How to Lose a Groom in 10 Days (5 page)

*

That night, driving
through a rain shower on their way to the campground after the visit to the veterinary clinic, Grady watched Melanie cradle the puppy with a tenderness that got to him. He’d seen that side of her once before—that first night when they’d met at the Stars’ family event and she’d been in charge of the childcare room for the team members who needed an extra eye on their kids. Now, as she cooed and comforted Polly, Grady remembered yet another reason he wanted her in his life.

She’d be ten times the parent he ever would. His own parents had fought so hard about how to raise him that they never had enough time to just “be.” His father always lobbied for more sports, more tournaments, more training. His mother wanted family time. Grady about came apart at the seams trying to make them both happy. But Melanie would never be like that.

Still, maybe it wasn’t enough that he had faith in her parenting. They’d never talked about having kids—he just assumed. And if he were already reading her all wrong now, how would it be five years from now? It killed him to think he’d run headlong into a marriage that could end up as unhappy as his parents’. They had waited until his younger brother turned eighteen and filed for divorce the next day.

“Is she warming up?” he asked, the silence broken only by Melanie’s soft words to the shivering dog on her lap and the rhythmic scrape of the Honda’s worn wiper blades as the rain picked up force.

“I think so.” She readjusted the towel she’d resurrected from a bag in her backseat as they drove toward the campground. “Her fur is dry now.”

The pup had a quick bath to rinse off the dirt for the vet’s assessment. It turned out Polly had a microchip that led to a local shelter. There were records that the animal had current vaccinations, but the owners, sadly, weren’t interested in retrieving their puppy. They said she was more work than they’d anticipated. They were tired of chasing her when she dug out of the backyard. Grady had bought some basic puppy supplies from the vet clinic’s store, including food, a bowl and a cardboard carrier in the backseat, and packed up the little fur ball to bring with them.

His hands clenched around the steering wheel as he thought of that puppy out alone, how easily he could have been stolen or hit by a car. “They shouldn’t have left her in the backyard all the time. She probably got bored out there with nothing to do, no human contact.”

“You have the instincts of a good pet owner after all.” Melanie leaned back in her seat, her gaze shifting to the dark, wet road ahead.

“You don’t have to sound surprised.” He downshifted as they approached a low spot on the road where the rainwater had pooled.

“I was paying you a compliment.”

“Forgive me if I’m not sure what to read in your words today.” He swerved to the far side of the road to try and stay out of the deepest part of the puddle. He wished he could navigate the potential pitfalls in this conversation half as easily. “Why did you name her Polly?”

“That was my first dog. She and I spent a lot of time together curled up in my room while my parents argued. She kept me company. She was my best friend and the best dog ever.”

“What kind of dog was she?”

“Some kind of lab mix. I didn’t think of her as a kind of dog though, just
my
dog.”

“Your folks argued a lot?”

“Mom’s an alcoholic. Dad enables. He tries to avoid arguments, but she could provoke a saint on the nights she moves from red wine to bourbon.” She shook her head as if to stop herself from saying anymore. “Short answer – yes.”

“I don’t know what makes you think I’m only interested in the short answers, Mel. If we want any hope of sorting through what’s going on between us, we’re going to need to both… try.”

The rain pounded the hood with new vengeance and he wished they’d taken his truck which could have sailed right through all the standing water on the old country route. But Melanie’s car was low to the ground and the sudden wealth of puddles-turned-ponds threatened to swallow it.

“Wait.” She gripped his sleeve before he could go around the next major body of water. “The car stalled on me last week when I got water in the distributor cap.”

“Where was I?” Frowning, he stepped on the brake. He didn’t remember and would have used it as an excuse to press his case to give her a new vehicle.

“Fundraiser for the children’s hospital.” She peered out the back window, probably to make sure no one was behind them since he’d stopped in the middle of the road.

But it was a quiet area outside the state park. Or maybe everyone else just had enough sense not to drive in a downpour. He wondered if she knew she still had her hand on him. He liked that she touched him when she wasn’t thinking about it—that her hands went to him if only in a subconscious way.

“It’s your call.” He put the power in her hands, knowing that she liked weighing in on things and he was trying to be the kind of guy she wanted. Needed. “Should I try going through or do we wait out the storm?”

Her eyes met his in the dim car interior, the tiny compact putting them so close their breath mingled just sitting next to each other. Awareness spiked along with his temperature. She must have felt it too because her hand fell away from his arm, her eyes going wide for an instant before she looked anywhere but at him.

“Might as well try to get through it. We’re almost to the campground.”

Where they’d have to hike a trail to get back to their tent. It hardly seemed fair to Polly, let alone to the two of them, but he’d be damned if he’d state the obvious.

Gritting his teeth, he nailed the accelerator. Water splashed high on the doors and he gunned it harder to get through the puddle fast. Just as his foot pressed more, however, the ignition sputtered. And died.

Leaving them stranded in a miniature lake.

He turned to check Melanie’s reaction. She chewed her lower lip and stared out the window. He’d done his damnedest to do things her way. Now? They were going with his plan. It was his wedding night, after all.

Tugging his phone out of his pocket, he switched on the screen.

“What was that website you mentioned again? BringFido.com, right?”

‡

M
elanie cinched the
hotel robe tighter on her waist, the thick cotton chasing away any remaining chill from her dash through the rain from the car. Grady had braved the downpour to dry out the distributor cap and—miraculously—was able to restart the Honda. He’d insisted on a hotel though, and she’d agreed as much for Polly’s sake as for her own. Their campsite would be washed out even though the rain had slowed in the last hour.

Now, checked into the luxury accommodations that gladly gave Polly her own bed, Melanie couldn’t stop thinking about the fact that this was her wedding night. A strange wedding night, of course. And one that they wouldn’t celebrate in the er—usual way—since she’d declared the whole thing a mistake. But as she stepped out of the bedroom and into the living area to see Grady balancing a room service menu on one knee, she couldn’t help but fixate on how things could have been so much different right now if only she’d been willing to accept a part time husband. A man who would be out of her life for two thirds of each year.

A man who’d genuinely wanted to marry her.

Her heart squeezed at the thought.

“So you won. We’re in a luxurious hotel.” She snapped at him to keep herself from thinking about how at home he looked here in his snug-fitting cotton tee and a pair of running shorts.

The man had the best thighs on the planet. Best butt, too. That’s where the power came from in his lethal swing, she knew. Those amazing glutes. She didn’t even want to think about what those same good glutes had done for her sex life.

“A luxurious hotel that accepts dogs,” he clarified, setting aside the menu while his eyes roamed over her. “I think I should get kudos for that. Especially given I’m spending my wedding night in a suite with two beds and a dog.”

He’d gotten them a two-bedroom suite and she’d been grateful he hadn’t pushed the issue at check-in. But obviously, the choice didn’t make him happy.

“Sharing a bed would only make things more complicated when we get an annulment,” she pointed out, her gaze falling to Polly where she gnawed on one of Grady’s discarded running shoes.

She bent to retrieve the sneaker before the puppy put a hole in it.

“I’m definitely not talking about annulments on my wedding night.” Grady glared at her. “What do you want from room service?”

“I don’t care.” She tossed the shoe in his bedroom and then shut the door to keep the pup out. It wouldn’t be fair to teach Polly she could chew on whatever she liked—even though Grady’s seemingly endless cash flow could replace just about anything. Even, probably, a wife. “Order whatever you want.”

“Okay then, I’m ordering all your favorites.” He reached for the TV remote, muscles on mouthwatering display as he stretched.

“You know my favorites?” She couldn’t remember ever telling him something like that.

He set the remote on the arm of his chair and used it to scroll to a room service menu on the television screen.

“I know more about you than you give me credit for.” He kept his voice even but something about that carefully controlled tone told her she’d touched a nerve.

He jabbed buttons harder as he input their room number.

“We’ve spent so little time together—”

“So you say. But I think ten weeks is plenty of time to get to know someone if you’re paying attention the way I have been. Contrary to what you might think, I’ve been taking this relationship damn seriously.” He clicked to the appetizers and checked off the fruit platter, hot spinach and cheese dip with an extra baguette, and a bowl of wonton soup—definitely the same three items she would have narrowed into her top choices. Except for the bonus baguette, which she would have craved but not ordered.

“Wow.” Absently, she bent to scratch Polly’s ears while the pup wrestled with a stuffed animal Grady had picked up in the hotel gift shop. “How did you know?”

Without answering, he jumped to the dinner screen and requested a small pizza—cheese only. The second meal included enough meat for a linebacker, and she knew that was meant for him. He consumed protein like breathing air.

At the end of the order, in the “additional comments or requests” section he used the keypad to highlight letters for “marshmallows and sticks.”

She had to laugh. “They’ll never stock sticks in the kitchen.”

“It’s a good hotel. They’ll think of something.” Tossing aside the remote, he met her gaze. Warm brown eyes teased over her body with ill-disguised heat. “You deserve a picnic since you lost your night of camping.”

Touched that he would think of something so sweet, her eyes burned. Damn it, was it any wonder he’d persuaded her to marry him even though they didn’t know each other? Even though she’d carefully hidden her mess of a past from him?

She’d wanted to buy into the fairy tale. To make the dream of them last for as long as possible, which was how she’d ended up breaking out in hives in a wedding dress that morning.

“Well. Thank you.” She cleared her throat, determined not to send him mixed signals. “I. Um. How did you know I liked all of those things you ordered for dinner?”

“Easy.” He sat forward in his seat and tugged the stuffed gator from Polly’s mouth. Shaking off a little puppy drool, he tossed the green stuffed toy a few feet away and they watched her chase the prize and tumble over it. “You debate out loud what you want to eat when you’re looking at a menu,” he informed her. “So I know the kinds of things you choose, plus the runners-up.”

She couldn’t recall meeting anyone who’d observed her so closely. Her parents had always been too consumed by their own drama to take an interest in her life. How much more did Grady know about her than she realized?

All day she’d been convinced he didn’t know her well enough to marry her. That he’d been impulsive and hadn’t thought out what married life would really be like. But now, she had to wonder…

Maybe she was the one who didn’t know him.