The Worst Wedding Date
: Chapter 21

Nothing inspires fast action like telling Laney there’s a problem. She’s on the phone ordering enough tacos for a hundred before we make it to the parking lot, even though we have sixty people at most to feed.

It’s hot as hell.

“Oh, crap,” she says suddenly. “How are we picking them up?”

I pull a set of keys out of my pocket and unlock the Jeep three spaces down.

She looks at the Jeep.

Then at me.

Then back at the Jeep.

Then back at me.

“How—what—when—”

She’s cute when she’s surprised. “Some of us can adult even when we don’t want to.”

“You rented another car?”

I shrug. “Don’t like being trapped. Think that many tacos will fit in this thing?”

Better question is if the restaurant can whip up that many tacos and fixin’s in the next hour.

And the next question after that is if she’ll throw herself at me again.

Hope so.

I can still feel those lips on my cheek, and I want more. Hurting later? Don’t care. Closure? Whatever.

All I care about is that this is my chance with Laney, and I don’t want to fuck it up.

“I don’t want to know what your credit card bill will look like when this is over,” she mutters. “And I’m getting dinner. No arguments.”

“Whatever makes you happy. Hop in. This one has pig radar.”

She laughs even as she side-eyes me while I open the door for her. You can see the question on her face. What do you do that you can afford this, and if you can’t afford this, just how soon will you be filing for bankruptcy?

But she doesn’t ask.

And I want to kiss her.

I want to pretend she wouldn’t be horrified if she knew my naked junk was paying off my credit cards, and I want to kiss her. Right here against the side of the Jeep. I want to kiss her until she can’t think straight, until she’s yanking my shirt off and running her hands all over my body and begging me to make her feel good everywhere.

I want to mess up her hair. Her makeup. Leave her so satisfied she can’t remember her own name.

“Theo?”

Fuck me.

When she says my name like that, when she looks at me with her eyes going dark and darting to my mouth, I think she wants it too.

Like that wasn’t just an excited you gave me one of my favorite things to do kiss on the cheek.

I clear my throat and gesture for her to climb in.

She licks her lips.

My dick goes full salute.

“I really like being on a team with you,” she whispers.

And then, thank fuck, she climbs into the Jeep.

I take my time walking around it to get into the driver’s seat, doing some deep breathing and ordering my dick to get himself under control.

She likes this Theo.

She likes what I let her see.

Would she still like me if she knew I’ve spent the past three years making videos of my woody for anyone with twenty bucks a month to see?

And that thought—that she’d judge me if she knew all of who I am—is what keeps me from pulling the Jeep to the side of the road and testing that theory that she wants to kiss me too.

She steers the conversation on the drive and while we wait, sticking to safe topics like rollercoasters and if tacos or hamburgers are better food.

Rollercoasters are overrated.

And talking about hamburgers makes me hungrier than talking about tacos, but both make me want to gnaw my own arm off.

I might not show my face in my videos, but I show off my six-pack. Not risking losing it so long as I’m making a difference in the world.

Which I don’t share with Laney.

I’m a complicated inspirational porn star isn’t at the top of the list of things I discuss with women when I don’t see us having a future.

Not that I’ve seen myself having a future with any woman since my channel took off. Didn’t expect relationship paranoia would come with financial success, but here we are.

The restaurant pulls off a miracle, and Laney and I are back at the resort unloading tacos before most of the scavenger hunters have returned.

Sabrina’s first.

Naturally.

And her eyes almost bug out of her head when she sees us rolling in carts of tacos. “What… No, you know what? I don’t want to know. What I do want to know is what’s in this big-ass box that was at the end of the treasure hunt and who in the ever-loving hell thought it would be a good idea to give a couple something this huge for a destination wedding gift, but I’m not asking that either.”

She and Decker, her scavenger hunt partner, jump in to help us unpack everything before Emma gets back.

Yeah, fine, before her beloved gets back too.

I didn’t do this for him though.

Sabrina mutters something to Laney about this resort seriously not living up to the dreams Emma’s had since she was little, but everyone’s all smiles by the time the rest of the wedding guests trickle back onto the lanai.

Uncle Owen sees me, makes the finger guns, then cackles and walks over to the buffet to help himself to a taco as Emma and her groom return. Dad was paired with Aunt Brenda, and he looks like he needs a stiff drink and a few stuffed elk heads to talk to for him to get over it when he gets back. And he’s not much of a drinker.

Though he’s totally a talker when it comes to talking to his art.

“Oh my gosh, what is that thing?” Emma points to the very large wrapped package sitting at the head table.

And by very large wrapped package, I mean it takes up most of the table, and Sabrina and Decker probably needed a hand cart to get it back here once they found it.

Laney’s eyeing me.

I know she knows where it came from.

Been sitting in our room for the past few days. And she’s not one to miss things.

“It’s your present,” Sabrina says.

Emma’s eyes flare wide. “I really hope that’s a box in a box in a box.”

“Whoever bought it, ships it, babe,” Chandler says.

She smiles indulgently at him.

I look away.

Don’t want to see it.

His interference in my conversation with that single mom last night changed something.

Or maybe Laney’s reaction to a decade-old truth changed something.

Either way, it’s harder to watch him with my sister today. Harder to accept that someone so important in my life wants to spend hers with someone who can regularly be such a dick.

“Is everyone back?” Em asks. “Oh my gosh, everyone, eat. We have…tacos?”

“Looks like,” Sabrina says.

There’s a flash of confusion before she smiles hard, like it’s taking effort. “Great! Awesome. We have tacos! Eat, please, while they’re hot.”

Emma loves tacos.

I know she loves tacos.

So why—

“I don’t like tacos,” Chandler says to Emma.

It’s not loud.

But it’s loud enough to explain why Em’s not thrilled.

It’s also loud enough that Laney’s back snaps straight and a glower ignites her face.

Shouldn’t have told her.

Should not have told her.

“Let it go,” I mutter.

“You freaking saved dinner.”

“Technically, you did.”

She growls.

And yet again, I’m half-hard in public because of this woman.

“I don’t know why they swapped out tacos,” Emma’s saying to Chandler. “I’ll go replace someone and ask.”

Sabrina slides up to my sister. “I’ll go ask,” she says. “You eat. Enjoy. And then I want to know what’s in this massive present.”

Laney shoots me another look and pulls me farther from the bride and groom. “What’s in the present?” she asks.

“Why would I know?”

“Theo.”

I grin and wink. “You think I know because big’s my style.”

She pins me with a look featuring dilated pupils, that soft spot fluttering quickly in her neck, and yeah.

I need to sit down.

Not because having a woody embarrasses me.

More because I don’t want to cause a scene.

For Emma’s sake.

“Is it fun?” Laney whispers as she sinks into the chair next to me.

Takes a minute to catch up to the fact that she’s asking about the present and not the toy in my pants. “I think so.”

She smiles. But it’s accompanied by stress lines on her forehead.

I scoot my chair closer to hers. “It’s not that bad,” I tell her. “Other people will think it’s funny too.”

“No, I’m sure it’s funny. I was just thinking that if the resort didn’t make the dinner she paid for, after telling me everything was under control, what else are they going to miss? Will the wedding be ready? Who’s providing the officiant? Who’s setting up the chairs? The decorations? The catering and the music and the cake for the reception? All of it?”

I open my mouth, then shut it again.

“I’m camping out at the front desk all night to talk to management if I have to,” she adds.

I don’t just want to kiss those stress lines in her forehead.

I want all of it.

I want to feel even a fraction of the love this woman has for my sister aimed at me.

And that’s always been my fascination with Laney.

She cares. She’s invested. She might follow the rules and be a stickler, but she loves, and she loves big.

There’s not much she wouldn’t do for the people she loves.

She agreed to babysit me, didn’t she? And I know that’s the last thing she wanted to do when she got here.

But now?

“Oh my god, you two.” Addison drops into the seat next to us with a plate loaded down with tacos and tortilla chips. “I would not have called this. But I should’ve. Opposites attract, right? You’re adorable. For real. Are your parents shitting total bricks over this?”

Laney doesn’t flinch or rear back or choke on air.

She simply shifts that frown to Addison. “Why would my parents be upset about choices I make as the fully-grown, competent, rational adult that they raised me to be?”

My stomach grumbles in the silence that is Addison freezing in confusion with her taco halfway to her mouth.

She’s not wrong. Laney’s parents hate me.

Probably should confess to being responsible for that graffiti on their car not long after the leave Delaney’s no-no box alone conversation in high school before her parents arrive.

But I’m pretty stunned myself at Laney’s response, honestly. She’s always worried what her parents will think.

Swear I overheard her whispering something about that to Sabrina in the last two days.

“I—you know parents,” Addison stutters. “They never let us go.”

“That’s their problem then, isn’t it?”

My stomach grumbles again. I ignore it.

Does she mean it?

Would she honestly, fully, truly tell her parents to fuck off if they weren’t willing to accept her choices?

Would she tell them to fuck off for me?

Laney frowns at me. “When’s the last time you ate? C’mon. Taco time.”

“I’m good.”

The frown turns into a full-on I will eviscerate you if you don’t stand up and get me the hell away from Addison immediately.

And it makes me smile like smiling is the only thing that matters.

“Yep. You’re right. I’m hungry.” I order my dick to get down, which works better when I pair the instruction with thinking about Aunt Brenda getting it on with my Uncle Owen, and I rise from the table and follow Laney to the line for tacos.

“I haven’t seen you eat at all in the past two days,” she muses.

“You’re not the only one with ninja skills.”

She meets my eyes, then looks down at where my shirt is gaping open.

“Don’t,” I mutter.

“You’re not eating.”

“I’m eating.”

“Why aren’t you eating?”

“I’m eating.”

“What are you eating?”

I force a smile. “If you give a Laney a bone…”

“This isn’t about me making sure you don’t pass out in the middle of Emma’s wedding and it’s not about me being right and it’s not about rules. This is about the fact that human beings need to eat, and you’re—you’re—” she waves a hand over my gaping shirt “—you’re this, and that takes diet and exercise no matter how much all of those ripped guys on TikTok pretend it’s just natural and that men don’t have body issues.”

“I—” I cut myself off, not at all sure what to say in response.

“You’re a human being with needs that too many people around you overlook,” she finishes.

I’m stunned.

Utterly. Fucking. Stunned.

High School Theo would hit back. Make her feel like shit for suggesting I’m a fuckup that no one cares enough about to worry over my basic well-being.

But hungry Theo who’s been hung up on this woman for longer than I can remember, even when I didn’t want to be? Hungry Theo, who doesn’t eat enough because I know what I have going now won’t last forever, so I need to look my best for as long as I can?

Especially since the entire package of me—my dick, my abs, my knitting, my stories—have me getting more validation in the comments of my videos than I’ve gotten in my own real life in ages.

Possibly ever.

Yeah, that Theo, the one getting validation from comments on the internet has a few issues.

And Emma hasn’t noticed my diet. My dad hasn’t noticed my diet. My buddies on the construction crew haven’t noticed my diet.

But Laney has.

I swallow hard. “Okay.”

She studies me too closely.

Way too closely.

Like she knows I’m terrified I’ll lose my six-pack. That strangers won’t tell me I inspired them or comforted them or lifted them up so much the day my body isn’t hard and tight.

The GrippaPeen thing was an accident, but it’s the best accident of my life.

And the worst at the same time.

Laney doesn’t say anything else while we make our way to the front of the line.

My stomach growls harder while the scent of tacos gets stronger.

We’re almost to the front of the line when Chandler’s voice makes my face twitch.

“What the hell?” he says.

Emma makes a noise. “Chandler. I told you. No peeking.”

“It’s a fucking human hamster ball,” he hisses.

“It is not.”

“It is. Look.” He rips the fancy wrapping paper off the box at the head table, and Emma’s face goes through about forty-six different emotions while she studies the box.

Laney angles closer to me. “Is it really a human hamster ball?”

“Two,” I murmur back. “Blow-up style. For working out their frustrations after an argument.”

She stifles a noise, then double-stifles it with a hand thrown over her mouth.

“Are you laughing or crying?” I ask.

Her eyes answer for her.

She’s laughing.

Jackpot.

And she’s not the only one.

Giggles and chuckles cascade over the lanai.

“When do we get to come over for game night at your place?” Jack asks.

“Dude, I only want in if they’re not doing freaky newlywed stuff in those. Like, I need to see it bleached before I climb in,” Decker calls.

“Isn’t your yard pretty hilly, Chandler?” Lucky chimes in.

“Oh my god, they’re the perfect size for my dog too!” Sabrina says.

“Why?” Laney whispers to me, her voice strangled like she’s trying not to laugh still.

“Who doesn’t need a set?” I whisper back with a conspiratorial grin.

She muffles another laugh behind her palm.

Home fucking run.

Except for the part where Chandler’s turning a glacial glare on me.

He doesn’t say anything.

Doesn’t have to.

Emma looks at me too, and she winces.

Dammit.

Just dammit.

When does she take my side?

She told me she wanted a set. Dad had a paper sitting out at Thanksgiving with all of the holiday shopping ads in it, and we were looking through it before Chandler got his panties in a bunch, and she pointed to the human hamster balls and cracked up and said they’d be fun.

“Where’s the real present?” Chandler asks.

“Honey, we’re getting married in paradise,” Emma says. “It doesn’t matter.”

“He stole my real present. He swapped my dinner, and he stole the real present.”

Laney snaps straight.

“Don’t—” I start, but it’s too late.

“The tacos are my doing,” she announces. “Resort catering goofed. There wasn’t food. I got tacos. And that’s an awesome present. If you don’t want it, I’ll take it back. The resort goofed there too. It was a glitchy day. You’re in fucking paradise. Quit being a baby.”

“…do that,” I finish.

Chandler gapes at her.

Emma’s face has twisted into such utter confusion that she probably can’t see straight.

“But—but—but you don’t do funny shit,” Chandler says.

Emma winces harder. “Chandler—”

“And you know I hate tacos,” he adds.

“Emma loves them.” The deadly calm in Laney’s voice has such a high degree of warning in it that my balls should be shriveling into cold, dead, dried-out walnuts.

Instead, having her defend me—and make no mistake, everyone on this lanai knows that’s what she’s doing—is making me want her.

Badly.

Not for closure.

Not for a vacation fling.

For everything.

Time to go.

I can’t do this.

I want her too much.

I can’t want Laney this much while knowing that even stepping-out-of-her-box Laney wouldn’t appreciate replaceing out she’s flirting with an adult entertainment star.

That’s too far.

While chatter starts up again about who brought the present and if it’s funny or tasteless and who still wants to play and who loves tacos, I angle back until I’m at the edge of the lanai.

And then I disappear.

If I don’t—if I wait for Laney—I’ll do far worse.

And on a day when I already feel like I’m on the verge of losing my sister, my heart isn’t up for the pain of having one more dream dashed.