“You’ve got some serious explaining to do, then, because I just got a text from Willow. She called that number on your phone, and a girl named Jill Vick answered. She was at Live Bay. Willow could hear Jackdown playing in the background. When she asked her how she knew Preston Drake, the girl hung up on her,” Marcus said, not sounding as angry, but more like he needed proof.
“Does Manda think I’ve cheated on her?” I asked, looking at the three of them.
“Of course she does! She’s a f**king mess!” Marcus replied, raising his voice again like he was about to go off. This all made sense now. Amanda . . . I had to get to her. Holy f**k. She’d be crushed.
“I gotta go talk to Manda. Now,” I said, stalking past them.
“NO! You’re going to Live Bay with us first. We’re finding this Jill Vick and figuring out why the hell her name is in your phone under ‘Greg,’” Marcus said, reaching out and grabbing my arm.
I loved the guy, but he was not going to make me let Amanda think for one more goddamn minute that I had cheated on her. Fuck that! “I. AM. GOING. TO. AMANDA.”
“Okay, look. I’ll go to Live Bay with you,” Dewayne told Marcus. “I know you’re angry because Amanda is so torn up, but he needs to get to her to fix this. She needs him to fix this. We will go figure out who the hell Jill Vick is.”
I pulled free of Marcus and ran to my Jeep. When I jerked open my door, I remembered where I had heard that name before. “Jill Vick is that brunette at Live Bay with the big fake tits and the pink tips in her hair. She’s been coming on to me for months. I just ignore her and she goes away.”
“I know her! You asked for another server last week because of her,” Dewayne said, snapping his fingers.
I nodded. “Yeah. That’s how I know her name. Rick told it to me when I went and asked him to keep her away from my table for the rest of my life.”
Amanda
“Hey,” Willow said, standing up when her phone rang and putting it to her ear. “He didn’t. I knew he didn’t. . . . Stop it, Marcus. . . . You’re too emotional about this. Calm down. Do Dewayne and Rock believe him?” She was pacing back and forth, and I was hanging on her every word. “See! They believe him. . . . I’m only staying until she tells me to leave. I won’t stay here until I hear from you if she wants me to go.” Willow looked at me and rolled her eyes. “Go figure this out and leave us alone. She’s going to be fine. He’s telling the truth. You know in your gut he is. . . . Love you, too,” she said, then hung up.
“Preston is on his way here. Marcus said he’s desperate to get to you. He swears he’s never touched anyone. And Jill Vick is the waitress at Live Bay with the pink tips in her hair, who Preston asked Rick to move from his table last week. Apparently, she was flirting with him.”
I remembered her. She had really big boobs. I was jealous, and Preston got pissed when she wouldn’t take a hint. I didn’t know he’d had Rick move her, though. “She kept showing Preston her cle**age, or trying to. He wouldn’t look at her, and he kept pulling me closer to him until he was behind me, wrapping his arms around me. But I have big-boob envy, and hers made me feel self-conscious.”
Willow sat down beside me and patted my knee. “I think we have a case of someone setting Preston up. He’s on his way right now. When he gets here, do you want me to stay or go?”
I didn’t want to talk about all this in front of my sister-in-law. “You can go,” I told her. “Thank you for coming, though.”
She nodded. “It ain’t over yet. If Marcus doesn’t get some proof, he’s going for Preston’s throat. Dewayne and Rock are still with Marcus, though, so they should keep your fiancée alive and your brother out of prison.”
If she wasn’t being serious, I would have laughed.
The door to our apartment flew open. “Manda!” Preston called out.
“He’s here,” Willow said, then stood up. “I’ll let y’all talk.”
Willow was walking to the bedroom door when Preston called my name again, sounding panicked.
“She’s in here,” Willow replied, and just as she walked out, Preston came barreling in, looking like a man on a mission.
“Swear to God I have no idea how that number got in my phone, and I’d never, ever f**king ever touch anyone but you,” Preston swore, wrapping his arms around me and pulling me up. “I don’t f**king know that bitch. I just know that’s what Rick called her when I asked him to keep her the hell away from me. She got to my phone somehow. I’ll figure it out, but I need you to believe me. Never, baby. God, I would never do that to you.”
The desperation in his voice as he held me so tightly that it was hard to breathe was all I needed. He was telling me the truth. This was the man I knew. The one who loved me. The one I trusted with my life. My happiness.
He was mine.
“I believe you,” I said, reaching up to touch his long blond locks. “But I can’t breathe.”
His arms loosened a little, and he continued to stand there breathing hard. “Swear to God,” he said again.
“I know,” I assured him.
He was rocking me now as we stood there. I could feel his heart slamming against his chest. This had scared him. All my pain was now replaced with sympathy for him.
“Did Marcus touch you?” I asked, trying to pull back to look more closely at his face, but he wouldn’t give an inch. He buried his face in my neck.
“No. But only because Dewayne and Rock held him back while he yelled.”
“I’m sorry,” I said as I tried to calm him.
“Don’t apologize for this, Manda. This shit was because of me. Not you.” He finally eased back enough to kiss me softly. “Just you, pretty girl,” he said against my mouth.
“I know,” I assured him.
“Gonna marry you, pretty girl.”
I smiled at that reminder. “Yeah.”
“I need you now, pretty girl,” he said as he trailed kisses down my neck and started making quick work of my clothes. “Hate that you’ve been crying. I don’t want you to cry. I hate it. I want you smiling,” he said against my collarbone. “Only crying you need to do ever is my name when you come.”
“Mmmmm,” I agreed as his attention moved to my br**sts , which he was very happy with. He didn’t seem to mind their small size. He made me feel perfect and beautiful.
He was my one.
Preston
My phone had been swiped from the table last week, when I was dancing with Amanda while Rock went to get a beer. The waitress Rick had sent me was a friend of Jill’s, so she did the dirty work. Jill’s plan was to send naughty texts until either Amanda saw it or I called the number, and if I called, she was going to try to talk me into meeting up with her.
The other waitress had sung like a bird when Rick called all the waitresses into the office and asked about it. Jill was fired, and so was the waitress who had helped her.
Marcus no longer wanted to kill me, and we were now back to being happy about becoming family. Not that we weren’t family before. Dewayne, Rock, and Marcus had been my family since second grade.
I hadn’t been allowed to see Manda all day. All damn day. Willow said it was bad luck. I tried telling her that nothing about Manda was bad luck. Willow had laughed at me and gone back to guarding Manda.
The wedding pictures that could be taken without me seeing my bride had been taken, and we had one hour before the wedding started.
I wanted to see my pretty girl. I didn’t like waking up to find a note on the pillow explaining that Willow had come and taken her away in the middle of the night. I wasn’t liking my future sister-in-law very much right now.
“Where are you going?” Dewayne asked with a smirk when I turned down the hall of the chapel toward the bridal room.
“Exactly where you think I’m going,” I told him.
“Just got an hour. Can’t wait until then?” he asked, amused.
“You’re next. When you’re wanting to see Sienna and they won’t let you, you’re gonna need help. You cover for me and I’ll pay you back.”
Dewayne nodded, then chuckled. “Yeah, I got this. Go see your girl.”
That was an easy sale.
I ducked behind the corner when the door to Manda’s room opened. Willow said she needed to go check on Eli and she’d be back soon to help her. Smiling, I waited until Willow was out of sight and I made a run for it.
The knob turned and I slid inside the room, closing the door and locking it behind me.
Amanda sat with her back to me, wearing a white lacy bra and matching panties, and—God help me—she had on a frilly garter belt and thigh highs. Jesus . . .
I must have made a sound because Amanda spun around.
“Preston,” she said in a surprised whisper. Then she started giggling. “Willow will be furious.”
I could give a rat’s ass what Willow was gonna be. “Stand up,” I said as I took the three long strides that got me to my bride.
She stood up, and the shiny white heels I’d missed with all those other things—now I saw them.
“How the f**k am I gonna get through the ceremony knowing you look like that underneath?”
She shrugged playfully. “Maybe that’s why you weren’t supposed to see me.”
That was bullshit. I didn’t like that rule at all.
“Manda, you’re wearing a thong,” I said as her ass cheeks flashed me.
She nodded.
“Sit on that table,” I said, stalking her as she backed up and sat down on the table behind her.
“Now, pretty girl, spread those legs for me,” I demanded, and she did exactly as I told her.
“Put those heels up on the table, but keep those thighs open wide.”
My bride did just like she was told. Grinning, I went down on my knees, watching her face while I did it. She had known while I was telling her what to do exactly what I was planning on doing to her. She wanted it.
I had a naughty bride. “When my pretty girl walks down that aisle toward me wearing white, her thighs will be wet from my mouth,” I said, then pulled the thong aside and began tasting the sweetest candy in the world.
“Preston,” she moaned, reaching for my head. Her hands grabbed fistfuls of my hair. I glanced up at her—her knees up high, legs wide open, arms reaching down to hold my head between her thighs—and it was the most f**king erotic thing any groom had ever seen on his wedding day.
“Sweet pu**y,” I said with a smile, and she watched me with her mouth open. Those lips of hers had been perfectly painted the pink I’d helped her decide on. I wasn’t going to mess that up until I got to kiss her in front of everyone.
There was a knock at the door, and her eyes went wide as her attention shifted from me to the door.
“It’s locked,” I assured her.
“But—”
I didn’t give her a chance to stop me. I played dirty and began sucking on her cl*t like a lollipop.
Her eyes rolled back in her head, and she kept her hands on my head to hold me there.
“Yes, yes, yes, there, just . . . like . . . that,” she panted, then squealed as she tried to keep from being loud.
I lapped at her until she laughed and pushed me back.
Grinning up at her, I wiped my mouth on my sleeve and stood up.
“Don’t clean that up. I want to say my vows knowing how wet you are. That little slip of satin you’re calling panties is drenched. I like it.”
Amanda was gasping for breath.
“Oh, for GOD’S SAKE! Preston, you have the rest of your lives for that!” Willow called through the door.
Amanda started giggling again.
“I get to taste you all night,” I said, licking my lips. “Before the reception I’m gonna need to f**k my wife.”
She puckered her lips like she was thinking, then sighed. “I guess I can manage letting my sexy husband have his way with me before we go dance and celebrate.”
“That’s good to hear,” I said, then pressed a simple kiss to her nose so as not to mess up her makeup. “I’ll let you get dressed. See you in a few. I’ll be the handsome guy at the end of the aisle. Come get me.”
Amanda
Preston blew me a kiss, then opened the door and walked out.
“I can’t believe you,” Willow said to him as she walked past him into the room.
Preston shrugged, and Willow burst out laughing.
When she closed him out of the room, she turned to look at me. “I guess if a bride is going to have wild, hot sex with her groom minutes before the wedding, it would be Preston Drake’s bride,” she said, then shook her head and laughed again.
“I’d say I’m sorry I let him stay, but . . . I’d be lying.”
“I know you would. I walked up on the end of that and heard enough to know I didn’t want to stand too close to the door. I backed up and kept everyone else away. You can thank me later for saving your mother the horror of hearing you get off.”