Loving You (The Bridesmaids Club Book 2) (18 page)

“You’ll put on five pounds if you have another one,” Molly said with a wicked gleam in her eyes.

Sally glanced at the plate of sweet bars and sighed. “Do you think Dylan will dance with you?”

Annie sat down and smiled. “We practiced last night.” Everyone in the room looked at her. “What’s wrong?”

Tess coughed into her hand. “Don’t you remember what happened at Connie’s wedding? He practically hid the moment the music started.”

“He won’t be hiding tomorrow night,” Annie said with confidence. “Once he got over the touching thing we discovered he’s a pretty good dancer.”

“And how would he be getting over his touching thing?” Molly asked.

Annie frowned at her friends. “It’s not like that. Something happened to Dylan in Afghanistan. He just needs time to get used to being around people again.”

“A bit like Max,” Sally said with a touch of sadness in her voice. “The bigger they are, the harder they fall.”

“Even if they do have the cutest brown eyes in town,” Tess said.

“Dylan’s got blue eyes.” Annie gazed around the table, then over at the Irish Wolfhound snoring in the corner. She bit her bottom lip. “You were talking about Max, weren’t you?”

Tess smiled. “I was, but it’s nice to know Dylan has cute eyes, too.”

Annie covered her hot cheeks with her hands. “We need to change the subject before I say something even more embarrassing.”

“You don’t need to be embarrassed.” Sally’s hand darted toward the plate in front of her. She grinned at Molly. “Dylan’s tall, dark and handsome. Half the single women in Bozeman will be carving a path to his front door once you’ve helped him sort his touching issues out.”

Annie’s temperature went from hot to cold in less time than it took Sally to eat her caramel bar. Half the single women in Bozeman accounted for a lot of women. Dylan could become the center of everyone’s attention. The thought wasn’t all that appealing.

“I’m sure he’ll survive,” Molly said. “But from the look of your face, Annie, I don’t think you will?”

Annie plastered a smile on her face. “Dylan can date anyone he wants to. It’s not as if he’s my boyfriend or anything.”

“What is he, exactly?” Sally asked.

Annie didn’t want to go anywhere near the answer to that question. “My landlord.”

Max heaved a big doggy breath in the silent room.

Molly picked up her coffee mug and pointed to the list in front of Annie. “You need to add another line…”

Annie picked up her pen and frowned. “What have I forgotten?”

“Working out how you feel about Dylan. It might help both of you.”

Annie dropped her pen. “I already know how I feel about him. We’re friends. Kind of.” Molly looked so closely at Annie that it made her uncomfortable. “He’s coming to the wedding with me as an experiment.”

“Is that a bakery term for a date?” Sally asked.

Annie crossed her arms in front of her chest. “It’s not a date.”

Sally shrugged her shoulders. “It doesn’t matter what you call it, really. The big question is what are you going to wear?”

And that, Annie decided, was so much better than talking about Dylan.

***

Dylan tugged at his tie. He’d picked Annie up from her apartment and met Logan and Tess at the Holy Rosary Church. By the time Sally and Molly joined them, he’d almost relaxed into wedding guest mode.

He didn’t mind weddings, sometimes he even enjoyed them. He’d been to enough of them not to worry about the sideways glances from family and friends, wondering when his turn for matrimonial bliss would arrive.

He’d even managed not to run in the opposite direction when a well-meaning relative had once asked him to dance. He had a standard line of excuses, reasons why he couldn’t dance with anyone.

But for now, he was safe. The dancing part of this wedding wouldn’t come until later. He wouldn’t have any relatives watching him, and no one in his family knew about Annie.

In the next few minutes, Holly Fraser would marry Richard Davis. Her six sisters, wearing dresses from The Bridesmaids Club, were standing beside her at the front of the church. The rainbow of colorful silk and satin dresses was unexpected, different to the standard sameness of most weddings he’d been to. He liked what Annie and her friends were doing in The Bridesmaids Club, the difference they were making in people’s lives.

Annie nudged his arm. “What do you think about Holly’s dress?”

He watched Holly turn to Richard and hold his hands. They were about to exchange wedding rings and pledge their unending love for each other. He couldn’t have given the same promise at their age. They looked so young, so sure that everything would end in happily-ever-after. He knew from personal experience that life had more potholes than plain sailing. Sometimes it was hard enough standing on your own two feet without supporting someone else.

He felt Annie’s eyes on him and he focused on Holly. The skirt of her wedding dress was big and puffy, with little sparkly beads sewn everywhere. “It looks good on her.” And he meant it. Holly was tiny, so small that she looked as though she’d get trampled in a crowd. But he’d seen the grin she’d sent her groom-to-be. Richard had smiled back in a shy, determined way that spoke volumes for how he felt about his bride. Dylan had a feeling that nothing would happen to Holly while her husband was beside her.

Annie nudged his arm again. He bent his head and wondered if the people behind them were getting annoyed. Annie couldn’t sit in one place for longer than five minutes without talking or fidgeting.

“That’s one of our dresses too,” she whispered.

“I didn’t know you had bride’s dresses?”

“We’ve got everything,” Annie whispered. “Lots of everything.”

Dylan knew space was already at a premium in the loft above Logan’s garage. The number of dresses in The Bridesmaids Club had grown beyond what any of Annie’s friends had thought would happen. Pre-loved dresses arrived most weeks, filling the clothing racks faster than they could find homes for them.

With the final words of the service finished and the marriage license signed, there was only one thing left to do. Richard Davis kissed his young bride tenderly on the lips. Dylan felt Annie tense beside him. She looked inside the tote bag she’d brought with her, pulled out a handful of tissues and blew her nose.

“You okay?” he asked as the Church organist pounded out the opening notes of the last song.

Annie looked up. Her big blue eyes shone with tears. “I’m fine.”

“Are you sure? You don’t look it.”

She nodded her head once. “I’m sure.”

Dylan frowned, but decided not to ask what was going on. After her unhappy marriage, he had a pretty good idea about why she had tears in her eyes. Disappointment and grief did that to a person. Sometimes those feelings snuck up on you so fast that the only way out was through tears or anger. The best you could do was hold on to what was real, let the moment pass and wait for the next moment to arrive.

He watched Holly and Richard walk down the aisle. Their bridesmaids and groomsmen followed behind, smiling and waving at the people they knew. He tried to remember a time when he’d felt that kind of happiness. It wasn’t easy.

“That was lovely,” Molly said from beside Annie. “Why do I suddenly feel so old?”

Sally leaned forward and grinned at Molly. “It could be because Holly’s only seventeen.”

Molly lifted her camera to her eyes and snapped a photo of Holly’s parents. “You’re probably right. I was still at school when I was seventeen. I hadn’t even dated all that much.”

Dylan tried to remember what he’d been like when he was seventeen. He definitely hadn’t been ready to get married. Dating, on the other hand, had been a different story.

Logan and Tess were the first to leave their seats. “Is everyone going to stay for a cup of coffee or go straight to Holly’s parent’s house for the reception?”

Annie looked at Dylan. “What would you like to do?”

He didn’t think arriving early at Holly’s parent’s home would work, especially if someone decided to turn the music on. “Why don’t we stay here for a while?”

“Okay.” Annie looked at Tess and Logan. “We’ll stay.” She picked up her bag and slung the strap over her shoulder. “If there are too many people in the foyer, we can stand outside.”

Dylan could already hear the noise from two sets of families and friends as they celebrated Holly and Richard’s marriage. A small wedding wasn’t an option when there were nine siblings in one family and seven in the other. He didn’t think families came in super-sized editions anymore, but he’d been wrong. He thought it was hard being the brother of three sisters. Six would have driven him insane.

When he arrived in the entrance foyer, Dylan’s heart kicked into overdrive. People were standing shoulder to shoulder, talking loudly over the top of each other. He felt a small hand slip into his. He looked down at Annie and she smiled.

“Let’s go.” She led him through the crowd, only stopping after they’d walked through the big glass entrance doors. Someone had already opened them, almost as though they’d known the foyer wouldn’t be big enough for all of the people at the wedding.

Annie sat down on the Church steps and rearranged the skirt of her dress around her knees. “When everyone’s got a cup of coffee and something to eat we can go back and get one for ourselves.”

“Thank goodness you decided to come outside.” Sally stood beside Dylan. “My ears were ringing and I’d only been inside for a few minutes.”

Annie looked behind Sally. “Where’s everyone else?”

“Molly saw someone she knows and Logan and Tess have gone to get us all a coffee and slice of cake. They could be a while.” Sally looked down at the Church steps. “I’m going to join you. My heels are killing me.”

Dylan looked at Sally’s shoes. The yellow high heels would have made anyone’s feet sore. He looked at Annie. She’d swapped her standard sneakers for a pair of silver sandals. The red polish on her toes matched the bright red dress she had on. She looked cute. With her pixie hairstyle and light dusting of makeup, she could have passed for a woodland nymph, or a fairy princess, or something even more interesting, but he wasn’t going there.

Annie pulled her feet under her skirt. “I don’t like high heels.”

“I’m glad.” Dylan slowly lowered himself onto the concrete step beside her. His ribs were still sore, a reminder of his stupidity. Going head-to-head against someone bigger and meaner hadn’t been a good idea. Especially when the guy in question had another three friends waiting to finish off what the first Neanderthal couldn’t manage.

Annie watched him with a steady gaze, but didn’t say anything. She knew his ribs were still giving him trouble. He liked her even more for not saying anything.

Sally slid her feet out of her offending shoes and sighed. “When do you move into your new home, Dylan?”

He blinked and tried to work out how they’d gone from high heels to moving house without anything in-between. “How do you know I’ve bought a house?”

“Your realtor is friends with another friend of mine. Rachel said you bought the Quinn home on Morning Sun Drive.”

Dylan nodded. He’d forgotten how interesting the strangest things could be in a small town. “The moving company is taking my furniture across on Friday. I’m taking a few boxes into the new house each day to make unpacking easier.”

He glanced at Annie and knew exactly what she was thinking. “I intend to unpack everything.”

Her grin grew wider and he smiled back.

Sally cleared her throat and a blush skimmed Annie’s cheeks. Dylan didn’t know what that meant, but Annie didn’t look too impressed.

Sally ignored Annie’s red face and pulled her cell phone out of her pocket. “You wouldn’t be interested in fostering a litter of kittens would you? We can’t keep up with the number of animals arriving at the shelter.” She turned her phone toward him and showed him a picture of three of the ugliest looking kittens he’d ever seen.

They were a motley splodge of brown, tan and orange. As Sally scrolled through the images, he began to appreciate how weird genetics could be. Apart from their coloring, they all had completely different markings.

Sally finished showing him the photos and smiled. “What do you think?”

The only thing he knew for certain was that they were too young to be away from their mama. “How old are they?”

“Six weeks. They were born at the shelter.”

“What happened to their mother?”

Sally sighed. “She got sick and died. We’ve been hand feeding the kittens for the last two weeks. They’re in good health, they just look a little…”

“Ugly?” he offered.

“…different,” Sally said with a grin. “Different is good. They’re unique. You’ll never find three kittens who look like these ones do.”

Dylan believed her.

“Can I see them?” Annie asked.

Dylan shook his head. “You don’t want to do that. Sally will convince you to take them home and you’ll end up with them meowing in your laundry all night.”

“No, I won’t.” Annie held her hand out. “You’re the one Sally asked to be their foster daddy.”