Page 61 of This

As we gain distance, a wall of brothers surrounds Bentley.

“You can let me down,” I tell Dane, watching them go toward the cabins.

“No. I can’t.”

I sigh and wiggle in protest. “I won’t go after him, I swear.”

“Yeah,” he says, readjusting his arm to better cover my upper thighs, “but I might.”

My attempts to get down stop. If he needs to haul me off to keep from murdering my ex, I shouldn’t be difficult.

We reach the veranda where we ate, and he lowers me to the ground. In the patio lights, I see the bruise forming on his cheek.

“Keaton’s going to freak,” he says, stretching out his knuckles.

My stomach sinks. I didn’t think about what their fight would mean for tomorrow. Three members of the wedding party will have bruised faces with hundreds of pictures to be taken.

“You okay?” he asks.

I nod, forcing a smile. “Hope you don’t mind wearing cover-up.”

“Marco once messaged me that contouring would bring me to an all-new level of hot. About time I test his theory.” His mouth perks up, and my smile turns genuine.

When we stop at the suite, he grazes the pad of his thumb over my bottom lip before he bends down to kiss me. “We still on for the balcony later?”

“No, but you can text me when you’re at the door.”

He hands me my phone out of his pocket. “Better charge it. Otherwise, I’m Romeo-ing.”

Doubting he’ll hesitate if I don’t answer, I beeline for my charger when I get into the room.

Keaton marches out of her bedroom and smacks a stack of sticky notes on my forehead. “Of all days, Bennett Ross.”

I pluck them off, sorting through a list of reasons to panic that she de-escalated on her own. “I’m sorry.” I collapse onto the couch and toss the mini-mems onto the table on one end. “Bentley picked a fight with Dane.”

“What?” She pulls her feet up under her, sitting on the cushion beside me.

I wince, looking over at her. My best friend, ready to get married now having to deal with the results of someone else’s bullshit. “Ford has a black eye, Bentley has a split lip, and Dane’s cheek is going to bruise.”

Her face falls, and her throat bobs in a hard swallow. “Oh.”

It breaks my heart to see the tears welling in her eyes, and I pull her into a hug. “We’ll figure something out. Who knows? Maybe they won’t look so bad in the morning.”

“Yeah, Bennett.” Liam stands in the doorway, shaking his head with a look of disgust. “And maybe you won’t fuck anything else up between now and then.”

“Liam,” Keaton says, her tone short.

“You think it’s my fault?” A jolt of irritation spikes through me, and I push off the couch. “Bentley was being an ass.”

“Bentley is always an ass.”

Unarguable.

“So then, please enlighten me. How exactly am I to blame?”

“How?” Liam steps farther into the room, the usual joking undertone he carries with me gone. “Dane’s not the guy who lets someone like Bentley get to him. He knows who’s worth a fight and who’s not. At least, he did until you decided to play relationship with him.”

“Play relationship?” The words come out in a shocked breath, and I blink at him, more hurt than I’ll let on. “You think I’mplaying? I love him.”

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