Page 6 of Give Me a Chance
“I’m good if we merge the two together.” Connor shrugs, eliciting a gasp from Natalie.
“Nope. No, no, no way. As maid of honor, my duty is to give my bride the best bachelorette ever, and I take that duty seriously.”
Anne is quick to agree, so I also give my two cents.
“I have to agree with Natalie on this one.” Everyone’s staring at me, blinking rapidly. Even Natalie’s eyes widen, though she is quick to replace it with a smooth expression.
“Sorry, babe. But I want them separate, too,” Rina says before squealing when Connor tickles her.
“Ok, so it’s done. The best man and the maid of honor will organize two incredible—completely separate—parties.”
“And how will you do that?” Rina asks, her hazel eyes observing us carefully.
“I’ll make a list, of course. Matt and I will work together to make sure there is no overlap until we’re all back on the yacht, ready for bed,” Natalie responds. Others are still staring; now at both of us. Were we really so bad with our bickering that one sentence of agreement is a shock?
Natalie ignores their shock and pulls Rina and Anne to the makeshift dance floor.
“Will I have to bail someone out during this...whatever this is?” Connor asks, gesturing to Natalie and me. Noah chokes on his drink, obviously thinking the same thing.
“Hopefully, not. But have some extra cash at the ready, just in case.” He lets out a low laugh and joins the girls on the dance floor.
“Still not talking about it?” Noah, the silent type, stares at me with his dark eyes.
“Yup.” He snorts at my response. Months ago, he asked me what the hell was going on between us and got the response, ‘Not talking about it.’ Noah doesn’t talk a lot, unlike Natalie, but he notices pretty much everything. The worst thing is I would love to tell him all about it, but I’m respecting her wishes.
We stand in silence while I’m drinking my new beer and watching the way she moves on the dance floor. Her dress tracks every curve on her body. Just another victim, unable to resist her, it follows her movements, billowing around her. Her eyes sparkle under the string of lights, happiness emitting out of her.
When it comes to her, I’m not sure truce is less dangerous than war.
5
NATALIE
Today. . .
Sitting in the private airplane Connor charted, I mentally check the items from my to do list, once again. You can never be too careful, and if I forgot something, now would be the last second to do something about it. Running the list through the end, I exhale a long breath, deciding it’s time to relax.
It’s who I am. I make lists for everything I can and follow them to a T. The internet would say it’s a defense mechanism, and I’d probably agree.
There’s comfort in that. Having things under control calms me down.
When I’m nervous, it’s more pronounced. Even Matt noticed it while we planned the bachelor and bachelorette party.
“What do you have there?” he asked as I pulled out the color-coded paper from my planner.
“A list.” I shrugged.
“A list?”
“Yeah, a to-do list of all the things needed to be done for the bachelorette party.”
“Wow, suddenly I feel under prepared.” This made me laugh.
“Don’t worry, you should be able to do it without it. I simply prefer my lists.”
“So, you make these often?” He eyed me with interest.
“Maybe,” I responded ambiguously, remembering that even though wewere forced to be friendly—hewasn’t a friend.
