Page 16 of Stuck With the Billionaire Grump

“AndIwant to thank my wonderful, amazing, vaguely insane maid of honor for planning all of these wedding festivities,” Josie says to the crowd.

Maid of honor.Oh no.

It keeps getting worse. Earlier, when I bumped into Lucy, I assumed that it would be easy enough to avoid her for the rest of my time in town, given how busy it is. I never imagined that she might also be a guest at Elijah’s wedding, let alone the woman responsible for organizing it.

Clearly, there’s no hope of avoiding her. My best bet is to stick to the edges of the crowd, ever the masculine wallflower and darn proud of it, and have faith in the fact that Lucy never deigns to flutter at the shadowy perimeter. And if our paths happen to cross by pure accident over the next few days, I can lean on my earlier plan of pretending that I don’t recognize her and pray that she plays along.

While my mind spins in circles, the girls—who genuinely look more like sisters than cousins—finish their shared speech. The crowd lifts their cups and bottles in a toast that I numbly attempt to mimic, and then Lucy and Josie are gracefully lowered down from the table with the help of the crowd.

I remain leaning against the wall, taking occasional sips of my drink as the music starts up again. Over the years, I’ve become extremely skilled at becoming invisible, so it’s easy enough to avoid being dragged into a conversation by anyone nearby. I become one with the wallpaper, unseen and unheard in the way that I have always preferred but have so rarely been able to enjoy thanks to my mother’s fame.

I try to keep my eyes on the happy couple, waiting for the ideal opportunity to make my way over to them. But it’s hard to keep my gaze off Lucy. As always, everything about her demands attention. She is a force of nature among the throngs, flitting here and there like a butterfly. Wherever she lands, there is laughter and smiles in her wake, as if she’s some kind of fairy princess sprinkling happiness all over the place. I try not to wrinkle my nose at the thought.

She’s ridiculous. Utterly, completely ridiculous.

And yet, I can’t deny that it’s difficult to take my eyes off her. She’s wearing yellow tonight—a fluttery dress with a low neckline that compliments her sun-tanned skin and dark hair. As she flits closer to this side of the bar, I notice that there are tiny pearls pinned in her wild hair, making her look even more like a mythical creature than a real person.

That’s what I always used to think of her—that there was no way Lucy Montgomery was a real person. She had to be an alien or a mirage or something impossible. There was no way that she could be so full of light and optimism, and still be an ordinary human. I’d never met anyone like her before. It drove me crazy how little sense she made to me.

I move positions subtly, slipping behind a particularly thick tangle of guests in hopes of avoiding her as she continues to mingle through the crowd with glittering ease. Out of the corner of my eye, I notice that she’s been handing out something to everyone. Disposable cameras, I think. The cheap, plastic things that were more common when we were teenagers.

At one point, she gets close enough to my hiding place for me to hear her.

“Take as many stupid and terrible photos as you can,” Lucy tells a group of people as she passes out the cameras. “Then drop it off in the bin by the exit at the end of the night. I’ll be putting together an album of the photos on the wedding website.”

“How cute!”

“Great idea, Lucy!”

“So vintage!”

I fight the urge to roll my eyes.

Ever so carefully, I move farther away.

And yet, as if she can teleport, she’s suddenly right in front of me.

I freeze, hand gripping my beer a little too tightly all of a sudden. The breath whooshes out of my lungs and I tell myselfit’s only because she surprised me, not because she’s glowing like the sun and has actually managed to take my breath away.

“Do you really think I didn’t notice you standing there, Theo Danvers?” she asks me.

I open my mouth to instantly deny that I know her, to concoct some sort of lie that would convincingly protest any familiarity between us, but I know that I’m doomed the moment her eyebrow quirks up in a silent question.

She knows that I know her. If I pretend that she’s a stranger to me, I’ll just look like a jerk.

Then again, she already thinks I’m a jerk.

“Pardon?” I reply, raising my voice to be heard, even though we’re in a slightly quieter corner of the bar.

Lucy purses her lips, unimpressed by my display of nonchalance. She lifts a disposable camera to her face, winks one eye closed, and snaps a photo without warning. The bright flash blinds me for half a second, causing my heart to stutter for a moment. Annoyance rips through me. Without thinking, I reach forward and snatch the camera out of her hand.

“Hey!” she protests.

“You shouldn’t take photos of people without their permission.”

Lucy rolls her eyes. “Get over yourself, Theo. It’s for the wedding website.”

“I don’t want to be on the website.”

---