Page 47 of Wedding Bet

I saw Landry’s expression change as he got out of bed. “It’ll be a beautiful ceremony.”

I bit the inside of my cheek. “Hey. If you start, you know, feeling like shit during the wedding or the reception, just come find me, if we get separated. Okay? I’ll be right there. I want you to be able to have a good time at the wedding.”

“You’re too sweet for this world,” he said, giving me a warm look. “Now go do what you need to do. I’ll be just fine.”

As I grabbed all of my stuff in my arm and bolted out the hallway, I heard Landry singing “A Whole New World” to himself.

God, I could get used to this, I thought as I made my way toward the front door.

Waking up next to him, seeing him all disheveled from sleep, and finding out that he sings songs when he’s happy in the morning. I’d half expected him to freak out and go cold on me, knowing that he usually pushed away intimacy.

But he hadn’t turned away from being close with me at all. He’d wanted it. If mornings like today could actually be a part of my life…

It was a useless thought, knowing who Landry was, but as far as mornings went, it was a pretty good one, even with the late wake-up.

I pushed open the front door and a split second later, the door directly across from Landry’s opened into the hallway.

And I found myself staring right into my brother’s eyes.

Shit. So much for getting out of Landry’s room without seeing anyone.

“Chase,” I said, my eyes flying wide. “Good morning!”

“Jamie,” he said before narrowing his eyes. “Wait, Jamie? Isn’t that Landry’s suite?”

I cleared my throat, feeling my cheeks flush with heat.

What was I supposed to say?

We spent the whole night together, and it was one of the most magical nights of my life, and I’m pretty sure I’d fall for him if he wanted anything to do with real relationships?

The truth was too much. But I’d been caught, red-handed.

“What are you doing up here?” I asked, trying to deflect. “Didn’t the guys’ brunch start thirty minutes ago?”

“I just came up here to grab my phone charger,” Chase said, holding up a cord. “Got to give it some juice.”

I nodded slowly. “Right, right. Well, um, I got up earlier—wayearlier, and took a shower this morning. In my own room. Obviously. But, I came uphere, and then I was asking Landry for some help with the florist delivery.” I cleared my throat. “Figured I could use an extra hand.”

God, I was a terrible liar.

Nearly incapable of it, really.

I planned on having a good, long video call with Chase sometime long after the festivities had died down, and eventually I’d explain everything. My weird attraction to Landry. The strange little connection we’d had.

But today was Chase’s wedding day, and I wasn’t about to get into all of that now. After we’d all left the ski resort, and I’d been back home in California for a while, I was sure that all of my feelings about Landry would die down and be nothing but a distant memory. It could be a funny anecdote, one day.

“I gotcha,” Chase said. His expression looked different than usual, but I couldn’t figure out if it was because I’d come out of Landry’s room, or something else entirely.

“You ready for the big day?” I asked my brother as we shared the elevator down toward my own floor.

Chase was pulling at a thread on his pants, and chewing on the inside of his cheek.

Shit.

Hewas the nervous one.

Chase reached out to gently grab my arm. I turned back around to look at him, and now the look on his face was one of sheer terror.