Page 25 of Runaway Bride and Prejudice

Hoisting my skirt up, I manage to wrangle an arm inside without flashing my underwear to Van. “Can you roll down the windows?” I ask.

“Um, yeah. Are you sure you’re okay?”

“No. But I will be.” I yank the garter down my leg. I might end up with a little fabric burn.

Worth it.

The wind whips my hair around my face as I line the garter up on my finger like I’m shooting rubber bands at someone across the elementary school lunch table. This doesn’t count as littering, right?

Who cares, I tell myself. Some squirrel will make it into a very nice nest.

I aim for the woods and let the garter fly.

It immediately gets sucked right back into the open back window like some kind of bad boomerang. I twist around but can’t see where it went.

Does this mean Van technically won the garter toss?

I start to laugh. What starts as a little giggle erupts into a hearty guffaw, awkward and loud. Van keeps shooting me glances like he’s fully expecting my head to start spinning around,Exorcist-style. Wouldn’t be all that surprising.

I feel a little possessed. All the fizzy bubbles in my blood have been shaken, and I can feel the pressure on my figurative cork.

“Can I do anything?” Van asks.

The question is sweet, and cuts right through my freakout. I think about what Morgan suggested—almost demanded. Could I ask Van? The idea feels preposterous. So stupid.

He wouldn’t want to go.

Would he?

Would I want to spend the next four days with a man I barely know on the honeymoon I was supposed to take with a man I thought I knew?

Yes, I think, glancing over at Van.

He makes me feel safe. It’s like I’ve known him for years, even though we’re practically strangers. I trust him. And even though I shouldn’t have any kind of even mild feelings of attraction toward another man today of all days, I do. That’s probably a reason not to have Van go.

But I can’t ignore the pull toward him. We could just be friends. Totally. Friends who are taking a supposed-to-be honeymoon together. It could be totally fine and platonic.

And really, really fun.

When Van reaches across to touch my hand, wild abandon takes over.

“How would you like an all-expenses-paid tropical vacation—with me?”

CHAPTER 5

Van

“You wantme to go with you?” I ask, not sure I heard her correctly. I couldn’t have. “On your …”

I swallow the wordhoneymoonrather than say it.

“I mean, not likethat. You’re not just a replacement groom or something. Obviously.”

Her hands disappear as she twists them into the fabric of her dress, swallowed up in soft white. I watch as she starts to slump, her smile falling.

Up until a few minutes ago, Amelia was holding it together pretty well, all things considered. Now, she’s like a sheet of ice over the top of a pond, spiderwebbed with cracks. I’m afraid any word I say might break the whole surface. So I shut up.

“Just as, like, a vacation. One I planned with someone else,” she mutters, almost an afterthought. “But it could be fun, right—a free beach trip? I know the team has a few days off. We’ll be back Wednesday. It’s barely four days.”

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