Page 40 of You Complicate Me

He let her struggle for another half a second before muttering, “Fuck.”

And with that, he grabbed her face between his hands and stepped closer to her. Their lips were only a heartbeat apart when he whispered, “Pretend it’s just you and me here, Sadie. No one else. No reason to panic. Take a big, deep breath for me through your nose. Do it for me, okay?”

There wasn’t anything overtly inappropriate about the words themselves, but the way they were looking at each other…there was something disturbingly intimate about it. Something that gave Grace a really bad feeling about the impending wedding. A really bad feeling.

But fortunately, it worked. Sadie sucked in a big breath through her nose.

“There you go,” he murmured. “Again.”

They looked like they were about three seconds away from kissing. Okay, this was officially too awkward.

“I’m finding it hard to believe Johns Hopkins taught you that particular method of helping a patient who’s hyperventilating, Gage,” Grace said in her driest of dry tones.

“Maybe I learned it from watching ER reruns,” he said, tone equally dry, eyes still on Sadie.

Sadie let out a weak chuckle and stepped out of Gage’s reach. “T-thank you, Gage. I don’t know what happened there.”

His eyes narrowed on her. “It was a panic attack. Have you ever had one before?”

She shook her head, then crossed her arms over her chest, seeming to notice for the first time that the bodice of her dress was around her waist and her white lacy bra was on full display.

Before Gage could notice Sadie’s cleavage, Grace grabbed him, turned him around, and gave him a shove out the door. “Time to go, Dr. Love,” she muttered. “Super-awkward half-naked bride time is over.”

When they were outside the room with the door shut firmly behind them, Grace punched Gage in the arm, putting all her weight behind it.

“What the fuck?” Gage yelped, rubbing his arm.

“I was just about to ask you the same thing!” Grace hissed. “Jesus, what’s going on between you two? You’ve been weird ever since you met her.”

He scowled at her and ran a hand through his hair. “It’s nothing. I’m dealing with it, OK?”

“Nothing? Are you kidding me? There was enough sexual tension in that room that I got a contact high.” She shook her head and jerked her thumb toward Sadie’s room. “That wasn’t nothing. Are you trying to steal the bride, Gage?”

He looked disgusted. “Of course not. I’d never do that to Michael. It’s just that…shit.”

That’s when she noticed his expression had shifted from disgusted and grumpy to defeated. She’d never seen Gage defeated before. “You like her,” she said, gentling her tone. “You really like her.”

He shoved a hand through his hair. “This is bullshit, right? It’s just a physical thing. It has to be. There’s no way you can start to have any real feelings for someone after a few days. Right?”

The desperation in his voice made her wish she could tell him he was right. That whatever he was feeling for Sadie—and whatever Sadie was feeling for him in return—would pass. But since she was experiencing the exact same thing with Nick…

His chin hit his chest when she didn’t respond. “What the fuck do I do, Grace?”

She reared back as if he’d slapped her. Jesus, this was worse than she thought. Gage had never asked for advice from, well, anyone as far as she knew.

“Well,” she said on a gusty sigh, knowing he wasn’t going to like her advice, “I think you should stay away from her and let this thing play out.”

His head shot up. “What if she marries him? It’s a mistake.”

“I know it is.” She paused, rubbing her temples. “But she’s obviously jittery and just getting over being sick. She’s not in any kind of emotional shape to be leaving her fiancé for his cousin, for God’s sake. We have a few days left before the wedding. Let me talk to Michael and Nick and see if we can subtly sort this…” giant potential clusterfuck “…thing out. Until then, you just stay away from her, okay?”

She supposed she’d have to take his frustrated grunt as agreement, because he’d already turned on his heel and stalked away. Ungrateful, antisocial, grumpy bastard, she thought.

“You’re welcome!” she yelled down the hall at his retreating form.

Chapter Nineteen

“Hey, Nick,” Grace shouted toward the open door between their rooms as she tossed her card key on the bed. “Can we talk for a…oomph.”

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