“Shit.” She rolled to her left, jumping out of the bed and yanking the sheet with her.
“Where are you going?”
“Shit. Shit. Shit!” Dani scrambled around the room tossing pillows and searching the floor frantically. Dylan grabbed a pillow, dragging it over his lap. No sense in letting her see how he’d assumed the morning was going to go. “We’re supposed to be downstairs.”
“So? We can show up a few minutes late.”
“We can’t show up anywhere, Dylan. Now I have to figure out how to get back to my room without anyone seeing me in the middle of the breakfast rush.” She sat down on the bed and pulled her panties on under the sheet. “Damn it! What the hell was I thinking?”
“Jesus, Dani. Way to make a guy feel good in the morning.”
“Sorry.” She paused her redressing to look him in the eye. “I didn’t mean that. This was… fun. But I don’t want it to be everyone else’s business, okay? Especially Emma and Sonya and, oh my God, Cat.”
Dani’s mascara had smudged under her eyes and her hair was a little on the wild side. Maybe she had a point about the optics of the whole thing.
“Look, I’ll check the hallway for you and you can make a run for it. Like you’re escaping a serial killer or something.”
“Don’t be like that, Dylan.” She hooked her bra behind her back and let the sheet fall away as she crawled over the bed. Heat burned down his neck when she knelt beside him. “It’s Cat’s wedding. I don’t want us getting caught in a compromising position to be the memory everyone takes away from the weekend. We should just chalk it up to a fun night and make sure it doesn’t happen again.”
She had a look like pity in her eyes and it rubbed him the wrong way. It wasn’t like he was planning to make something out of this. Sure, it was fun, but he didn’t do a lot of second meet-ups. Not even for a woman like Dani. Usually he was the one who got to break that news, though. Today he was on the flip side, and he didn’t entirely like the way it felt.
He rolled out of bed and found his boxers on the floor, yanking them on. “Yeah, all right, Dani-pie. I’m not really too psyched about Josh finding out either. Or Shawn. I get enough shit from those two about this type of thing. You being Cat’s friend and all would probably piss Josh off, so let’s not mention it.”
“Dylan.” Dani sighed and came to stand in front of him. He’d never seen her like this. She was usually done up in heels and cleavage-baring tops whenever they were together. Here, barefoot and in her underwear, her hair sticking up in the back, she looked soft. Cute instead of like she was about to bite your neck and slap your ass. And he’d been right about that, for the record. She put her hand on his forearm, squeezing. “I’m not just Cat’s friend,” she said. “We’re friends too, right?”
“Yeah,” he muttered, a little bit like a child. She raised her eyebrows expectantly, and he shook off the pissy mood his ego had put him in, reaching down to give her a hug. “Friends.”
“Good.” She picked her dress up off the floor where it was still crumpled and stepped in, quickly fastening the halter behind her back. “Now, look out in the hall and give me the all-clear.”
Dylan gestured for her to wait behind the door. He patted his hair back into place before peeking his head out into the hall.
Where he came face to face with Shawn’s wife, Minnie.
“Hey, Dylan! I was just about to knock. Where did you run off to last night?”
“Um…” He glanced back at Dani, then stepped into the doorway, shielding Minnie’s view of the sheets strewn around his hotel room. “I was beat. Long day… golfing, and ya know…”
“Are you coming downstairs?”
“Yeah. In a few. Where are the newlyweds?” He scanned the hall again and saw Cat’s sister coming out of her room, then Shawn meandering toward them looking like he might have slept in the outfit he had on.
“I don’t know,” Minnie answered. “I didn’t dare knock on their door.”
Shawn cocked his head, his bushy orange eyebrows slanting inward. “You doing okay, buddy?”
“Yeah. Didn’t sleep too well. Too much tequila.” Dylan waved at Cat’s sister as she passed, and smiled at another woman who must have been a relative of the bride’s. She had about a hundred. Dani was right about it being rush hour. “Well, I’ll see you two down there.”
“Okay. We’ll save you a—”
He closed the door in Minnie’s face and gave Dani a shrug. “There’s a lot of people out there.”
“Shit!” She looked frantic again.
“Look, just wait here while I shower and get dressed, then I’ll head down and text you when it looks like everyone is already down there.”
“Okay,” she said, her crazy curls bouncing as she nodded. A vision of them squeezed between his fingers flashed before him.
He grabbed his t-shirt from the bed and headed toward the bathroom, then paused when he thought of one more solution. “You could join me. Save yourself some time getting ready.”
“Dylan!”
“It was worth a shot,” he said, slinging a towel over his shoulder.
Damn, she was cute when she was mad.
When Dylan walked into the hotel dining room, Cat jumped up from her seat and waved him over to a round table. Her parents and Josh were there, all of them with overflowing plates.
“Dylan,” she said. “Over here.” There were two chairs left empty, and he assumed the other was for the maid of honor.
“I can just grab a seat with Shawn.” He didn’t feel like sharing breakfast with Dani at the moment, childish as it was.
“Don’t be silly,” Cat said. “Sit.”
Josh stood to greet him, followed by Cat’s father Carlos.
“The best man,” Carlos boomed, shaking his hand much harder than necessary. The guy was huge.
“That’d be me.”
Dani had mentioned once that Carlos was like a second father to her. Her parents moved out of state once she left home, and Dani spent a lot of college breaks with Cat’s family. Suddenly Carlos’ presence felt really awkward, like meeting your date’s dad before prom night when you knew exactly where that dress he’d paid for was going to end up.
Dylan cleared his throat, flipping his phone around in the pocket of his sweatshirt. He really needed to text Dani, but now it might be obvious.
“You gonna get some food, man?” Josh asked, amused.