Page 22 of The Wedding Wrecker

"I don’t believe we’ve met,” Richard said, cocking his head toward James.

“James Carter,” he said, reaching to shake Richard Wellington’s hand.

“Ah, I see. I believe I saw your name on the guest list.” He snapped his fingers, as if trying to remember an obscure detail. “Was it a family friend of Lily’s parents?”

“That’s right,” James said.

"I didn't realize you and Emma were..."

"Together?" James smiled, but there was steel behind it as he looked at Dick. "Very much so. We only started dating recently. Though you wouldn’t guess it with how crazy we are for for each other. Right, babe?”

He planted another kiss on my temple, then brought his lips to my ear. “Might want to release the bomb you look like you’re holding up your ass, or they’re going to see through the lie.”

I was going to kill him.

“Uh, huh,” I managed, smiling.

Yep. He was a dead man. And I was going to do it with my own hands.

Right after I figured out how he got here.

And maybe after I stopped noticing how good he smelled.

And definitely after I figured out why my heart was doing that stupid flutter thing again.

8

JAMES

OOPS…

The single word summed up the last half hour pretty well. From the way Richard Wellington had seemed downrightpissedthat Emma was supposedly in a relationship, to how he’d snapped his finger and suggested something I was sure Emma was going to hate me even more for.

“This presents the perfect opportunity,” he had said, eyes sparkling with… something.Had that been genuine excitement, or was it thinly veiled anger?I still wasn’t sure.

But he had smiled as he told us about his “opportunity”. “My Aunt Martha wasn’t happy with the views in her room,” Richard had said, “and Emma’s room has amazing views. I’m sure you two wouldn’t mind giving her Emma’s, since the views in hers are superior. That way, you both can cozy up together in James’ room like a proper couple.”

That was half an hour ago, and Emma hadn’t really spoken to me since then. Instead, she was busystorming.She’d walked calmly enough out of the restaurant while we were in view of the Wellingtons, and then she’d practically torn herself off my armand began embodying the female equivalent of a hurricane, or maybe a tornado.

Her pissed off energy seemed to seep into the air around her.

Honestly, it was kind of adorable watching her. She was a small woman, and something about small things rampaging and raging admittedly tickled at my amusement.

Even with much longer strides, I had to pick up my pace to keep up with her as she stormed into the elevator, down the hallway, and even stormily used her keycard. To her frustration, it hadn’t worked until I helpfully showed her she was holding it backwards.

Now she was rage-packing her suitcase with her ass pointed right at me.

Accident?Maybe.But I had my hands stuffed in my pockets as I fought my natural impulse to stare at the absolutely mouth-watering view that put the Rockies to shame.Yeah.With a woman like Emma, you could save a few bucks booking hotel rooms. Why would you give a shit what was out your windows when you’d want nothing more than to stare at her?

“Are you going to offer to help?” she asked, voice muffled as her ass wiggled with the force of her packing. She was trying to gather all of her things from her room—which was definitely way nicer than mine. If she thought she was pissed now, I wondered how much worse it would be when she saw the comparatively shit room I’d been given.

“Did you want help devouring this welcome platter of food and champaign? Because it looks like you were doing pretty well on your own.” I grinned, picking up a piece of cheese with a smallbite taken from it. I popped it into my mouth and chewed.Tasty.“This thing looks like a pack of wolves went at it.”

Emma whirled, still crouched as she glared with one hand in her suitcase. "This is your fault," she said, turning back to shove more clothes into her bag with impressive force. "All of it. If you hadn't shown up playing hero?—"

"You'd be fending offDickright about now.”

"I could have handled Dick just fine on my own."

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