Chapter 1
Cade
* * *
What’s that saying about rain on your wedding day? Fuck if I know. And it’s not even my wedding day, so ultimately I don’t even care. It is, however, my brother’s wedding day. Despite the fact that we’re not close, I’m expected to be inside. Which means I’ll have to leave the warmth of my car, walk through the pouring rain, and go inside. Soon.
As soon as I overcome my resentment.
I haven’t even seen my brother, Aaron, since our mother’s funeral. Which was three years ago. Frankly I’m still pissed at my little brother for neglecting to tell me she was sick. I didn’t get to say goodbye to her. Just had to fly home for the funeral.
I know I need to be the bigger man—bury my anger long enough to make it through his wedding—but it’s hard to do that when we’ve drifted this far apart. The distance was understandable when I was serving abroad, but I’ve been a civilian for nearly four years. I haven’t made the effort and neither has he. Hell, I haven’t even met his bride-to-be. I didn’t even go to the rehearsal dinner, because I’m not part of the wedding party. I’m just one of the invited guests. Not that I wanted to be his damn best man, but aren’t brothers at least included as groomsmen?
Fuck. Now I sound like a whiney little bitch about it.
It’s not that I even care, it’s just that it’s hard to get motivated to walk through the rain when I doubt anyone will even notice I’m there.
Before I can muster the motivation to leave my car, I see movement out in the blur of the rain. It’s distorted, but obviously a person, coming straight towards my car. Probably my jackass of a brother coming to find me. Or he sent one of his groomsmen.
No … wait. Not a groomsman. Not unless they found some tacky-ass green tuxes somewhere. Which I doubt would suit my ambitious brother’s taste.
Before I can give it anymore thought, the passenger door opens and a very wet woman practically throws herself in, sitting her drenched ass on my restored leather upholstery.
“Fuck, lady, wrong car,” I say.
She looks at me, blinking, all wide green eyes with long, long eyelashes and makeup that doesn’t even seem to be running despite the fact that water is pouring off her candy-red hair into her face. Something in her expression or her eyes or something—fuck if I know—hits me right in the gut.
“You’re not my Uber?”
“Does this look like a fucking Uber?”
She blinks those ridiculously large eyes at me again before looking around the interior of the car as if searching for evidence to disprove me. Finding none—obviously. Because my fully restored GTO is not a fucking Uber—when she doesn’t find it, she reaches into the bust of her dress and pulls out her phone. I’m not even making this shit up. She pulls her phone out of tits like she’s doing a damn magic trick.
It’s shouldn’t be hot. Not when she’s dripping all over my car. And if her breasts weren’t so hot, it wouldn’t be. But, damn, her breasts are like a work of fucking art.
She paws frantically at her phone for a few seconds and then looks at me with wide, terrified eyes. “My Uber is still nineteen minutes away.”
I don’t care.
It’s not my damn business.
Not even if she cries.
Which she looks to be about ten seconds away from doing.
Nope. Make that two seconds.
“Can you just drive me somewhere? Get me away from here?”
I glance down at her soaked dress. It’s molded to her banging curves and my cock twitches against my thigh. Her cleavage is nearly busting out the top and her skin is so fair and creamy looking. Wet, weeping women are not my thing. At all.
And this is not my problem.
I’m done rescuing people.
It is not my fucking job. Not anymore.
Not even crying women. Which are my damn Achilles heel.
“Please.”
Fuck me.
I reach behind me and grab a towel that I keep back there, because my girl may be restored, but she’s still close to sixty years old, and I never know when I’ll need to get down on my knees and fix something.
“Just sit on this.” –I hold the towel out to her— “So you don’t ruin my leather?”
She looks down, then at the dash, then does an obviously double take. and her face whitens even more. “Oh my God, is this a ’64 Pontiac GTO?”
It’s my turn to blink in surprise.
But before I can answer, she blurts. “Shit it is!” She scrambles to grab the towel, twisting her body into kinks to dry off the leather while positioning the towel under her, and saying, “By the way, this car is hot as …”
She seems to swallow the obvious expletive as she lowers herself onto the towel. Blushing, she says, “… well, you know.”
I quirk an eyebrow at her.
Still blushing, she blurts. “I mean, that’s assuming you think a 6.4 liter v-8 engine is hot. Which I assume you do. Because otherwise why would you have this car. Or care about the leather. Or—”
Damn, this chick can talk.
Normally I find women who never stop talking a turn off. But this woman? This gloriously curvy woman? Who clearly knows her muscle cars? This shit is whole new level hot.
Which is a shame, because I do not have time for her or her drama.
“Are you in some kind of trouble?” I ask.
She bites down on her pillowy bottom lip. “I just really need to get out of here. The sooner the better.”
“As much as I’d love to Sugar, I can’t.” And—fuck me—I really would love to. Because right now, I feel exactly the way I did the first time I saw a ’65 Mustang with a perfect candy-apple red paint job. I wanted to drop down on my knees and worship it. I shake my head, partly in answer to her request, partly to dislodge the sensation of wanting—no, needing—to grab this woman with both hands and pledge my undying devotion.
Aloud, I say, “I gotta go inside for a wedding.”
She blows out a breath and tries to blot at her damp face.
I nod to the glovebox in front of her. “Fast food napkins in there if you want to try to dry your face.”
She smiles at me. “Thank you.” She opens the box and pulls some out and wipes at her face. “Listen, you don’t need to bother going inside, the bride cancelled the wedding.”
“Shit. Should I go in and check on the groom?”
Her pale green eyes roll upward. “Aaron is fine. He was balls deep in the maid of honor.” She gives an indignant snort of laughter that sounds more pained than amused. “So, yeah, I think he’ll be occupied a bit longer.”
I close my eyes because of course he was. My brother has never been what you’d call subtle or discreet. “What a dumbfuck.”
“So can you take me somewhere? I don’t want to be in your way, I just need to get out of here before everything implodes. The bride’s family is going to lose their minds and Aaron won’t be happy. And my Uber is still…” She fiddles with her phone again. “Shit! Now it’s twenty-four minutes away. How is that even possible?”
She’s blinking again.
Fuck. She’s about to start crying. I just fucking know it.