The Marriage Pact Read online

  “I could do that for you.”

  “Really?”

  “Sure. It’d save you forty bucks, too, you old miser.”

  We giggled together for a moment before I gratefully accepted her offer. “Just let me get changed and I’ll meet you over there.”

  It didn’t take me long to change out of the dress and ten minutes later I was headed for the restaurant. As soon as I hit the door and smelled the hash browns and bacon frying, I knew I was home. I inhaled deeply, as though I could suck in the comforting smell of grease and sweet tea that permeated the air, storing it away for the next time I got homesick.

  “Hey, Shan. Over here!”

  I spotted Becky and ambled over, sliding into the booth across from her. After we placed our drink orders—water for her, another diet I suspected, and sweet tea for me—we got right down to the gossip I’d missed out on. In a small town, everyone knew everything about everybody. No person’s business was their own.

  “So, do you know who else is in the wedding?”

  Becky sat back, eyeing me speculatively. “Didn’t Tiffany fill you in?”

  “Yes,” I admitted. “But…”

  “Shana, if you want to ask, just come out and ask.”

  “OK.” I took a deep breath, smiling sheepishly. “How’s Brody?”

  She rolled her eyes at me. “Now was that so hard?”

  Yes, I replied silently, which she must have seen on my face, because she took pity.

  “He’s fine. Good looking as ever,” she added ruefully. “He’s… seeing someone.”

  I nodded. It didn’t come as a surprise and didn’t hurt nearly as much as I’d expected, either. Sure, there was that familiar pang of loss, but I wasn’t allowed to have that. Not when I’d been the one to turn him down. “‘Course he is, and why not?”

  She rolled her eyes at my attempt at indifference. “Because he loves you, dummy, and you love him!”

  “Uh, begging your pardon, but shouldn’t you get my take on that before you decide who I love?”

  “Puh-lease, Shana,” she said, sounding like we were back in middle school all over again. “I don’t have to ask. I see it every time I, or anyone else, mentions his name. Your eyes light up like little Christmas trees.”

  “Aw, is that your way of saying I have pretty eyes?” I batted my lashes at her, trying to turn her insistent little frown into a smile. No such luck; she was glaring determinedly at me.

  “Don’t try to change the subject! I’m right and you know it!”

  “It doesn’t really matter anymore,” I replied. Not only had I failed to make her smile, but mine was fading now, too. “Brody’s is moving on and I’m… well, I’m glad.”

  “Bullshit!”

  I could practically hear conversations around the restaurant screech to a halt. My cheeks promptly began to redden with embarrassment. You just didn’t use language like that in public around here. Becky, bless her, didn’t even notice. “Look, can we just put a moratorium of this conversation? Seriously, I thought we were trying to catch up.”

  “I’m catching you up on life, doll.”

  I rolled my eyes, but giggled all the same. “Seriously. No more Brody talk, K? We’ve both moved on.”

  She slumped back in the booth, arms folded across her chest with a look that plainly said I don’t believe you. “Fine. Let’s talk about Tiffany and her doomed nuptials.”

  “Becky! Ever the romantic, aren’t you?”

  “I am a romantic, Shana. When two people are meant to be together, like you—”

  I held up a hand. “OK, OK, forget I said anything.”

  She smiled sweetly, crinkling her nose at me—she had the daintiest little nose with a smattering of freckles on it, even though she had them nowhere else. Nowhere visible, anyway, as she liked to remind me—and widened her emerald green eyes innocently. “So, I was thinking we should hide some supplies in your dress.”

  “Supplies?”

  “You know, a silver bullet, garlic, holy water.” She tapped her chin thoughtfully with a forefinger. “Maybe a crossbow.”

  “I think you’re mixing genres, honey.”

  “Look, OK, yes, some people assume that the apocalypse will come in the form of zombies. Forgive me for being open-minded.”

  Becky could be so infuriating sometimes—especially when the whole Brody-and-me topic came up, which, left up to her, it always did—but I loved her. She was not only my closest friend, but the only one from my hometown that I could pick back up with as though no time had passed. As an added bonus, it was nearly impossible to be bored when she was around.

  Before I could answer, our waitress walked up carrying our drinks. “Anything else, ladies?” she asked, sounding cranky.

  I could see right away that she’d overheard Becky’s potty mouth earlier and wasn’t amused. I looked at Becky, who met my eyes and grinned. “Chocolate shakes,” we said in unison. The waitress marched off, seemingly even more annoyed than before, but we didn’t care.

  Becky raised her glass of water. “I would like to propose a toast.”

  I picked up my sweet tea. “OK. What to?”

  “To me, the best friend ever, who is going to be at Tiffany’s wedding just to make sure you get out of there alive.”

  “You know that if something really happens, like, the groom turns into a werewolf, you know I’m gonna be really pissed at you, right? Not to mention the bride.”

  “You’re too superstitious!” she chided. “Besides, Tiffany’s never not mad at me, so you won’t catch me crying over it.”

  I grinned at her and we clinked our glasses together.

  Chapter Three

  Relax, you’re being paranoid, I told myself as I looked at the dark, ominous sky. Talking to Becky had clearly done a number on me, because when I woke up on the morning of the wedding and saw the gray clouds outside my window, I was sure they spelled doom. Poor Tiffany.

  Still, I went to my closet and pulled out the hanging dress that Becky had returned to me, newly altered, just two days ago. I still wasn’t convinced that the pale green looked good on me, but Becky had been insistent to the contrary, and you just didn’t argue with her. It was close to impossible. More impossible, I thought with a smile, than the apocalypse on Tiffany’s wedding day. One more glance at the sky showed me that the trees in the yard were whipping their branches around furiously and a light spray of rain already dotted the window, even though it hadn’t been there two seconds ago when I’d last looked.

  The day grew even uglier with the passing of time and Becky had sent me not one, but four texts gloating over her prediction. Regardless, I got to the church unharmed. Thankfully, Tiffany had called to say that the hairstylist would meet us at the church, given the weather, rather than at the salon as we’d originally planned.

  Traffic was moving at a crawl and I got no less than fourteen texts from the frantic bride-to-be, and one from Becky that read: Told you so. LMAO. I bet she was, too. I could just see her living it up while I was here, trapped in ungodly bumper-to-bumper traffic with no end in sight and a bridezilla demanding to know why I couldn’t just walk to the church. By the time I finally made it, I was seven minutes late, my hair was a black, tangled mess, and I was soaked to the bone and shivering.

  “Oh, thank God!” Tiffany exclaimed when I came stumbling into the dressing room. She said it in a voice that led me to believe she might drop to the ground any minute and start praising the good lord on her hands and knees. She could be very devout, when it suited her.

  “S-sorry I’m late,” I talked over my chattering teeth, rubbing my hands up and down my arms—which was useless, since my shirt was also soaked through.

  “You poor thing!” Tiffany crooned sympathetically, leaning over to peck my cheek. “You look like you need to thaw out. Why don’t you have a cup of hot tea before you get your hair done? It’s over there.”

  I followed her finger until I saw the teapot with mugs nearby. “Thank you.”

 
Though it had a rough start, three hours later we were talking and kidding back and forth, giggling as we applied our makeup. Now that her entire bridal party was accounted for, Tiffany had mellowed somewhat and was laughing at our bald ribbing.

  “My dad told Jonathon to paint his dick green!” another bridesmaid, Kim, said.

  “What the fuck?” Megan laughed. “Why would he do that?”

  “He told him that if I was really a virgin, I wouldn’t freak out,” she confided.

  “Did you?” I wanted to know.

  “Freak out? ‘Course I did, we’d been having sex since the tenth grade. Jonathon got a kick out of it though. Moral of the story, though, Tiff: If he’s painted his little man green, you know why!”

  “Oh, I don’t know,” Megan chimed in. “The way I hear it, his man isn’t so little!”

  We joked and carried on in the way a group of women will do until the wedding planner poked her head in and told us we had half an hour until the service would start. As Tiffany fluttered around in an excited panic, I looked at her bright eyes and face-cracking grin and realized with a start that I was jealous. It completely took me by surprise, but when I thought about it, really thought about it, I had to admit it was there, even if I’d never noticed it.

  Today Tiffany would marry the man she’d given her heart to, who’d given her his in return, and the truth was, I hadn’t come even close to that kind of relationship in all the time I’d been away. If I was honest with myself, I had to admit that it might never happen for me again—maybe, when I was young and stupid, I’d looked right at the only chance I’d ever have and thrown it away with both hands.

  But things like that didn’t just come around once, did they? And we had been so young… so very young. If I’d accepted Brody’s proposal, where would I be right now? I didn’t have to think on it for very long. I would be right here, in the same wonderful, quirky, but severely limited town I’d grown up in. I’d be Brody’s wife, like everyone had expected, and that would be that. The book would be closed on my life. I’d never do anything or be anyone important.

  At least, that’s what I’d thought at the time. Right now the idea of being someone’s wife, of being someone’s mother, even, sounded pretty good.

  “Shana! It’s time to get moving!”

  I tried to smile at Megan, mouthing ‘sorry,’ but it all fell a little flat. Not that she noticed. As soon as she saw she’d gotten my attention, she’d turned around and began to walk out behind Kim, who was the maid of honor. I obediently fell into step behind her, trying to swallow back the scratchy pain of realization that had worked its way into my throat.

  * * *

  “It was such a beautiful ceremony,” Becky said with a jovial smirk as we walked into the reception.

  “You are really the world’s worst cynic. Why do people even invite you to their weddings? I mean, especially after you set fire to the back of Heidi’s dress last year. I thought you’d be permanently scratched off the invite lists after that.”

  She scowled at me. “You know very well that I didn’t purposely knock that candle over. Besides, I helped her put it out!”

  “With holy water! Jesus, Beck—”

  “And Mary and Joseph,” she chimed in helpfully.

  I returned her grin. “I’d be surprised if Father Paul ever forgives you. Even on his deathbed. Pretty sure that’s a grudge he’s taking to the grave.”

  “Good thing I’m not Catholic,” she quipped.

  “Besides, it was beautiful.”

  “C’mon, Shan. Get real. Her mom looked like she was smelling shit throughout the whole ceremony.”

  I looked around quickly, trying to make sure no one was listening. “Shhh! You know better than to talk like that in public! Besides which, we’re in a church!”

  “We’re in a reception hallway, I doubt God’s listening.”

  “She was beautiful,” I defended Tiffany, in an attempt to change the subject.

  “She was also about to pop out of her dress.”

  “Sometimes, I don’t know why I keep hanging out with you,” I muttered.

  “Because I keep you laughing. Admit it.”

  I cut my eyes at her. “Yeah, you kinda do.”

  “Great, now that we got that solved, I’m starving. Do you think they have pigs in a blanket?”

  “Probably. You know that’s a wedding staple. Why don’t we—” I broke off abruptly, replacing whatever I’d been about to say with an ‘oomph’ as I was knocked into from behind.

  “Oh, sorry, I didn’t see you there.”

  I felt strong arms reach out to catch me, but it wasn’t until I saw the owner of the strong hands that my legs gave way beneath me and I truly began to fall.

  * * *

  Brody tightened his hold on me and helped me stand up. “Easy there. Did I hurt you?”

  I shook my head wordlessly. God, he was gorgeous. He was yummier than even my dreams had painted him out to be. The first thing I thought when I looked up at him with wide, blue eyes, was damn. I took my time drinking him in, ever conscious of his hold on me. His arms were tanned and muscular, from what I could make out beneath the starched aqua shirt he wore. Blue had always been Brody’s color—it brought out the green flecks in his eyes, which right now looked like warm, gorgeous pools I’d give my medical license to climb into. His hair was as wild and untamed as ever, but somehow added to his overall good looks.

  “Shan? You OK?”

  It had been so long since he’d called me by my nickname that hearing it from his deep, masculine voice nearly made me fall again. I opened and closed my mouth, but hard as I tried to tell him I was fine, no sound came out.

  “She’s fine!” Becky insisted, grinning like a fat cat with a bowl of cream. “Just fine.” She even purred like a cat. Why hadn’t I ever noticed it before?

  “Shan?” he repeated, looking at me with concern creasing his handsome features.

  God, he looked like a movie star. A chiseled-cheeked, strong-jawed movie star. And he was taller than I remembered, too, towering over me at over six feet. Snap out of it, I told myself sternly. You’ve got to stop looking at him like a drooling moron or you’ll never be friends. I tried to smile, but there was just one problem: The feelings I had going on right now—the tightness in my chest, the fluttering in the belly—weren’t friendly feelings. Not at all friendly.

  “Say something before I call 911.” He was grinning as he said it, as though he’d slipped inside my head and read my mind the way he’d done a thousand times before.

  “Hi,” I breathed through parted lips.

  “There she is.” He turned that easy grin on Becky before turning back to me. “Hi yourself.” His voice was low and sexy and his eyes were twinkling at me. He looked down at my arm, seeming to just now realize he was still holding onto me. When he let go, I felt the loss of his warmth keenly.

  I folded my arms across my chest, holding a hand to where his had touched me as though I could restore the warmth of his fingers. My own just weren’t the same.

  “How are you, Shana?”

  “Good. Things are, you know. Good.”

  “So I gathered.”

  Damn it, how was he so cool and composed while I had become the village idiot? Maybe he really had moved on. “So… maybe I’ll see you. You know. Later.”

  “Sure. Later. Sorry again.”

  I didn’t even bother to reply—what could I do but continue to stick my foot in my mouth?—but watched him walk away, wishing I could melt into a puddle on the floor.

  “Hot damn, you’ve gotta love that view,” Becky whistled, eyeing him appreciatively.

  I could feel my cheeks warm. “Stop it!” I hissed.

  “Oh, that’s right. Sorry. I didn’t mean to check out your man. It’s just so hard not to.”

  “Becky! You know he isn’t my man.”

  “But you want him to be.”

  I was still shaken from running into him, from the way butterflies had started in my stomach
the minute I’d seen his familiar, penetrating eyes, the feeling of his hand on my arm. That was the reason—the only reason—that I didn’t reply right away.

  Becky chose to take my silence as agreement, because she began to hoot. “I knew it! I knew it! Oh, man, let me tell you—”

  “Shhh!” I hissed. “Could you please keep it down?”

  “Hmm, let me think.” She tapped her chin thoughtfully for two seconds. “Uh, no. I want to shout it from the rooftops. I was ri-ght, I was ri-i-ight.”

  I rolled my eyes at her little dance, which looked a lot like the hula mixed with some provocative gyrating. “Please, people are starting to stare.”

  She stopped dancing long enough to give me a onceover, after which she grinned, tossing her hair over her shoulder. “Sure they are; that’s because I look fine in this dress.”

  Some things never changed. And sadly… I glanced over in Brody’s direction and saw him handing a cup of punch to a tall, willowy blonde. Sadly, some things had to.

  Though I couldn’t quite shake the sadness I felt seeing Brody so cozy with another woman, I managed to fake my way through it until I was managing to have a pretty good time. Thankfully, Tiffany had pretty good taste in music—even Becky agreed, albeit begrudgingly—and after three glasses of champagne Becky was about to coax me out on the dance floor. If there was one thing I’d always been self-conscious about, it was my dance moves. Or to be more accurate, lack thereof. But buzzed on the champagne, I forgot all about that and boogied just as hard as I did when I was home alone.

  “You go, girl!” Becky enthused. “Just like in Showgirls!”

  “Thanks!” After two beats I turned to face her. “Wait, is that that stripper movie?”

  She shrugged casually. “Whatever.”

  “So you’re saying I’m dancing like a—” Just then, the music shut off and I realized how loudly I was talking. I saw a few heads turn in my direction and I waved cheerfully, oblivious to the fact that I was more than a little tipsy.

  “I like this side of you,” Becky commented. “Let’s have fun Shana out to play more often, shall we?”