Page 62 of Catch and Release Groom

They’d made it to the couch, not the bed. For the first time, anyway, which was technically the second time that day, making their session between the sheets a half hour later the third fucking charm.

Still his cock throbbed to life as if it’d been weeks instead of hours.

This was their last day together, and he found himself feeling strangely sentimental. An urge arose, one Imogen would give him endless shit for, yet there it was anyway. He blamed her for it, too.

She stirred, her cheeks pink from sleep, her hair mussed from him.

Pride swelled, delivering enough of a boost to ask. “I’d like to grab my phone and take a picture. Everything covered, of course. Just of…” He gestured between them. “Us. If it’s okay with you.”

“Why, Easton Reeves? Are you saying you’d like to—le gasp—capture a moment instead of simply experiencing it?”

“Funny that.” He shifted to face her, lowering his walls and tucking a lock of her hair behind her ear. “You might’ve convinced me it’s possible to do both.”

“On one condition,” she said, snuggling closer. “You send me a copy.”

“Deal.” Balancing his phone in his hand, thumb hovering over the button as he extended his arm above them, he snapped a picture centered more on Imogen than him.

He’d been wrong and he’d been right, he surmised as he studied the frozen image. As impossible as it’d be to aptly portray the beauty of both his bedmate and the moment, with the rays of morning light as a backdrop, damn if she wasn’t as breathtaking on screen as she was in person.

In the next instant, he was tackled to the mattress, his phone flung from his hand to land somewhere in the tangle of blankets. Imogen’s dark curtain of hair obscured half of her pretty, self-satisfied face.

He rolled, careful not to crush her as he flipped the tables and pinned her beneath him. Determined to keep her out of her head and basking in moments for what limited time they had left, Easton painted kisses down her body, pausing to flick his tongue into her bellybutton.

One inch lower, he panted a heated breath against her skin and said, “Meet you in the shower.”

Imogen slowly nodded and then fell back to the mattress with a contented sigh, and he padded toward the bathroom to turn on the water.

Once Imogen joined him beneath the steamy stream, they lost track of time as they explored bodies and extracted pleasure. They drifted from their shower, wrapped in fluffy towels to eat breakfast, then back to cuddling on the bed. With Gator, who hogged most of the space.

But the hour of truth came for them eventually, along with a general undercurrent of dread. Didn’t matter how many times he assured himself it’d be fine. The wedding. The bad memories. The stares and the whispers.

By the time Easton parked his truck at the end of a row that consisted of about every vehicle in town, there was one belief he decided to cling to: as long as Imogen remained at his side, he’d get through.

…

As Imogen took her saved spot in the center of Easton’s group of friends, the questions that’d run on an endless loop since last night cycled again.

What did it mean that Easton’s ex had messaged him in the wee hours before her wedding?

What did it mean that he hadn’t mentioned it?

Had he even seen it?

Imogen hadn’t meant to. As she’d climbed out of bed for the second time that morning, his phone had slipped from between the covers and fallen to the floor. An alert flashed across the screen when she’d picked it up, reminding Easton that he hadn’t responded to Grace Harper’s Facebook message.

Throughout getting ready for the big event, Imogen felt like a reluctant, ineffectual spy, constantly watching to see if his eyes would widen or his expression would give away his feelings on the matter. She’d told herself not to let it turn into such a big deal—she was flying back home to Chicago this evening, and that’d close the book on this fun, unexpected chapter of her self-rediscovery.

But what if she was suddenly reconsidering how she wanted the rest of her life to go, and who she wished would be in it?

We can’t exactly have that chat now, she thought as she surveyed the bustling crowd on both sides of the aisle, and matrimonial details collided into her tornado of thoughts.

Floral arrangements and arguments over price.Brett ruled in favor of extra greenery and daisies over tulips—her favorite, and a flower he’d never once sent—to save money, and didn’t that just epitomize their relationship?

Endless meetings with the caterer and the organizer at the event center.

Per cost comparisons and decisions between chicken or fish.

Along the way, Imogen had allowed her doubts to get lost in the particulars, in the idea of walking a petal-strewn pathway in an exquisite white gown.

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