What the hell am I doing here?
I let out a deep sigh and then check to make sure nobody noticed. This rehearsal dinner isn’t quite what I expected, even though my cousin Aubrey warned me that her fiancé and his brothers were…different.
Turns out that was the understatement of the year.
Nothing Aubrey told me could have prepared me for what I’m seeing, because the Beckett family and their friends are all wild.
Rowdy.
Even a little scary.
They drive motorcycles, pickup trucks, proudly sport tattoos and scars. And although this dinner is a happy occasion, as I sit here at the table, I can practically smell the testosterone in the air.
I know I don’t belong here, and so does anyone else who’s taken so much as a passing glance my way.
Even the women, the girlfriends and wives and friends of the Becketts, make you feel intimidated. They have big boobs and shiny hair, and they flaunt everything proudly.
I take a deep breath and try and remind myself that this is just one wedding. A couple of days to suck it up and then I can go back to my normal, slightly boring life, and forget that this other world even exists.
“You look like you could use a shot,” comes the smooth, masculine voice from just over my shoulder. Someone has approached me from behind. A large hand brushes through my field of vision and places a filled shot glass on the table in front of me.
I turn and find myself looking up at the most gorgeous pair of eyes I’ve ever seen, and a very arrogant smirk that says he knows it, too.
This is Jax Beckett, the dead-sexy middle brother. The guy who, three minutes into the rehearsal, was already working his charm on every bridesmaid in the lineup. In fact, I’m pretty sure I saw him stuffing a pair of black panties into his jeans pocket earlier.
Cousin Aubrey warned me that Jax was a handful, and now that he’s up close and personal with me, I can understand why. His charisma and self-confidence radiates from him like heat.
I can’t speak. I just sort of mumble something that sounds like “Thanks.”
“Are you gonna drink it?” he asks, chuckling. “Here, I’ll have one, too.” He holds his own shot out towards me.
Jax stands there, waiting for my response, showing off his lean and tight muscles, the dark jeans molded to him like a second skin, his goofy T-shirt bearing the image of a tux cummerbund and ruffles down the front but somehow looking absurdly good on his expansive chest. I don’t see any tattoos on him, but I’d bet anything he has something on his torso, maybe even his thigh. A little “surprise” for the ladies he beds, something that makes her feel like she’s sharing a secret with him. His dark blond hair is a little shaggy on top, his jaw clean-shaven.
Everything about this man screams sex.
“Fine,” I mutter, picking up the shot glass and sniffing it.
“To my big bro Smith, for getting lucky and finding his girl,” Jax says.
“Her name is Aubrey,” I remind him.
He grins wider. “I know her name, hon,” he winks, and then downs the shot.
I close my eyes and manage to get the burning liquid down my throat, and then when I open them again, Jax has already gone, vanished, back to his seat as if he was never even there.
The only proof I have is the empty shot glass on the table in front of me, and the tears streaming from my eyes, which I quickly wipe away.
This is crazy. I’m in a Quentin Tarantino movie, and my cousin is marrying into a family of bar owning bikers or something.
Sitting just down at the other end of the table from me, I have a good angle on Aubrey and her fiancé, Smith, and I can’t help staring at them now, watching them, trying to understand how this all even happened.
Did Aubrey lose her mind?
But then I watch as Smith leans over toward my cousin and sweeps a lock of hair from her face. His touch is so gentle, his eyes locked on her and so filled with passion, that my heart clenches in jealousy and sudden understanding of how Aubrey could fall for a man like him. He brushes a soft kiss on her lips, and she sighs against his mouth, her whole body arching toward him. They murmur quiet words to each other that I can’t hear from my end of the table.
I tear my gaze away from their intimacy. I’ve never had anyone look at me that way. Touch me like that. Make me feel like I’m the center of his universe. What would that feel like?
Yeah, I can see by their interaction why Aubrey is crazy in love. Why my cousin has such a glow about her that she’s never had before.
There’s a light tinkling sound near the far end of the table, and I glance over to see Jax rising with his slender wine glass in his hand, clanking it with a fork.
My heart gives a strange kick at his crooked smile to our group, and I push the reaction back in self-disgust.