Page 3 of How to Ruin a Wedding

He raises a thick brow. “Not at all.” I realize his voice is that of my savior from earlier. “Do you have an explanation for the first part of my question?”

I make a show of looking around. “Funny, I didn’t hear any question marks.”

He tilts his head, his full lips, with a sharply pointed Cupid’s bow, pulling up. “They were more like statements, you’re right. I just thought if I said them, you’d answer.”

“Well, I’m not a mind reader. If you have a question, you should ask it.”

I blink as the scent of mango and sandalwood encircles me. “Okay, stranger, why were you hiding under the bushes?”

“I don’t know you. I don’t have to tell you anything.”

Amusement glimmers in his gaze, which travels up and down my body, and it takes all my self-control not to shift my weight or fidget. Usually, I have so much restraint over myself, but being caught like this is disorienting.

His thickly lashed eyes, the hazel that changes color depending on the way the light hits them, narrow on me. “You’re right again.” I’m sure he broke his nose during childhood, the way it crooks at an angle slightly. “But I saw you when I first walked through, and my curiosity is more than piqued.”

I’m well aware the curiosity is more about my actions than me, but the way he says it, softer, sexier, sends ripples of awareness down my spine. Suddenly, I remember just how long it’s been since I had sex, since I had a man speak to me with his gaze piercing me into place.

Just as suddenly, I realize what he said.

“If you saw me earlier, why didn’t you say anything?” I cock my head to the side. “You knew it was me sneezing, not an animal.”

“I’m no snitch,” he says, and his smile is too infectious for me not to mirror.

“Well, I’m not a threat, stranger. No need to call security, and thanks for keeping my hiding place a secret.” I step away, trying to make a break for it. He’s already seen my real hair under the wig and already has too much attention on me when I’m supposed to maintain a semblance of anonymity while wedding wrecking. After a job, if yousaw me again, you might recognize me vaguely, but you’d never be able to give an accurate description to an artist. Whether I’m contouring my face, sculpting a sharper shape from my soft features, paling out my tan complexion, covering my freckles, plopping colored contacts over my brown eyes, or wearing crooked glasses, I always put in effort to look far removed from my actual appearance.

There’s only a slim chance someone will recognize me while ruining a relationship, but I prefer to make the margin even smaller. It’s not something I want my own circle of vastly more successful marketing peers and honor-roll college graduates to know about. As much as it feels good helping, wedding wrecking’s not supposed to be my forever career path; it’s just something I stumbled into five months ago, right after I lost my job.

Even though my curiosity wants me to stick around a bit, it’s better I skedaddle while I can.

He steps toward me. “I can’t even get your name?”

“I’d only give you a fake one.”

His chuckle is stormy and sexy, eliciting spots of warmth throughout my body, and the butterflies that have been long asleep flutter with anticipation. The way his appearance seems mysterious, but his eyes are alight with harmless mischief, is stimulating too many forgotten hormonal responses from me.

Love steals your logic, but lust steals your self-preservation.

“You’re only making me want to know more,” he says, his gaze traveling lazily up my body, and my legs actually buckle. All right, seriously, I’ve got to get out of here.

“Sorry,” I say, placing much-needed space between us. “Someone’s calling for me.”

Another amused sound escapes his throat. “I don’t hear anything.”

“Coming!” I shout to the sky, and with no other options, I literally and metaphorically run away, as fast as my heels can take me.

When I make it back to my room—after showering and popping some Claritin—I remove the three missed notifications from Taina, who’s house-sitting for me since I promised to check in on my neighbor’s cat while she was away before I got this job.

I open my camera roll and pull up the video I threw out my dignity for to send to Jennie.

The Birds are in center view, angled slightly toward each other, as if they’re in a romance poster. This could be it, what Jennie needs to save Eliza. I crank up the volume, hit play, and—

I rewind and try again.

I stare at the screen, the silence echoing in my skull.

My finger must have been on the speaker. The only noise is the occasional rustle of movement when I inch closer.

This isn’t good enough. I can’t send this to Jennie. It’s basically a silent film.