer of a vacation in Antigua.
Not even after she discovered that Grant Porter was going to be the best man.
Not that Grant being the best man should have come as any surprise, Ava reflected as she wrapped her batik cotton cover-up around herself sarong-style, self-consciously tucking the ends in around her waist, aware of Grant’s eyes on the expanse of skin between the makeshift skirt and her red bikini top.
It was ridiculous to be embarrassed around him. He had seen her in bathing suits every summer for most of her life, at the city pool, in friends’ backyards, at the lake the summer they all learned to water-ski.
Ava had yet to determine why it was different now that he had seen so much more of her than any bikini revealed, but she could feel him watching her as she trudged through the sparkling sand back up toward the resort.
Along the way, she paused to pet one of the ubiquitous black-and-white cats that seemed to populate the entire island. It bumped its head up against her hand and she pretended not to take the opportunity to glance sidelong at Grant, still standing where she had left him on the beach, staring her as she moved away. “Come find me at dinner,” she told the half-grown cat. “Maybe I’ll have food then.”
Grant Porter. The bane of my existence.
The thought was a little melodramatic, Ava knew. But it felt accurate at the moment, anyway.
If only his job as bearer of bad news had been the only reason for her to loathe him. That, she could probably have dealt with, eventually.
She even could have handled Grant kissing her at midnight one New Year’s Eve—and not even the friendly you’re my best bud’s little sister so I should be killed for this peck on the cheek kind of kiss, but the most passionate kiss Ava had ever experienced.
It was following up that kiss with the a night of amazing, mind-blowing sex, then going back to being as good as related themselves the very next morning business that was more than Ava was willing to handle.
It had been a year and a half since that asinine decision.
Asinine on his part.
The decision to return the kiss of the man she’d had a crush on for as long as she could remember? That part wasn’t asinine. At least, it hadn’t seemed it at the time.
In retrospect, following him without asking any questions as he led her to the bedroom had probably been a stupid move.
Well, she had learned her lesson. No more kisses for Grant Porter. In fact, she hardly even spoke to him at all. He could just keep his kisses to himself.
Not to mention the rest of it.