When she flicked her gaze toward Grant, she found him staring at her intently.
You can do this, she admonished herself sternly. After all, it was just one trip.
One shopping trip. One wedding. One week.
If I can deal with the dinner rush on Saturday half-price chicken fried steak night, I can deal with anything.
Time to suck it up, buttercup.
Still, the gleam in Grant’s eyes made her nervous.
Two
Grant stood in the covered portico of the hotel’s circular drive, waiting for the rest of the group to arrive so they could take a taxi into Antigua’s capital city.
A shopping trip with Ava. This could be fun.
Okay, so shopping for clothes wasn’t Grant’s favorite thing in world. But at least it would mean time with Ava.
Time with Ava could mean a chance to regain the closeness they had shared once.
But not too close.
No. She was Seth’s baby sister, and she deserved better than anything he could ever offer her. She deserved a real life, full of laughing children and a real home in Necessity, the town she had never wanted to leave, and a husband who could actually live in that home with her.
Not someone whose career meant he was practically a vagabond, living out of hotel rooms—or worse, travel trailers parked near drilling sites.
Grant spent his days surrounded by roughnecks and pumpers. He loved his job as a petroleum engineer, but it was no life for someone as beautiful and delicate as Ava.
She deserves better.
The general lack of women and children on-site made it clear how unsuited it was for someone like Ava.
Well, other than the women who work there, he admitted to himself.
The fact that he couldn’t imagine dragging her into his life didn’t mean he and Ava couldn’t be friends again, did it?
After all, they had been friends before.
Until he had ruined it all with one drunken New Year’s kiss—a kiss that had led to the most amazing night of his life.
Even now, he couldn’t say he wished he could take it back.
He did wish he could find a way to restore their easy camaraderie, though.
He heard her laugh from the hotel lobby before he saw her. As usual, the sound of her voice went right through him, like it had since she was thirteen and he was sixteen, and he had turned around and really noticed her for the first time.
She and Kristin moved out from behind a pillar just as the hotel shuttle pulled up, and then they were all piling into the van. Grant stood back to let the women climb in first, and found himself staring at Ava’s perfect ass as she stepped up onto the van’s running board. Her brightly colored sundress swirled around her calves, and it was all he could do to stop himself from reaching out to brush his hand against the soft skin of her legs.
Because that’s not creepy at all.
Get ahold of yourself, Porter.
Kristin and Seth settled into the first row, and Grant followed Ava to the back bench seat. As he sat down, the scent of her wafted across him, a mix of her apple shampoo and something sweet, a smell that was pure Ava. He would recognize it anywhere. Even here, covered as it was with the smell of sunscreen.
Glancing up, he caught Kristin watching him through narrowed eyes, her gaze speculative.
Great. Just what he needed—a wedding-crazed bride intent on matchmaking.
Time for a distraction.
“What do you two have to do to get the wedding license?” he asked Kristin.
“Apparently, we have to go to the Ministry of …” Kristin paused and closed her eyes as she tried to remember.”
“The Ministry of Justice and Legal Affairs in St. John’s,” Seth finished for her, and she nodded.
“Any idea how long that will take?” Ava asked. “What?” she continued when her brother made a face at her. “I want to know how long I have to find a new, perfect dress for the ceremony.”
“And a matching tie,” Grant added dryly. Having seen the way Kristin was watching him, he wasn’t sure that the whole matching-tie business wasn’t an excuse to make sure he and Ava spent plenty of time together.
“It’s not like we all have to take the shuttle back together.” Seth rolled his eyes. “Take as much time as you need. Just be back in time for the rehearsal tomorrow evening.”
Ava snorted. “I think I can find a dress without an overnight trip.”
“You sure?” her brother replied. “Remember taking her for that prom dress, Grant?” He turned to Kristin. “About half the time we were kids, the only way I could take the car out was if I took Ava to do something first. I’m pretty sure Grant and I hauled her over half of Texas looking for a dress. If camping out in a mall to keep looking had been an option, I’m pretty sure she would have done it.”