I make a point of closing the door loudly but, clearly beat, she only manages to turn her head to find out who’s joined her. “I work out alone,” I say, wandering over to the bench press.
“Me too,” she replies, pushing away from the bag and removing her gloves. “So are you leaving?”
I smile, setting my water on the rubber mat. “What did the bag do to you?” I ask, reaching for a fifty and loading it on one end of the bar. She shouldn’t be over-exerting herself like that. She’s not my responsibility—I wouldn’t ordinarily give two shits—but she and Rose have grown close. And . . . well, that’s it.
Beau, out of breath, looks at the punch bag and jabs it lightly with her bare fist. But she ignores my question. “I never got to congratulate you.” She doesn’t look at me, going to the unit on the far side of the gym and dumping her gloves. “Congratulations.”
I study her back as I collect another fifty, splitting my attention between her and the bar. That’s not strictly true. She told me she was happy for us. Same thing. “Thanks,” I say quietly as she remains facing the wall, unwilling and unable to look at me. I take no pleasure from her pain. None at all. I’m elated, Rose is elated. It’s a tricky balance to find a happy medium between that and compassion for Beau and James.
I settle on the bench, pretty fucking stumped. What the fuck do I say to her? “Are you okay, Beau?” I ask, and immediately kick myself. What a stupid fucking question. I saw her when she joined us in the kitchen last night. I watched her embrace Rose and fight with everything she had to show nothing but happiness while on the inside I know she’s dying. And I watched James collect her and make their excuses to leave, seeing his girlfriend grow closer and closer to revealing her true emotions. And I ask if she’s okay? Shit.
“All good,” she says, still facing away from me. I see her reach for her face, trying to be discreet with her quiet sniff. My eyes fall briefly to the punch bag. That bag was a number of men. Dexter. The Bear. Her ex. Maybe even her father. She swings around with an air of confidence that I’m so not buying. “Nervous?” she asks, and immediately frowns to herself.
I hitch an interested eyebrow. “Should I be?”
“It’s your wedding day.” She busies herself with the gloves she just discarded.
Is my wedding what she’s actually talking about? Or something else? “What do you know, Beau?” I ask outright.
She eyes me. “Nothing. What do you know?”
“Nothing.”
“Then we both know nothing.” She smiles, totally fake, and walks away hastily. “Rose needs me.”
I lace my fingers, stretching my arms out, my eyes lasers on her back. “See you later,” I say quietly, but she hears me, her steps faltering a fraction before she finds her pace again.
Nervous? Can’t say I was. Now? What does she know?
She meets Brad at the door. “Morning,” he says, stopping and following her path as she rushes past.
“Morning,” she calls, not looking back.
Brad pouts. “Someone’s in a hurry,” he muses, pulling the towel from around his neck as he finds me on the bench. He dazzles me with a stupid smile. That’s fake too. He’s as delighted about today as a pig booked in at a slaughtering house. “Nervous?”
I roll my eyes and fall back to the bench, taking a grip of the bar. “No. You?”
“Depends which part you’re talking about.” His face appears above me. “Best man duties, or murdering duties?”
“Who are we murdering?” I ask.
“We? No, not we. Me. I’m seriously considering murdering you.”
“No blood at the wedding,” I warn, flexing my hold before lifting it out of the anchors. “Rose will go ape.”
“Oh, so we should be wary of your wife, but not the megalomaniac with an army of murderers following him through Miami like the Pied-fucking Piper.”
I bring the bar down to my chest slowly and ease it back up, repeating twenty times. “Those murderers are dwindling.” We’ve killed half the fuckers at the top and fed them to the sharks. “It’s all coming together.”
“Right,” Brad says, taking the bar and resting it in the holder. “It’s all coming together.”
I stare up at him, wiping my brow. “Where’s James?”
“Why?”
“Can you just answer a fucking question without interrogating me?”
“You don’t trust him.”
Trust no one. It’s what Pops always said. Do I trust James? Did I ever trust James? Does he trust me? I’m not sure of anything. “You know I don’t trust anyone.” I take the bar again. “So where is he?”
“I don’t know. I’ve not seen him this morning.”
Good. I pump out another four sets of twenty, have a few jabs at the punchbag, distracted, and row for fifteen minutes. My workout has done nothing to relax me. I collect my water from the mat. “I’m going out on my jet ski.”
“Why?” Brad calls, smacking the button on the treadmill to slow down.
For fuck’s sake, he’s like a woman. “Because it relaxes me.”
“So you are nervous.” The laughter in his voice makes me want to shove the punch bag up his arse sideways.
“Fuck off,” I call back, swinging open the door. “Don’t forget to decrease the weight on the bar.”
“Fuck you,” he yells, and I laugh, heading to our room. I’m intercepted on the stairs by Rose, and I take a moment to drink in the sheer stunning beauty of her looking all flustered in a white robe, her hair piled high.
“I need you,” she says.
Oh, she can see me? “I need you too, baby,” I practically growl, bending and lifting her onto my shoulder.
“Danny!”
I take the stairs urgently before we’re interrupted by someone again. I need to let off some steam before I go—
“Rose?” Mum calls.
“Are you fucking kidding me?” I mutter, swinging around to find my mother, who has apparently turned into the sex police, hands on her hips at the bottom of the stairs looking unimpressed.
“Put her down,” she warns. “You’re not supposed to see her this morning, let alone maul her.”
Anyone else in the world who demanded such a thing would be dead in a heartbeat. But my mother? I growl and lower Rose to the step below, showing my mother my displeasure. “She started it,” I say childishly.
“I need you to help with something.” Rose takes my hand and leads me back down the stairs. God help me, why ever did I agree to this? I rub at my face with the back of my hand. “The tent firm have sent the wrong bulbs.”
I’m stumped. “What?” I ask, being dragged into the garden and into the tent, which is now adorned in white. Everything white—the balloons, the flowers, the tablecloths, chairs, even the floor. White. Pure, unblemished, bright white. It’s a conscious move on Rose’s part.
“The bulbs,” she says, pointing up at the twinkle lights draping from the ceiling, going all the way up into the eaves. I smile, being reminded of our favorite restaurant in St. Lucia. “They’re the wrong color.”