Page 37 of Wedding Bet

“Oh, no,” she said. “Only good things, I hope? Did he tell you I whooped his ass in that papercutting class?”

“Hey, it wasn’t a contest,” Jamie said, laughing.

His mom laughed. “I was faster, but yours were prettier,” she said. “Good to run into you, Jamie. And I’m glad to finally meet you, Landry.”

I wondered idly what Jamie had told his mom about me. There was something about the thought of Jamie talking about me that I enjoyed a little too much.

“How was the rehearsal dinner?” Jamie asked.

“Terrifying,” Adam said. “I wasn’t nervous until we actually started practicing, and then I realized I’m gettingmarriedtomorrow, and now everything feels so real. I don’t want to, you know, fuck it up.”

The rest of us laughed. “You’re going to rock it, you know.”

“He’s going to be amazing,” Chase said, taking Adam in his arms and pulling him close. “I’ve been trying to tell him that everything could go to shit tomorrow and I’d still love him more than anything in the world.”

“And I keep trying to tellhimthat I’m certain I’m going to fall over and break an ankle or something. I’m so clumsy when I’m nervous. Damn, that reminds me, we have to go pick up those envelopes from the front desk—”

“Nope! I grabbed ‘em,” Jamie’s mom said. “Come on over to my room, Adam, sweetheart. Oh, and Chase, I have your tie inthere, too. Sewed up the missing stitches for it. We can go over those final touches for the dances as well.”

Suddenly Adam and Chase were being led off to her room. Chase looked back at us and gave us a sympathetic glance.

“Sorry,” he mouthed before waving and walking off with his mom and husband-to-be.

“I love them,” I said, waving to Chase. “They are clearlysobusy this week.”

“I love them, too,” Jamie told me. “They’re perfect, but they don’t even realize it. And Mom is being so cute, getting all involved in helping out. She knows just the right amount of involvement to actually be helpful, and not be annoying.”

“She seems awesome.”

We headed over toward the bay of elevators and waited for one to come.

Jamie was giving me a look. “Kind of like how you’re awesome and don’t realize it?”

I snorted. “Far from it,” I said, pulling a deep breath in. “I will take you up on showing me those audio tracks, though. I need sleep tonight. Good sleep. I don’t want to feel like a zombie for the wedding.”

“I’ll show you my favorite one,” he said. “I often put it on to drown out the sound of my roommates fucking. Nicole can beveryvocal when her boyfriend’s in the mood.”

I laughed as the elevator doors swung open.

And when we looked inside, my heart skipped a beat.

Parker and his fiance were in the elevator.

I stepped to the side, giving them room to step out. “Evening, Parker.”

He waved a hand. “Oh, we’re not getting out. We’re coming up from the pub.”

I nodded and Jamie and I stepped into the elevator beside them. “Thought you hated the little downstairs pub?”

“For some reason myfianceliked it,” Parker said, giving him a little shove. “We hung out there tonight.”

Jamie cleared his throat, proudly reaching for my hand and squeezing it. “Landry and I had such a good night together, too. You’re so cute when you sing karaoke, baby.”

I got a thrill hearing Jamie call me that, even though I knew he was pretending.

“Landry doesn’t do karaoke,” Parker said, cutting Jamie a glance.

Jamie just shrugged, leaning against me. “He did tonight, when I asked him.”

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