Chapter 1
Daisy
Daisy rolled the coat rack out from behind her secondhand folding screen with the faux watercolor crane on it. Its wheels squeaked, as did the uneven floorboards as she positioned it roughly in the middle of her studio apartment. With her hands on her hips, Daisy gave the dresses that hung off it a glare, her nose wrinkled in disgust.
“You have so many,” Stephanie marveled enviously, sprawled out on Daisy’s unfolded futon. “I swear I’ve never seen half of those before.”
“They’re so cute,” Karen gushed, stroking the one on the far right.
Daisy’s shoulders slumped for a fraction of a second, but then she swung away from the offensive rack of flowery, sunshine-y, pastel, A-lines and tea dresses.
“Karen!” Stephanie chastised. “Daisy doesn’t want to be cute anymore.”
“Oh my gosh, I’m so sorry,” Karen apologized. “It’s just, they’re just so…” She trailed off helplessly, her eyes darting over to Stephanie for help.
Daisy heaved a sigh. “I know. They are cute.”
“And you hate them all,” Stephanie reiterated.
In her robe, with her hair already wrestled into a complicated braid crown, she stabbed a finger at the offensive dresses. “I am five-one with D cups, girls. I feel ridiculous in these. One, I’ve had most of them since I was nineteen, and I’m twenty-six. Two, they’re all little girl colors with flowers and bows and lace. And three… I hate every cute one of them!” She pulled off the cutest one and shook it at them. “Look at it! This isn’t me.”
Karen bit her lip and reached out to stroke the lace overlay.
“I totally get your feelings,” Stephanie said, firm and supportive.
“But?” Daisy prompted.
“But,” Stephanie said with an ominous shrug, “you’re not going to this reception as a guest, you’re going as one of the bridesmaids. What would you wear if not one of these bubbly, oh-my-gosh-it’s-your-special day dresses? Some skin-tight snakeskin printed sheath with your boobs up to your chin and four-inch stilettos? C’mon, Daisy.”
With a melodramatic groan, Daisy started to flop onto her futon, but pinwheeled her arms and screeched, catching herself before her updo was crushed by her big head.
“Wear this one,” Karen suggested as she held up a watermelon pink cotton poplin dress. “It has pockets!” she chirped, tugging open one of the hidden pockets.
Daisy squinted hatefully, but Stephanie had made a valid point. Tonight was not the right time or place to debut a newer, sophisticated look.
“Guess the hair will have to be enough,” she grumbled, then ducked behind the screen to wrestle her boobs into one of her sturdy bras, slip on a thong, and tug on the dress. “Zip me up?” she asked.
Once Stephanie had done up the zip, Daisy began rummaging through her jewelry.
“So,” Stephanie sighed, “how was the ceremony this morning?”
Daisy knew what Stephanie was really asking. The groom was Jamie Houston, Daisy’s ex-brother-in-law. They were still as close as siblings, even though Daisy and Tyler, Jamie’s younger brother, had separated four years ago. Tyler had moved to New York right after, and Daisy hadn’t seen him until the rehearsal dinner last night, so Stephanie was a good friend to ask.
“You know Tyler and I are fine,” Daisy reminded her as she did the clasp on a pearl necklace and then hooked on matching earrings.
Daisy wasn’t lying to them, or lying to herself either. After all, she’d been the one to ask Tyler to leave. Of course the end of her marriage had been tough; she and Tyler had gotten married when she was only nineteen and she’d thought it would be forever. But she and Tyler had grown up and grown apart, and she didn’t regret how it had all turned out.
“You don’t have to tiptoe around it,” she added.
“Maybe I just don’t understand how it’s not weird,” Stephanie said.
“It was weird—four years ago,” Daisy laughed.
Karen nodded sagely and handed Daisy a lipstick. “I get it. He hasn’t lived here since y’all split. It’s not like you had to see him all over the place or hear about him dating someone new from everyone in the county.”
“Exactly,” Daisy exclaimed, dashing on some mascara. “When we saw each other at the rehearsal dinner, it was more like seeing one of my best friend’s younger brothers who I haven’t seen in awhile. It wasn’t some devastating moment where I saw my ex. I’m not still stuck on him.”
“Okay, okay,” Stephanie finally caved with a grin. “I get it. You’re so mature.”
Daisy snickered as she pulled on her cream-colored heels. Then she went into her bathroom, where the world’s worst full-length mirror was hidden behind her robe. She tossed the robe onto her toilet seat and stepped back, examining herself.
“Good enough,” she decided.
“Ready to go?” Stephanie asked.
Daisy opened a can of wet food for her cat, Lempicka, dumping it into her bowl and mashing it up a little with a fork.
“Ready,” she said while she slung her purse over one shoulder. “Bye, Lempicka, be a good guard kitty!”
The three women clattered down the stairs of Daisy’s apartment complex and got into Karen’s car, the top forty station already cranked up. They sang as Karen drove over to Wild Harts, the restaurant owned by the bride, Leda Riveau, and her two brothers, where the reception would be.
“Y’all did a great job with the decorations,” Karen said in admiration as they pulled into the restaurant’s parking lot.
Admiring the extra lanterns and twinkle lights she, Leda’s friend Chase, and the Wild Harts staff had spent all day yesterday putting up on the building and around the parking lot, Daisy said with satisfaction, “Thank you. And thanks for the ride, too.”
“Of course, sweetie,” Karen said as Daisy hopped out. “Have a great night!”
Daisy bent over to wave at them. “Enjoy your movie.”
Daisy walked inside using the side door, which lead to the back where the kitchen, storage and office were, so that she could stash her purse.
Then she went out into the restaurant and couldn’t help but beam.
“Daisy, thank Jesus you’re here,” Jesse Riley, the bride’s best friend, practically bellowed. She plowed across the room, which was already three-quarters full of guests, and grabbed Daisy’s hand, dragging her towards the stage. “It’s picture time,” she groaned.
“Daisy!” everyone chorused when they got there.
“Hey, y’all,” she said happily, letting Jesse cram her into the front row.
When Leda Riveau had asked her to be a bridesmaid, she’d thought it was a trap. Leda was the jealous type and had yelled at Daisy until she was blue in the face a few months ago, just because Daisy had hugged Jamie, the groom.
Well, he had only been in his undies, not that Daisy had paid it any mind.
So, yeah, maybe Leda had asked her because Jamie wanted her to be a part of the wedding—and because she knew how to handle Jamie and Tyler’s difficult mother.
But Daisy had had a wonderful time getting to know Leda and her group of friends, who had been seniors when Daisy was a freshman back in high school, cool and rowdy. Now they were surrounding her, loud and happy and laughing, jostling each other. They tried to take some serious, formal shots, but the photographer gave up pretty quickly in favor of letting them mess around. Daisy, who had been a full-time artist up until recently, was sure that their giant smiles and long-standing camaraderie were easy to capture on film.
After the pictures were introductions, dinner, the first dance, and then the speeches, which made Daisy cry a little, her head resting on Jamie’s dad’s shoulder. “They’re so happy,” she hiccoughed.
“I know, Daisy,” he said, hugging her and rubbing her shoulder.
Once the toasts were done, the partying started in earnest.
Daisy wasn’t really much of a drinker, but it was a wedding and she was so happy for Jamie, Leda, and Jamie’s little boy, Hunter. So she had some champagne and danced with her friends and other guests, that wedding reception camaraderie turning everyone into best friends. They shouted while they danced to “Don’t Stop Believing” and “Marry You” like fiends, madly happy on behalf of the bride but also crazy jealous of the love she’d found.
Of course, weddings could make singlehood sting a little, so plenty of the other women were on the prowl. They evaluated all of single men except Tyler, in deference to his status as Daisy’s ex, which she appreciated.
But everyone else was fair game.
“He’s so hoooot,” one of them moaned.
Daisy followed her laser-beam-like eyes across the dance floor to the bar and definitely had to agree with her judgment: Dunk McCoy was so, so hot. He was the quintessential jock with a tall, broad body and slabs of bulgy muscles, a too-wide smile like a dog with its tongue hanging out, and dumb and twinkly light brown eyes.
“Oh my god,” she continued to moan, “like, seriously, he’s perfect.”
Dunk high-fived the bartender at that exact second.
“I did not hear that,” Chase, who was dating Dunk’s best friend, shouted, circling her pointer fingers around her ears to make the ‘you’re crazy’ gesture.
“Please. Look, even Daisy agrees with me and she’s perfect!”
Daisy scrunched up her face and shrugged apologetically at Chase. “Um, well, he is a, ah, a very good specimen of… man…” She and the other woman hummed in agreement, nudging and jostling her. “And,” she whispered, since Chase had deliberately turned away in horror at their talk about her friend, “we know he’s got the experience to back up those hots.”
“Hell yeah, Daisy Rhys!”
They weren’t that far from Jamie and Leda and all of their siblings, who all looked over at the shriek of Daisy’s name.
Daisy might have been fine with being around Tyler before, but Tipsy Daisy panicked and bolted out of that clamshell and off the dance floor, towards the bar that was very far away from her so-called friends and her ex-husband.
“Vodka martini, please,” she half-gasped, half-begged when it was her turn at the bar. “Can you make it strong? Like, I’m-in-the-bridal-party strong, please?”
The bartender’s eyes widened at her request, but he did what she asked.
Once she was sagged against the bar, all but hugging the martini glass, the bartender went to the other end of the bar to help a happy gaggle of girls—someone’s cousins, probably; the drunk, slutty girls at weddings were always someone’s cousins.
All of a sudden she felt eyes on the back of her neck.
Daisy’s ex-husband was a good guy, one of those guys who liked to repair fences and rebuild bridges. He had never tried to do that with her before, but she absolutely didn’t want to have some stupid heart-to-heart at his brother’s wedding.
“Fuck, fuck,” she breathed.
Then she edged smoothly along the bar until she could duck and back under the thingy servers used to get out from behind the bar, so close to the swinging door into the back of the restaurant where she could hide.
Her heel caught in one of the holes in the honeycomb-shaped rubber mat.
She had a martini in one hand that she didn’t want to let go of.
Just before her ass or her elbow could hit the ground, sending her sprawling, giant paws caught her around her upper arms, and she snapped her head up to find the dangling, grinning face of Dunk McCoy.
“Hey there,” he said, cheerful as all hell.
“Don’t—” she hissed, not wanting him to draw attention.
But instead of helping her to her feet, he just kicked out with one shiny, brand-new dress shoe and crab-walked them through the swinging door.
Or, he crab-walked and dragged Daisy like she was being saved from drowning on Baywatch.
She gaped at him, her hand held out past his shoulder to hold the martini steady.
Once they were in the back and the swinging door closed, he bounced easily to his feet, hauling her up along with him. She stumbled back a few steps, the heel that had gotten caught a little off-center, and blinked up at him. He was an honest-to-God foot taller than her and she swiped her free hand across her forehead as if she had any bangs to smooth out of the way.
She was a drink or two past tipsy and he was just grinning at her, hands on his hips, his suit jacket gone, his tie loose and his sleeves rolled up, a vest gloriously outlining his torso. If it weren’t for his completely unpolished grin and his dopey hair, he could’ve been someone who was born in a suit, that was how good he looked.
“Thanks for the assist.”
That grin widened, all white teeth, his canines a little sharp.
“So, Daisy Rhys,” he invited as he slouched against the hall wall, “what’s a pretty girl like you need to duck away from a wedding party for?”
She gulped down the rest of her martini and then twirled the glass in her fingers as though it were a rose. “Oh, you know, just my ex-husband,” she answered, and it was probably only the drinks she’d had that allowed it to come out calm instead of choked-off and completely panicked.
When a few seconds went by, she grimaced and peeked up at Dunk, expecting him to look guilty that he’d been so insensitive, like everyone else would be.
But instead, his head was tossed back and one fist was crammed into his mouth, his whole body shaking as he all but seized with laughter.
Daisy’s mouth fell open in astonishment.
Everyone in Maybelle County treated her like some fragile, sugar-spun fairy princess locked up in a tower, guarded by her big brothers. No one else would ever dream of laughing at her. It was always old ladies clucking “poor dear,” or other women smirking like they thought she didn’t know anything about being a woman. Or, which was the worst, men’s eyes zigzagging as they came up with lame excuses for why they couldn’t dance with her or ask her out.
But Duncan McCoy was laughing at her.
She should’ve been outraged, even if it was a strangely nice change of pace.
But then, a great big laugh burbled out over her lips.
“Oh shit,” Dunk gasped, “I’m such an asshole, that was so mean—”
“Shut up,” she wheezed out, smacking him weakly on the arm.
His big chest shuddered as he finally got his laughter under control. “Okay. Seriously. That was mean. You should say something mean back to me.”
The very idea of her being mean, or of anyone thinking she was capable of being mean, made one last uncontrollable giggle get past her lips.
“Nothing?” he challenged. “I’m that perfect, huh?”
“Well, you know what they say,” she answered without thinking.
“No, what do they say?” he countered, like she was about to tell him a terrible joke.
Caught off-guard because she’d really meant you know what they say about you, she sort of stared stupidly up at him.
“If it’s something mean,” he teased, “now you have to say it.”
She made some sort of oh-my-God-help-me sort of face, but he just swept one hand through his hair and grinned that giant, dopey grin at her.
“I’m pretty sure gossip that you have a perfect record of getting a girl into the endzone isn’t mean,” she said breezily, as if she had conversations like this all the time.
Dunk cocked his head to one side. “Depends on what exactly the endzone is in this metaphor,” he said.
Damned if she didn’t blink up at him like Barbie when he said metaphor. What kind of jock who had grown up to be the football coach slash gym teacher at his hometown high school knew what a metaphor was?
It must’ve been her shock that made her answer, “Oh, it’s an orgasm.”
“Damn, Daisy,” he murmured, suddenly looming over her, one hand braced on the wall somewhere over her head, “that was mean, saying it’s only gossip that I make every girl I touch come.”
Her circuits overloaded.
Dunk wasn’t touching her, but he was so very intentionally almost touching her.
She breathed out, along with all of her sense, “It’s gossip until I have proof.”
His hands slid down the wall until his bare forearm below his rolled-up sleeve slid across the outer curve of her shoulder, then his thick sinews flexed and shifted so that he could palm her arm. “What kind of play do you want me to make here?” he asked.
She was so stuck on his sexy mouth, the words barely sunk in. “God, I’m too tipsy to keep up the football endzone orgasm metaphor thingy,” she admitted with a laugh.
He laughed again too, a raspy sort of booming noise, like thunder in the distance.
But before she could untangle her thoughts enough to figure out if he was flirting with her or flirting with her, the swinging door flew open.
Chase came careening through. “There you two are!” she shouted happily, swerving over to throw her arms around them and rock manically. “We’re cutting the cake!” she added, still shouting.
Then, with a lot more strength than Daisy was prepared for, Chase dragged them both out into the restaurant and right up to the table where the gorgeous cake waited.
Jesse appeared behind Daisy with a tray of shots. She eyeballed everyone sternly and handed them out, the color some sort of alarming sunset orange-pink thing that screamed blinding hangover.
“Tequila?” Daisy ventured.
“Kamikaze,” Jesse clarified.
“Um,” Daisy began, not sure that she wanted to drink it, since her fingertips were tingling and she couldn’t feel her feet in her heels anymore.
“Are you a part of the bridal party?” Jesse shot at her.
“Yeah,” she said hesitantly. “But I’m kind of already past my limit—”
“Tonight you are going way past your limit,” Jesse cut her off, and then flashed a sharp, stubborn grin.
Daisy had always been intimidated by her, since Jesse managed to balance clearly not giving a fuck what people thought with being smart and not typically aggressive or in-your-face.
“Okay then,” she said, flushed because she was so damn happy that the bridal party just accepted her, treating her like she’d always been there.
So, while Leda cut the cake with frightening skill for someone so drunk, they waited with their shot glasses hovering at their chins. As soon as Leda gleefully slammed a piece of cake into Jamie’s face—while he just gently swiped some frosting over her lips and waited for her to chomp her slice out of his fingers—they downed them.
And then there was another shot glass in Daisy’s hand and the music started up again, and she started to lose track of where she was and why she’d been so nervous. She danced more, even though it was probably more bouncing than dancing by that point, the bridal party surrounding her.
The music got louder and the crowd thinned out as everyone but the bride and groom, the other bridesmaids, and the groomsmen headed home. People jammed their way into the group to say their goodbyes, driving Daisy backwards until her ass bumped into Dunk’s thighs.
She shot an apologetic look up over her shoulder at him.
His cheeks were red and his grin was much looser and goofier than it had been however-long-ago it had been that they’d talked, and his hands slid over her hips.
“I like your dress,” he ducked down to tell her.
She snorted; from his angle, he could probably see three-quarters of her boobs and the edge of her utilitarian black bra getup.
Jesse came around with more shots.
Everything swam a little, except for Dunk’s giant hands squeezing Daisy’s hips and waist and his hot breath ghosting across the back of her neck.
She let out a quiet moan, hopefully lost under the loud music to everyone but him.
Damn, it had been so long since she’d felt sexy. So long since she’d found anyone else sexy. Her parents and her brothers had left the reception ages ago, and so had Tyler. There was no one paying any attention to what she was doing but her, and Dunk.
His breath got hotter and stronger as his mouth dropped just above her shoulder and she leaned back. Just a fraction, but he had to have felt it. His lips dragged up the back of her neck and whatever lingering, silly idea of good girls don’t blew away.
“Take me somewhere,” she begged, letting her head fall against his chest.
Practically giggling, they snuck off the dance floor and into the small office, where he pressed the button to lock the door.
Dunk smiled at her, raising one dirty blond eyebrow in challenge.
“Daisy Rhys,” he murmured, his voice even raspier after all of the drinks and the celebratory yelling, “where do you want me to take you?”
Her fingers covered her answering smile and she tipped her head back, feeling her hair starting to bust out of the trillion bobby pins trying to keep it locked up. “The endzone?”