Page 104 of Gravity of Love
She turned to Zee, lowering her voice. “Can you do me a favor?”
He cocked his head, instantly shifting into bestie/accomplice mode. “Anything.”
“If anyone asks, I had a migraine coming on and needed to lie down.”
Zion gazed at her for a long, meaningful second, most likely trying to suss out if a migraine was indeed impending—spoiler alert: it was not—before he nodded solemnly. “Migraine. I’ll even throw in my best fake sympathy face and say you stuck it out as long as you could.”
She lifted up on her toes and kissed his cheek. “Love you.”
He looked her up and down, mischief gleaming in his eyes. “Just to be clear, you are?—”
“Going to find Liam? Yes.”
Zee grinned, slow and sly. “Go get your man, Mouse.”
With a last fortifying sip of the final few gulps of her drink and a deep inhale of the heady, sugar-and-citrus air, she set her glass on a table and began weaving her way toward the side exit.
She knew that the wedding party was ‘supposed’ to stay in the cabins, but Liam wasn’t really big on doing what he wassupposedto do. She pulled out her phone from her pocket, the fact that her dress had pockets was one of her favorite parts of the day, to call him and saw that she didn’t have any service.Shit.
On the walk to the parking lot to grab a ride with one of the drivers Dr. Sterling hired, she felt light taps on her head. Surrounded by gorgeous Jeffrey pines that populated the mountain resort, she assumed they were stray seed cones. By the time she’d made the short walk down the lit path, the tiny tapshad developed into heavy thuds, and the ground beneath her was slick with raindrops.
She was steps away from the hired Cadillac Escalade when out of the corner of her eye, she saw Liam’s Range Rover in the parking lot. He was still on site, there was no way he’d leave without his ride. The wedding party all had cabins, but Liam had made it clear he had no interest in using his. Maybe he’d changed his mind. She figured she’d try there first. If she struck out, she’d expand her search to other buildings on the grounds. If shestillcouldn’t find him, then she’d go to Plan C…after she came up with one.
29
Liam steppedout of the shower into a cloud of steam, the rivulets of water tracing down his skin as he reached for a towel and scrubbed it over his face and hair. He hadn’t fully realized what a circus the night would become when he’d agreed to come to Hope Falls’ version ofMy Big Fat Greek Wedding. Maybe he should’ve, he’d heard Frankie talk about her family gatherings, but hearing about the legend that was the Costas Clan and experiencing them were two different things. He was fairly certain only experience could have prepared him for the evening’s trajectory.
He patted his face dry and frowned at the bright red patch of fresh blood on the white terry cloth towel. His hand swiped the frosted mirror. He leaned forward to get a better look at the bridge of his nose, which had had an up close and personal meeting with Aunt Joanna’s fist. He’d committed the mortal sin of attempting to steady Athena, one of Frankie’s cousin’s, on the dance floor when she was, at least, four drinks past her limit. His efforts were rewarded with her projectile vomiting all over his chest and torso, which Aunt Joanna slipped in, resulting in what Liam was coining her Three Stooges arm flail. Her windmillembodied Larry, Moe, and Curly, and she nailed him with a left hook that would’ve made Joe Frazier proud.
The real agony of the evening had nothing to do with bloody noses or ruined dress shirts. What made Liam’s ribs ache—literally, as if a heavy object pressed against them—was how close he came to breaking every rule of decency and family loyalty. How many times had he caught himself reaching for Frankie whenever she was within arm’s length? How many times had he watched her through the thicket of gowns and black ties, just to catch a brief glimpse of her eyes to see if she was looking at him the way she did when they were alone? It was a kind of torment he’d never experienced, not even in med school, not in the military, not even in residency when fellow students joked that they were being pushed to their mental, physical, and emotional limits and likened their sleep deprivation to waterboarding and other forms of torture.
He’d deluded himself into believing that he and Frankie could just be “normal” around each other. That he could stand across from her at the altar, walk down the aisle with her after his father kissed his bride, be next to her to take photos, or seated beside her as they toasted the newlyweds without feeling like a live wire of electricity in a rainstorm buzzed between them.
How naïve could he be?
The wedding had been a procession of near misses. The way Frankie’s shoulder brushed his as they lined up for the wedding party photos. The melodic tinkling of her laughter across the table during the dinner, like wind chimes during a blustery day. The moment she nearly dropped the champagne flute, and, in the half-second of chaos, he’d caught her wrist and steadied her, only for him to freeze and look away because the alternative was too dangerous.
He couldn’t permit himself to be close to her for more than a handful of seconds, and yet every primal instinct in his body wasdriving him to be as near her as physically possible, to make her laugh so hard her head fell back so he could press his lips to the hollow beneath her ear and say something that would make her blush and swat his arm and then kiss him with the same fire she had in her eyes.
Liam had spent the last three hours clenching his jaw, counting backward from a hundred, and pretending he was fine. He wasnotfine. He was the exact opposite of fine, actually, and every time he caught a whiff of her perfume or heard her voice from across the room, it was like being stabbed with a very tiny, very sharp knife. Watching her after the cake was cut as she licked the frosting off her lips, it was pure torment not being able to walk over and kiss her. As much as he wasn’t a fan of getting punched, it had been a relief to have an excuse to leave the wedding early.
It was obscene how much he missed her when she was right next to him. It was also obscene how close he was getting to not caring if he caused a family scandal. Because this was supposed to be his dad’s and Frankie’s mom’s day, not a crucible for his own bad decisions. He’d gone along with pretending Tristan and Frankie were still engaged. He’d stayed silently on the sidelines because it was important to her to keep whatever was between them a secret, at least for now.
And now there was Zion. He still didn’t know what the story was there, and honestly, he didn’t give a shit, not until Frankie told him otherwise. As far as he knew, they’d only ever just been friends. No matter what anyone told him, he couldn’t believe that she’d gone from his bed, telling him that she loved him, to being in a full-blown relationship with another man by the afternoon.
As he continued to dry off, he could hear the patter of rain getting louder outside, the kind that slicked the pine needles and turned the gravel driveway to mud. It had been drizzling whenhe made the trek from the hall to the cabin nearly thirty minutes ago, but now it sounded like it was really coming down.
He hadn’t planned to use the cabin his dad had reserved for him at all tonight. But after being puked on, he decided to come and get cleaned up so his Range Rover didn’t stink like vomit for the foreseeable future. His clothes were getting dry cleaned by the resort. He’d grabbed his duffle bag out of his SUV. That was one benefit of being a doctor, he typically had a change of clothes with him as well as toiletries.
Now, standing in the humidity of the bathroom, he wondered if he was actually losing his mind. He’d spent the last half hour replaying the night on a loop, scrutinizing every look, every word he’d shared with Frankie, and he felt the urge to drive his fist through the drywall. He resisted, barely. Kept a polite distance. He exhaled, a long, shaky breath, as he popped the top off of his Degree deodorant and spread it under his arms.
As he set the stick back down, a sharp, insistent knock at the door made him jerk his head to the side. His clothes were being delivered to his house, so the only person it could be was Poppy, possibly annoyed that he’d left the festivities early, or maybe worried about the graphic bodily fluid mess he’d been involved in and upset she’d had to have heard about it secondhand. The offense occurred when she was talking to Frankie and Zion, so he hadn’t spoken to her before he left. He’d told AJ to let her know he was leaving, and AJ had offered to drive her home, which he assumed she’d be happy about. Hell, he was basically being her wingman, or wing-brother.
Still, Poppy wasn’t exactly the poster child for emotional stability, and Liam could already imagine her barreling into the cabin, demanding to know if he was okay and making sure his nose was not broken. She did tend to be overprotective of him despitehimbeing the older brother.
With a sigh, he ran a hand through his damp hair, wrapped the towel tighter around his waist, and started for the door. Before he made it two steps, the knock came again, harder this time, rattling the window beside the front entry.
He unlocked and swung open the door, fully expecting to see Poppy’s small, furious face. Instead, he found himself blinking down at Frankie, standing on the porch with her arm lifted to pound on the door once more, fingers clenched in a fist, and knuckles white. Her eye makeup was smudged to a smoky haze, causing her to somehow look ridiculously beautiful and slightly unhinged.
