Wedding Party Collection: Once A Bridesmaid...: Here Comes the Bridesmaid / Falling for the Bridesmaid

‘Is it? I’m offering to give up a piece of a past I never really had—the bike. In return, you give up something you can’t accept is past its use-by date—your sister’s two-year hold over you.’

‘She doesn’t have a hold over me.’

‘If she didn’t have a hold over you the four times thing wouldn’t exist. So—my bike for going where no man has gone before and risking the magic number four.’

‘No.’

‘Then take the alternative option and change your name. You said it might be a way of moving on, so do it. Move on, Sunshine, one way or the other.’

‘I...I don’t know,’ she said, agonised.

‘Take some time and think about it,’ he said. ‘But not too long. Because—in case you haven’t quite figured me out yet—I don’t wait for what I want. I just go out and get it. Even if I have to steal it.’

‘You don’t really want me.’

‘I’m like an immortal lobster—who really knows? Let’s get to number four and see.’

‘Well, you can’t steal me.’

‘Don’t bet on it, sweetheart. I’ve spent my life getting my own way. And I can take things from you that you never knew you had.’

She located her obi and whipped it up off the floor. ‘That’s not even worth a response.’

Leo just smiled and started pulling on his boots.

She tried, twice, to tie the sash, but her fingers were clumsy.

And Leo’s hands were suddenly there—capable, efficient, tying it easily.

‘Thank you,’ she said stiffly when he had finished, and flicked her hair over her shoulders. ‘I’ll see you out.’

She walked Leo to the apartment door. ‘So!’ she said. ‘I’ll email you about...about the clothes for the wedding and a few other things. And then... Well...’

‘And then...well...?’ Leo repeated, looking a little too wolfish and a lot too jaunty for a man who was waiting for an answer about sex that could, should—no, would!—go against him. And then he leant down and kissed her quickly on the mouth.

She jumped back as though he’d scalded her.

‘It’s just a stolen kiss, Sunshine,’ he murmured. ‘Think of the calories.’

* * *

Sunshine stared into the darkness long after returning to bed.

Leo would give up his motorbike.

Into her head popped an image of Moonbeam—laughing as they left the party that night. Giving a wild shout as she started the bike. Zooming off with Sunshine on the back, gripping her tightly.

And then darkness. And that feeling. Waking up in hospital and knowing, without needing to be told, that Moonbeam was gone. She never wanted to experience that desolating ache again.

Leo didn’t understand what it would do to her if something happened to him. And that said it all, didn’t it? She’d only known him for one week, and already she was terrified that something would happen to him.

What a conundrum. She could get him to give up his bike if she slept with him twice more. But if she slept with him twice more she would be getting dangerously close to him. And she couldn’t risk that.

Or...

She could get him to give up his bike if she changed her name. And she just wasn’t sure what that would mean. Maybe it would help her accept Moon’s death. But maybe it would be a betrayal—taking a twins’ decision and making it a solo decision. Moving on when Moon couldn’t.

And did anything matter more than keeping Leo safe?

Sunshine threw off the covers—what a restless night this was turning out to be!—and yanked on her kimono, leaving it fluttering as she raced from the room and into her office.

There, on the high-gloss blue bureau, was her sister. Her sister, who had wanted her ashes to be scattered at a beach under a full moon.

Instead here she was. Beautifully housed in a stunning antique cloisonné urn featuring all the colours of the rainbow.

But an urn—no matter how beautiful—wasn’t the ocean.

And the ocean was where Moonbeam belonged.

* * *

Leo stared into the darkness, thinking about the simple pleasure of touch.

It didn’t take a psychologist to work out what his issue was—the fact that his parents had never touched him the way other parents touched their children. Because there had been more important things to do than give their son the affection he craved. Like shoot up. Suck in the crack. Snort up the meth.

It had been different for Caleb, because Leo had made it so. Leo had looked after Caleb, put his needs first, fought his battles, protected him. And so Caleb wasn’t reserved, wary, driven, and damaged—like Leo. Caleb attracted affection and gentleness and love. Leo attracted people like Natalie, for whom his remoteness was a challenge and his celebrity something to use.

‘You’re choosing wrong,’ Sunshine had said—but what if he was choosing right and he was getting exactly what he deserved?

It wasn’t as if he could choose Sunshine Smart as an alternative. She didn’t want to be chosen by anyone.

So why he was offering to give up his motorbike for her was a mystery.

So what if he never had sex with her again?

So what if she went on grieving for her sister for the rest of the life?

Leo punched his pillow. Forced his eyes closed.

And there she was, warning him about her scars. So beautiful. And damaged, like him. But wanting to stay damaged—unlike him.

His eyes popped open and he punched the pillow again.

God, but she irked him.

Her perkiness irked him. Partly because he wanted to think that it made her shallow...and yet she’d learned the Heimlich manoeuvre and wasn’t afraid to use it.

The way she chucked crazy facts into her arguments—about the sexual habits of praying mantises, the questionable immortality of lobsters, regenerating livers, and so on and on and on—irked him. Because most of the time that stuff was fascinating. And even if it wasn’t, it was fascinating to watch those unique eyes glow with the wonder of it.