The whirlwind in pink and sequins wanted the world to know she was the bride. The title was spelled out across her boobs, and a tiara with the same perched atop her blonde hair. It listed a little to one side as she bounced over and threw her arms around Sam.
“Oh, it’s so good to see you! It’s been forever. How was your flight? How was your first year of grad school? I feel like we haven’t talked in months.” The words spilled out in a rush that made Griff wonder if she’d already gotten into the alcohol on her own flight here.
Sam laughed and hugged her back. “Good to see you, too, Chloe.”
The entourage—and there was really no other word for the tight cluster of other girls and guys who’d trailed Chloe over here—watched in fond amusement as she continued to jabber. It took Griff about two seconds to conclude this was most of the wedding party, even without the sap in a tuxedo t-shirt staring at the bride’s ass.
“—so much fun. Everybody should get married in Vegas!” Chloe swung an arm around Sam’s shoulders and pivoted, nearly smacking Griff’s nose as she flung an expansive hand out, and grinned at him. “And you must be Sam’s boyfriend. Welcome to Vegas.” In a voice that was probably meant to be a whisper but could totally be heard on the other side of the baggage carousel, she murmured, “Girl, you did not tell me he looked like that! Good for you!”
The desire to smirk at the compliment was drowned out by the other thing Chloe had said. Boyfriend. Griff fought the urge to scowl. Of course Sam had a boyfriend. She was smart and gorgeous. So what if he’d had a hot-for-teacher style crush on her during all those tutoring sessions? It wasn’t like she’d had cause to give him a single thought in the last four years until the last five minutes.
“Um.” Color crept into Sam’s cheeks.
Griff waited for her to correct Chloe’s assumption, but she didn’t. Probably because she couldn’t get a word in edgewise.
The groom finally intervened, snagging Chloe around the waist. “Come on, babe. We’ve gotta hustle if we’re gonna make the shuttle to the resort.”
“Oh, of course. Silly me.” She gave her fiancé a sloppy kiss. “I really love you.”
He grinned back. “I really love you, too. Now let’s get to the hotel so we have time to check out our room before dinner.”
No question there was Thank-God-we’re-in-Vegas nookie planned over there.
The groom began steering his bride toward the exit, and Griff couldn’t help but notice Sam relaxing at the departure.
“Are you two riding over with us?” Chloe shot back.
Sam lifted her hand in a wave. “No, we’re good. Thanks. And I promise I’ll see you at dinner.”
With an array of blown kisses, the whirlwind got hustled out the door. In her wake, the baggage claim felt downright peaceful.
Sam released a slow breath and grimaced. “Sorry about that. Chloe can be a lot on a good day, and she’s definitely gotten into the champagne early.”
“No worries. Everybody should be so lucky as to be that excited to get married.”
“That is the dream, I suppose.”
They lapsed into a silence that felt a helluva lot more awkward than it had before the bride’s appearance.
Time to rip the Band-aid off. “Well, I expect you need to go find your actual boyfriend.” There. That came out neutral instead of growly, right?
Her mouth twisted in chagrin as she looked up at him. “I don’t have one.”
That information should not have made him want to do an endzone touchdown boogie.
“No?”
Sam bit her lip, which only served to pull his attention to the smooth pink curve of it. Damn, that mouth. He used to have the hardest time focusing on school when she’d tutored him because of that lush mouth and imagining what it would taste like. Not that he’d ever found out. She was a good girl who absolutely deserved better than the likes of him.
Her shoulders straightened, some kind of resolve coming into her gaze. “Okay, look. This is crazy, and feel free to say no, but my douchcanoe of a now ex-boyfriend bailed on me at the last minute. This whole weekend is meant to be full of couply things. I know we haven’t seen each other in forever, and you probably have other things you’d rather do, but… do you wanna be my plus one? They already think you’re my boyfriend, and there are sure to be lots of all-you-can-eat buffets, alcohol, and gambling between the wedding stuff. It’d just be through Saturday night.” By the end her words were spilling out in as much of a rush as Chloe’s.
A good guy would walk away. A good guy would remember that she was still that good girl and deserved better.
But she looked so damned miserable at the idea of facing all that mass coupledom on her own. Griff couldn’t blame her for that. Nobody wanted to be the lone solo act in a group like that. And it wasn’t like he already had actual plans here. Wouldn’t Vegas be more fun with someone he knew?
“To clarify, are you asking me to be your plus one as myself or as the douchecanoe?”
She winced. “Asking you to be my last-second plus one to a wedding of people you don’t know is bad enough. I couldn’t possibly expect you to do it while pretending to be someone else.”
There was something in her tone that made him wonder if there wasn’t a chance in hell anyone would believe he was whoever this idiot was who’d dumped her. Maybe there wasn’t. She was smart as hell. Her ex probably was too, his decision to dump her notwithstanding. Griff was just a jarhead who didn’t know what he wanted to do with his life. Maybe this was a terrible idea. He was supposed to be curbing that naturally impulsive nature.
Sam shook her head, flags of color creeping back into her cheeks. “It’s stupid. I’m sorry I asked. It was good to see you Griffin. Have a good time in Vegas.” She turned and fumbled with the handle of her suitcase, trying to escape.
It was the blush that did it. Because he knew her well enough to understand that she wasn’t embarrassed of him.
Griff reached out to lay a hand over hers on the handle of the monster suitcase. “I’m in.”
She went still beneath his touch, and he’d have sworn an electric current shot up his arm from where their hands connected. Slowly, she lifted those big brown eyes to his. “Really?”
“You’re the number one reason I graduated high school. Helping you get through this weekend seems like the least I can do.”
And maybe it would mean he’d finally get a chance to taste that mouth of hers.
Those lips curved into a relieved smile. “Then let’s go find a ride to the hotel.”
Sam had completely lost her mind.
Griffin Powell, the guy she’d crushed on for most of high school, the guy who regularly tangled her tongue simply by breathing, the guy who’d grown up to be even finer than he was at eighteen, was staying in her hotel room for the next three days. As her fake boyfriend.
This was, officially, the worst idea she’d ever had.
If Griff noticed her panic, he said nothing on the elevator ride up to their floor. Sam used the mirrored walls to surreptitiously watch him standing beside her, with that straight, military bearing, his duffel bag thrown over one shoulder. An air of waiting, of readiness surrounded him. It was a far cry from the restlessness she remembered from all their study sessions. When the doors slid open and a trio of men stepped on, she sensed his posture shift. Two of the men openly checked her out.
“Hey there, sweet cheeks.”
Griff slid in front of her and growled. Growled. It was an unquestionable threat. A sound of possession. Ridiculous. Unnecessary.
A bolt of heat shot straight to her core.
Yep. Stupendously terrible idea.
Griff didn’t even glance at her, just kept that deadly blue gaze on the other men. He’d been a brawler back home. Never without cause and most often in the name of backing up his foster brothers or defending one of his foster sisters. Sam appreciated the idea that he was ready and willing to defend her, but now was not the time or place. She laid her hand on his arm, a silent order to stand down. His muscles were taut beneath her fingers, vibrating and waiting for action, though his hands still hung loose by his sides. At her touch, his head tipped toward her, snaring her with his eyes.
As the elevator car came to a stop again, she found her hand sliding down his arm to link with his, squeezing gently. “This is our floor.”
His hand tightened on hers, and he used his bigger bulk to shoulder by the other guys. “’Scuze us.”
He didn’t let her go as they made their way down the long hall to their room.
“Just curious… are you going to be this overprotective the whole time?”
“That a problem?”
Was it? She hadn’t known she had bodyguard fantasies before the last five minutes. Maybe it would be fun to indulge in one for the next few days. “No. It’s just… unexpected.”
Griff glanced down, as if just realizing he still held her hand. He released her and rubbed at the back of his neck. Color crept up his throat. “There’s a lot of fun to be had in Vegas, and a lot of folks who don’t know where the line for that ends. As long as you’re here with me, I’ll keep you safe.”
If not for her hand on the door, she might’ve swooned right at his feet.
But who’s going to keep me safe from you?
Sam cleared her throat and opened the door. “I appreciate that.”
He followed her inside, bumping into her back as she came to a dead stop at the sight of the lone king-size bed. Right. That was a thing.
Because she didn’t want to think about their sleeping arrangements yet, she dragged the monster suitcase across the room and hefted it onto the waiting luggage rack. “We should probably do a crash course in what we’ve both been up to the last few years so we don’t get blindsided at dinner.”
“Makes sense. And we may need to do some shopping. I didn’t come out here with stuff that’s wedding appropriate.”
“Whatever you packed will be fine. We’ll tell them the airline lost the bag with your suit. Either Chloe will be fine with it, or we’ll go rent one for you for the actual wedding.”
“And tonight?”
“I’ve got a dress. Just wear the nicest shirt you brought.”
“Got it. So, the rapid-fire catch up. Four years in the Marines. The last two of that was in Okinawa.”
Sam’s focus lasered in on that hint of ink on his biceps. “Is that where you got the tattoos?”
“Yeah. Most of them, anyway.”
He had multiple? She wanted to know how many, of what, and where. But those weren’t questions that would likely come up at dinner, so she bit her tongue.
“How long ago did you last talk to any of these people about the idiot ex?” Griff asked.
She had to think about it. “Probably four or five months? They’ve all been busy with senior year stuff, and I’ve been up to my eyeballs with grad school. It’s easy for time to just slip by.”
“Shouldn’t you also be in your senior year? You were at UT Knoxville, right?”
“I was. I finished in three years.” Easy to do since she’d started as a sophomore.
He huffed a laugh. “Of course you did.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Nothing. Just that you’re still sucking up knowledge like a sponge. I always admired that about you.”
He had? That was news to her.
Before she could comment further, her cell phone rang. Chloe’s name flashed on the screen.
“Hey, girl, what’s up?”
“Did you and Sexy McSexyson make it to the resort?”
Sam’s lips twitched. “We did.”
“Great. Everybody’s meeting in the lobby in half an hour to head out to dinner. Cody says we’ve got reservations at some hard-to-get-reservations-for place, so don’t be late!”
“We’ll be there with bells on. See you soon.” Sam hung up to find Griff’s mouth pursed with amusement. “What?”
“Chloe and Cody?”
“True story. And they are as nauseatingly cute as that sounds. I need to finish getting ready.” She carried her toiletry kit and the dress she planned to wear into the bathroom.
“So grad school where?” Griff’s voice sounded from outside.
“UNC Chapel Hill. In English.”
They continued their catch up as she did her best to erase all signs of her long day of travel, scrubbing her face clean and starting fresh with her makeup. She put in extra effort because it was Griff’s arm she’d be on tonight. Stupid. This whole thing was fake, and her crush was a million years ago. But she’d come so far from that nerdy girl with glasses who’d tutored him, and by damn, she wanted him to notice that.
“One more question,” he called.
“Shoot.”
“Are you heartbroken over the asshat?”
Sam paused in the process of fastening her earrings. “Not even a little bit.”
“Good.”
Good? What the hell did that mean? Good that she wasn’t having to fake being happy? Or good that she wasn’t on a rebound because he was actually interested?
Don’t get ahead of yourself and read something into this that isn’t actually there. He’s just doing you a favor.
“Let me throw on my dress, then I’ll be ready to go.” She shut the door and stripped out of her shorts and t-shirt. The bra had to go, too, to accommodate the dip in the back. A shimmy and a tug and the dress fell into place. Fitted and flirty, in a bold siren red, the 1950s-style halter swing dress hit just past her knees. She’d fallen in love with it on the spot in a little boutique in Raleigh and bought it long before she’d known where she’d wear it. She felt good in this dress. Sexy without being trashy. Now she just needed shoes.
Stepping out of the bathroom, she spotted Griff by the expanse of windows, looking delicious in well-fitting jeans and an untucked navy button-down shirt with the sleeves rolled up to expose his muscular forearms.
His eyes swept over her in approval. “Very nice.”
Sam ducked her head, hoping he couldn’t see the blush as she sat on the bed to strap on her heels. When she’d finished, a broad hand appeared in her field of vision. For a moment she simply stared at it, then up at him.
“If anybody’s going to believe that we’re together, I’m going to have to touch you.”
Well that just sent her brain off on a merry-go-round of lust as she imagined all the inches of skin he could reach in this dress, including the expanse of bare legs under her skirt.
Griff didn’t appear affected. He never had. This crush had always been one-sided. Damn it. Cursing her embarrassment, and praying her palm wasn’t sweaty, she took his hand, letting him pull her to her feet.
The heels put her eyes right on level with his mouth. That surprisingly sensual mouth she had no doubt could do wicked, wonderful things.
Don’t think about kissing him. Don’t think about kissing him. Don’t think about kissing him.
“Ready?”
“Yes.” Oh God, had that sounded as needy as she felt?
With businesslike efficiency, he tucked her arm through his. “Then let’s get this show on the road. I’m starving.”