A Girl Walks Into a Wedding Read online

  As the waves of intense pleasure finally recede, you release your fingers and lie still until your body calms. Then you stretch luxuriously and slip off the table to find your clothes. You’ve never felt more relaxed.

  Now you’re ready for the rehearsal dinner. Go to page 251.

  It’s the night of the rehearsal dinner

  It’s the evening of the rehearsal dinner, and you step onto your hotel balcony in your bra and panties. You wiggle your fingers in front of you as you wait for your nail polish to dry. Your room has a view out over the formal rose garden, and at this time of day, the scent of the blooms is so strong, it’s almost like smoke. The distant lake looks gilded, along with the tops of the trees.

  ‘Ahem.’

  Startled, you turn to see Bruno sitting on the balcony next to yours, dressed for dinner, with a drink in his hand and his feet up on the balcony wall. You shoot into your room, where you reach for a long t-shirt and slip it on, careful not to damage your nail varnish. Then you go back outside.

  ‘I didn’t think there’d be anyone out here,’ you say, cheeks burning.

  ‘No worries, Stinky,’ Bruno says with an evil grin.

  ‘My name is not Stinky! Why do you always have to be such a tosser?’

  ‘But I’ve always called you Stinky,’ he says, surprised. ‘It’s a term of endearment.’

  ‘No, it’s not. It’s a term of arseholeism.’

  ‘I didn’t realise you didn’t like it.’

  ‘How could you not realise that? What woman wants to be called Stinky?’

  Bruno’s face drops. You flash back to Cat and Lisa getting hot and heavy last night, and you suddenly feel a little bad for him.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ he says. ‘You’re right, we’re not eleven any more, it’s not appropriate. I won’t do it again.’

  You nod, feeling silly for making such a fuss over it. ‘We got up to some crazy stuff back then, didn’t we?’

  ‘The massacre of the Action Men will never be forgotten.’

  ‘Just getting my own back. You know, for stuff that would land you in a young offenders’ institution these days. Hair-burning. Assault with a deadly cowpat. That kind of thing.’

  ‘Look, I suppose I should explain. When we were kids, I always thought you were sort of awesome. I had a little crush on you, and I guess the only way I knew how to deal with it was to pick on you.’

  ‘You did not!’ you say.

  ‘Did too!’ he says, and you both laugh.

  ‘Really? You mean it? All those years ago, you fancied me?’

  ‘Yup.’ He holds your eyes and you can’t look away. In fact, you don’t want to. You want to hear more about this crush – it certainly shakes up your memories of Bruno as a boy.

  ‘Uncle Bruno! Uncle Bruno! Knuckle Bronko!’ Domino are panting across the lawn after their kids, who are racing ahead of them.

  ‘To be continued,’ Bruno says as he leaps over the balcony with surprisingly athletic ease, and falls to his knees on the grass, not caring that he’s ruining his smart trousers. The children climb on top of him for piggyback rides up and down the lawn. You can’t help smiling.

  You’re about to leave the room for the rehearsal dinner, when there’s a knock on the door and Jane enters. You saw her briefly when you returned from the spa – Aunt Lauren was whisking her away for a French manicure and an expensive boozy lunch – but she sent you a text, telling you not to worry about her.

  You give her a hug. ‘How are you feeling?’

  ‘Still a bit hung-over, but Aunt Lauren has been feeding me Bloody Marys all day. Listen … I’ve decided that telling Tom about last night will only hurt him. I know for sure now that I want to be with him. Does that make me a coward?’

  The delectable Father Declan’s words come back to you. ‘No. It makes you kind. Everyone can have a moment of madness. And Mikey is hardly likely to say anything, is he?’

  Jane sighs. ‘No way. We had a little chat after breakfast. He feels awful too.’

  You find that a little hard to believe, but decide to keep it to yourself. ‘If you think about it, in a twisted way, Mikey’s done you a favour. If it wasn’t for his teeny monkey penis, you might still be having doubts about Tom.’

  Jane gives a half-chuckle. ‘This is going to sound crazy, but until last night, I had no idea they could be so tiny! And did you know that not all penises are bendy? I just assumed they were all like Tom’s.’

  You flash back to your night with the pilot, and his oddly bent penis. But this isn’t the time or the place to mention your own escapades. ‘Too much information! Seriously, Jane, I’m so glad you and Tom are back on track.’

  ‘It’s getting late, I’d better get going. Thanks for being there for me. And not judging me.’ Jane hugs you again and hurries off. If nothing else, the entire episode has quelled your niggling doubts about whether Tom is the best guy for her. It’s clear that she’d fall apart without him.

  As you make your way to the rehearsal dinner, you decide that your next duty is to have a word with Lisa about her extra-curricular activities last night.

  ‘Hello again.’ You turn to see the DJ exiting his room, looking hot enough to melt the iceberg that sank the Titanic. ‘I looked for you last night,’ he says. ‘Thought you might have fancied a sundowner.’

  Hmm, why are you always in the wrong place at the wrong time? This man definitely makes your pulse race a little faster.

  ‘How about a rain-check?’ you ask.

  ‘Deal,’ he says.

  Of course, Cee Cee has planned the rehearsal dinner with military precision. From the dress code (smart) to the seating arrangements (each place adorned with a hand-crafted name card in gold-inked calligraphy) and even the location – an elegant function room that’s been partitioned so that it fits just one long, narrow table.

  You wander around the table, looking for your seat. It’s an intimate affair, just family and close friends. You find your place – the card to your left says Lisa and the one to your right, Cee Cee.

  ‘Over here,’ you call when Lisa walks in, rocking a fitted tuxedo, with excessively high luminous pink heels that match her hair. You’re glad she’s sitting next to you – it’ll give you a chance to interrogate her about seeing her sucking face, and who knows what else, with the bride’s brother’s girlfriend.

  Your stomach flutters as Father Declan sits across from you. How is it possible that he gets better looking every time you see him? You greet each other warmly, and then Bruno and Cat take their places to his right. You can’t miss the smouldering looks passing between Cat and Lisa.

  You whisper in Lisa’s ear, ‘I know what you did last night.’

  ‘Jesus fuck,’ Lisa bursts out.

  ‘We can talk about it later,’ you say.

  ‘No, look!’ You follow her gaze and almost fall off your chair. It’s the pilot from two nights ago. He’s walking across the room towards you. You struggle to breathe. What’s he doing here? Has he been stalking you?

  ‘Dad!’ Tom says, pumping the pilot’s fist and giving him a hug.

  Suddenly it all falls into place. The bent penis – like father, like son. You’ve shagged the father of the groom. You cover your face with your handbag. Lisa is still gawping beside you, and then she bursts into snorts of laughter.

  ‘Don’t say a word! I’ve got dirt on you from last night,’ you snap.

  Tom walks his dad around the table, introducing him. Shit, shit, shit, you think as he gets closer.

  When the pilot sees you, he does a double take. ‘It’s you!’ he says, and then he spots Lisa. ‘And you!’

  ‘You know each other?’ Tom says, baffled, but polite. ‘But how—’

  ‘We met the other night,’ you say, aware that your voice is unusually high.

  ‘Yes, you could say she knows him, in a sense,’ Lisa says, and you kick her hard under the table.

  Jane calls Tom to join her, and shooting you and his dad (his dad, oh God) a last puzzled glance, he lea
ves. Lisa pinches you playfully and turns to talk to Cat, leaving you alone with Mr Bruce Willis.

  ‘So you’re Tom’s dad!’ you say, overly bright.

  ‘That I am, and your connection is …?’

  ‘Bride’s best friend,’ you say. You’re sure your face is scarlet.

  ‘Small world,’ he says.

  ‘So small!’

  ‘Tiny.’

  You rattle your brain for something to say. ‘How come I haven’t seen you … um … around here? At this hotel, I mean.’

  ‘They were full. That’s why I’m staying at the other one.’

  ‘Right.’

  ‘I missed you the other morning,’ he says, leaning forward, his voice intimate.

  You tug at the neckline of your dress, which suddenly feels too tight.

  ‘Jack!’ Aunt Lauren swoops down on the pair of you in a swathe of expensive perfume, and wraps her arms around him. Perhaps a Vivienne Westwood ball gown is a little over the top for a rehearsal dinner, but that’s Aunt Lauren for you.

  ‘Hello, Lauren,’ the pilot says, kissing her on the cheek.

  ‘How fabulous to see you again – it’s been far too long, stranger,’ she purrs. ‘I see we’re sitting next to each other, what a lovely surprise!’ She winks at you in a way that makes you think it’s not really a surprise to her at all.

  She loops her arm through his. ‘Shall we sit down? What say we try and make that ex-wife of yours a little jealous?’

  Jack gives you a helpless look as Aunt Lauren drags him away.

  ‘Bugger,’ you whisper to Lisa as she turns to you again. ‘Of all the men in the vicinity this weekend, why did I have to shag Tom’s dad? This is all your fault, you know. You were the one who saw him first!’

  ‘Tom’s dad or not, he’s still hot!’ Lisa says.

  You check him out surreptitiously, sitting at the opposite end of the table to Tom’s mum and her boyfriend. Aunt Lauren is murmuring in his ear, her hand on his arm. Clearly you and Lisa aren’t the only ones who think he’s hot.

  Right, you’ve made it through the first five minutes of dinner, and it’s been excruciating. You reach for your wine glass: only two and a half hours left to go.

  You survey the rest of the table. There’s so much electricity zinging between Lisa and Cat, you can’t believe that nobody else at the table has noticed. You glance at Bruno, but he seems blissfully unaware, and when he catches you glancing at him, he smiles sweetly. He must feel bad about the bollocking you gave him earlier, you think. But you’re glad to have got it off your chest. The two of you might even end up friends at this rate.

  A mobile phone rings, and you’re aware of Jack taking a call. Then you see him getting up and saying something to Tom.

  ‘I’m afraid I have to leave,’ he says to the table, and your eyes meet briefly.

  ‘Pilot emergency?’ Aunt Lauren asks.

  ‘Something like that. But I’ll see you all tomorrow at the wedding.’ He glances at you again, then leaves. You wonder if that call was a ruse to save you both further embarrassment, and you sit back, relieved and at the same time, slightly disappointed. But it’s for the best. If you’d known he was Tom’s dad, you definitely wouldn’t have hooked up with him.

  You turn your attention back to Father Declan. He really is exceptionally attractive, especially tonight, in an all-black suit. Smoking-hot is the only way to put it. And after your heart-to-heart last night, you feel connected to him. Your conversation was almost more intimate than if you’d shagged each other senseless. He’s making Noe laugh, his face crinkling in that devastating smile, but he still has those shadows under his eyes.

  Halfway through the main course, an extremely complicated risotto, you feel a foot against yours under the table. At first it’s just a bump, but the next time you feel it, there’s more to it. You freeze, a forkful of sun-dried tomato halfway to your mouth. You look around. There’s Noe, who’s busy dicing up food and feeding it to her kids, seated next to Declan, who is seated beside Bruno, who’s in the middle of an intense conversation with Lisa, Cat and Aunt Lauren. As you contemplate whose foot it might be, you catch Declan’s eye, and he smiles.

  Good God, it’s him! He’s the one playing footsie-footsie with you under the table! You knew you hadn’t been imagining the chemistry between you last night. Heat surges through your body from the tips of your toes to the edges of your ear lobes. He smiles at you again, his eyes creasing at the corners, then goes back to his conversation with Jane’s mum, a few seats down from you.

  You feel his foot move again. It briefly rubs over your ankle, then withdraws. You hold your breath and push your fork around your plate, too aroused to eat anything more. You wait for the sensation of his foot against yours again, wondering if maybe you imagined it. But no, it definitely happened, your foot is still burning where he touched you. Declan catches your eye again, and this time he winks, and that’s all the confirmation you need. You slip your foot out of your shoe, and stretch your leg forward until it finds its mark, and you feel the crook of an ankle under your toes. Then you lift your foot slowly, slowly, up his leg.

  Declan drops his fork onto his plate with a clatter and starts coughing. You drop your foot. Noe turns to him and whacks him on the back until his coughing fit passes, before going back to wrangling Paris or Penang or Perth, who’s trying to shove a chicken leg (in a miso, ginger and sesame crust) into her water glass.

  Declan reaches for his wine and shoots you a surprised look. You continue playing with your food, your face innocent, and return your foot to his calf, this time running your foot all the way up his leg, then down again, and then up one last time, before lodging your foot in his crotch, pleasantly surprised by the solid hardness you find there.

  You can tell that Declan is trying desperately to remain outwardly calm. He lays his serviette over his lap just as Jane’s mum asks him about the new organist at their home parish.

  As the waitress clears plates, Declan excuses himself. You wait a few minutes, then, unable to remain burning in your seat any longer, you follow him.

  You bump into him just outside the room and he grasps you by the hand and pulls you into an empty and darkened function room, a narrow space filled with spare tables and chairs, and a sofa against the window. He leads you into a corner, and you can’t tell if it’s anger or desire you see storming in his eyes.

  He tries to start three different sentences and then gives up, groaning as he folds you into his arms. You can feel his heart banging away against your chest.

  ‘What am I going to do with you?’ he says, dropping a kiss onto your hair. You wriggle against him, desperate for more, tipping your face up to him. He gazes intently into your eyes, but makes no move to kiss you.

  You can’t bear it. You stand on tiptoe and press your mouth against his. For a long minute, he doesn’t respond. And then, with a sound of satisfaction, his mouth opens against yours. You almost swoon with desire and relief, luxuriating in the softness and warmth of his mouth before you tentatively slide your tongue against his. Slowly, agonisingly slowly, he responds, meeting you halfway, shifting his head so that his stubble rasps against your face. You clutch the back of his neck, rocking your hips against him, and however conflicted he may feel emotionally, his erection is in no doubt whatsoever.

  And then it’s like a dam breaking, he’s all over you, kissing you frantically, sliding his hands down to your bottom and holding you against him so hard, he’s almost rough.

  You tumble onto the sofa, panting, and he clutches you, his face creased as if close to tears. He shuts his eyes and leans his forehead against yours. You move a fingertip along his lips, and then kiss him along his jawline, slowly working your way down the side of his neck, inhaling the rich, masculine smell of him as you go.

  ‘What are we doing?’ he whispers.

  ‘You started it,’ you say.

  ‘I did?’

  ‘Yes!’ You’re indignant. ‘What was all that footsie-footsie under the tab
le?’

  ‘I didn’t start it – that was you!’

  If it wasn’t Declan’s foot, then whose was it? The realisation dawns: it could only have been Bruno. You flash back to your conversation earlier on the balcony, and the glances he was giving you across the table this evening. But that doesn’t change how you’re feeling now.

  ‘I’m sorry. I know it’s not allowed, but I’ve never wanted anyone more,’ you say.

  ‘Me neither. I just wish it wasn’t so complicated.’

  If it’s too complicated to be with him, go to page 266.

  If you want to be with him even though it’s complicated, go to page 270.

  It’s too complicated

  ‘I get it,’ you say. ‘I don’t want to get it, but I get it.’

  ‘Oh the hell with it,’ he says, and leans towards you again, clasping your head with both hands and kissing you desperately, deeply, his tongue rolling over yours, a drowning man clinging to a raft. This time it’s you that pulls away, after long minutes of pure ecstasy. It takes every grain of will-power you have, and you know how much you’re going to regret it later, but you can’t go through with this: there’s too much at stake.

  ‘Declan, I can’t,’ you say, holding both his hands. ‘It’s not that I don’t want to, I want to more than anything in the world right now, but I can’t be responsible for this. It’s too big a thing.’

  You both stay where you are on the sofa, your faces almost touching, just breathing for a minute. Then he rests his fingertips on your cheeks, and kisses you very gently on the lips.

  ‘I can’t stay,’ he says.

  ‘What do you mean?’ you stutter.

  ‘I can’t stay and go through with this wedding. It would make me the worst kind of hypocrite, and I know you understand why. This’ – he looks at you – ‘has just brought everything to a head.’