The Bride Test (19 page)

Right?

She began to rub her face, but the scent of lobster gave her pause. “I need to wash my hands. I will be right back,” she said before rushing away from the table.

In the bathroom, she took the far back stall. It was funny, but bathrooms soothed her. Probably because they felt familiar —she’d cleaned so many. But she couldn’t stay in here all night. She had a decision to make.

“You know she’s after him for his money and a green card,” a woman in one of the other stalls said.

“Of course she is,” a second woman replied.

Esme released a measured breath. They had to be talking about her and Khải. She’d known these kinds of conversations would take place. It was surprising she hadn’t heard talk like this until now.

“To be honest, if he wasn’t family,
I’d
be after him for his money,” the first woman said with a laugh.

“Well, me, too, actually.” Both women laughed at the same time.

Were
they talking about Khải? They made it sound like he was a billionaire, when Esme was certain he wasn’t rich. She supposed it was perfectly possible these two women were worse off than he was. An old beat-up house was better than no house.

“Did you see her all over Quan?” the first woman asked.

“Yeah, if it doesn’t work with one brother, try the next.”

Esme scowled. Without a doubt, they were talking about her, but she hadn’t been flirting with Quân. Had she? Definitely not on purpose. He
was
attractive, though, and funny, considerate, and kind. If she’d never met Khải, she’d jump at the chance to dance with him.

But she had met Khải.

Toilets flushed, heels clacked against the tile floor, and water ran as the women washed their hands.

“He
is
good-looking, though,” the second woman said.

“He’s also an asshole.”

“Okay, I agree. I know he’s ... you know, but I heard he complained to Sara about her wedding. Right there at the table on her wedding day—”

Esme’s tolerance for their secret bad-talking ended as a fire lit inside of her. She clawed the door of her stall open and marched out. “He is not an asshole. He is sweet.”

It was fine if they thought the worst of her— she didn’t care about them—but Khải was their family. Instead of spreading rumors and condemning him, they should have tried harder to understand him.

One of the women flushed and hurried to the door, but the other sent Esme a cutting glance. “
You
don’t get to look down on anyone.”

Esme lifted her chin, but she said nothing as the women left the bathroom. What
could
she say? They had judged both Esme and Khải without knowing their entire stories. Khải wasn’t bad. He was misunderstood. As for Esme, she wasn’t a gold digger. Her reasons for pursuing Khải had nothing to do with money. Too bad she couldn’t tell anyone about them without ruining everything.

She finished washing her hands and looked in the mirror, and her shoulders sagged. No matter how hard she tried, something about her was always off. She searched through her purse until she found her lipstick and applied a fresh red coat to her lips, but that didn’t fix the problem. She still wasn’t Esme in Accounting, the one Khải wanted.

But Quân wanted her— maybe— and he seemed to like her as she was, without an accounting certification and GED. Unlike Khải, he wanted to dance with her. It might not be a big deal for Quân, but it was for her. The man radiated sex appeal. Their bodies would touch. He’d have his arms around her. They’d move together. And she’d respond to him. How could she not? She was human and starved for affection.

If she was smart, she’d switch to the brother who was a better bet. From where she was now, that brother appeared to be Quân, but when it came to matters of the heart, she’d never been good at listening to reason. The real question was: Who did her heart want?

________________

K
hai could not focus on his book. There was no sense in trying anymore. He slapped his book shut and paced about the bottom floor of the restaurant, running his thumb over the corner of the book and flipping through the pages.
Fliiip. Fliiip. Fliiip
.

He didn’t pace anymore. He didn’t do this fidgety stuff anymore. Except, clearly, he did.

The hostess and all the staff were busy upstairs with the wedding, and his footsteps were loud on the red carpet. The dancing was going to start soon.

Khai didn’t dance. But Quan did. He suspected Esme did.

Quan’s words from earlier repeated through Khai’s head:
I’m interested. Those eyes alone would do it, but the rest of her ...

The building rumbled with a slow bass, and Khai’s skin went cold and numb. It had started. First, it was the bride’s dance with her dad. But after that ...

Esme. With Quan. Bodies together. Moving slowly.

He was going to be sick. His skin hurt. Each breath hurt. His insides were splitting open. Why the hell did he want to smash everything to pieces?

Quan was going to put his hands in the small of Esme’s back, that place Khai had claimed earlier today, touch her hips, her arms, her hands. And she was going to let him. She was going to touch him back.

As she should. Quan was the better man.

Khai realized he could leave. Quan would take care of her and drive her home. Maybe after spending time with Quan, she’d want to pack up her things and switch brothers and houses. That worked out nicely for Khai. He couldn’t form a full-scale addiction to her if she was gone.

Setting his jaw, he marched to the front doors of the restaurant and pressed his hands to the metal handle. But his arms refused to push.

What if she didn’t want to dance? What if she wanted to go home right now? It didn’t make sense for Quan to take her when Khai was going there. That would be inefficient.

He turned around, planning to head up there and brave the music long enough to assure himself she was happy and tell her he was going home.

But there she was, at the bottom of the stairs, her hand resting on the railing.

So beautiful. And here. She’d come to find him again. No one ever looked for him. They all knew he wanted to be alone. Except it wasn’t always that way. Sometimes he was alone out of habit. Sometimes it took effort to distract himself from the growing emptiness inside.

“Are you leaving?” she asked in a small voice.

“I was going to tell you.” He heard the words as if from a distance, like someone else had spoken them. “If you want to dance, you should stay.”

“Do you want me to dance?” She didn’t say the words, but they hung in the air between them:
without you.

He swallowed past a lump in his throat. “If it makes you happy.”

She took a step toward him. “What if I want to dance with you?”

“I don’t dance.”

“Can you try?” She took another step toward him. “For me?”

His chest constricted. “I can’t.” He’d never danced in his life. He’d be terrible at it and injure her and humiliate himself. Not to mention the loud music. He couldn’t function with those earsplitting decibels. Another reason why Quan was the better man. “If you want to stay, I know Quan will be glad to take you home.”

“You want me ... and him ... to dance?” Her eyebrows drew together. “Is that right?”

“If you want to.” And it was true. If that was what she wanted, he wanted her to have it, even if it made his chest feel like it was getting trampled on.

Several moments passed before she said, “I understand.” Then she smiled, but tears trickled down her face. She swiped them away, took a deep breath, and smiled wider before turning around.

He’d made her cry.

“ Esme ...”

She ignored him and walked back to the stairs. She was going to find Quan. She was going to be perfectly happy.

Without him.

Something inside of him snapped, and the rational part of his mind blinked off. A foreign part of him took control. His skin went fever hot. Blood roared in his ears. He was aware of his feet taking him across the room, saw his hand wrapping around her arm, pulling so she faced him.

Those tears.

They shattered him. He brushed the saline away with his thumbs.

“I’m okay,” she whispered. “Don’t worry. I—”

He took her mouth, pressing his lips to hers as the feel of her shocked through his system. Soft. Silk. Sweet. Esme. When he realized she’d gone stiff, he started to pull back in horror. What had he been think—

She softened against him, kissing him back, and that was it. His thoughts burned away. Something else rose from the ashes, something he’d kept chained up so long it was all fierceness and animal hunger. He stroked his tongue over her lips, and when she sighed and parted her lips, savage victory swept through him. He claimed her lips, claimed her mouth, claimed the liquid heat inside that tasted of vanilla and strawberries and woman.

________________

E
sme melted beneath the intensity of Khải’s kiss. She’d never been kissed like this, like he’d die if he stopped. His motions were tentative at first, as if he was learning her, but he gained confidence quickly. Each aching press of his lips, each dominating sweep of his tongue, weakened her more.

Her knees threatened to buckle, but she was afraid to anchor herself against him. If he stopped, she’d cry. She needed more, much more. She couldn’t breathe for needing.

She kissed him back harder, and he groaned against her mouth and swept his hands down her back, across her shoulder blades, along her spine. Lower. He squeezed her behind, and her inner muscles tightened.

He pulled her close and rolled his hips so his hardness pressed against her. She gasped as an electric thrill shot straight to her core, and she arched against him, clinging to the lapels of his coat. It was either that or fall.

Closer, she needed closer. She tried to melt into him, rubbed her body against his, but it wasn’t enough. Her palms ached to touch and explore, to know him. She resisted the urge and gripped his lapels tighter as he kissed her jaw, nipped her earlobe, and sucked on her neck. Goose bumps rippled over her skin.

The room spun in a dizzying swirl, leaving the two of them in a world of their own. All she knew was the safety of his embrace, the heat of his mouth, and his scent— soap, aftershave, man. They needed a bed, a wall, a table, anything. She wanted him now, and he was so ready—

“They put too much oil in the soup,” a familiar loud voice said. “But the fish was— oh father of mine.”

His mom and several of his aunts stared at them from midway down the stairs.

Esme and Khải tore apart at once. Blushing furiously, she smoothed shaky hands over her dress as the ladies finished descending the stairs.

“
Chào
, Cô Nga,” she said before inclining her head toward the aunts. She pressed her thighs together, not used to being this aroused in a room full of people.

Khải ran a hand through his hair. “Hi, Mom, Dì Anh, Dì Mai, Dì Tuyết.” Averting his eyes, he sucked his swollen bottom lip into his mouth. Oh sky, her lipstick was all over him.

“Anh Khải, let me— I . . .” She lifted a hand toward his face. When she hesitated to touch him, he brought her hand to his jaw.

“What is it?” he asked.

“My lipstick.” She brushed her thumb over a smear at the corner of his reddened mouth, but it wouldn’t come off. “Oh no, Khải.”

Instead of getting upset like she thought he would, he smiled, flashing those dimples at her, and warmth flooded her heart.

He didn’t mind getting caught kissing her.

“Young ones, ha?” one of his aunts commented, and the others tittered into their hands like schoolgirls.

“These two kids.” Cô Nga tried to sound stern, but she couldn’t keep a smile off her face. “Go home already. People will see you.” She dug through her granddaddy-sized purse until she came up with a tissue and handed it to Esme. Then she dragged the aunts off.

As soon as the front doors swayed shut, Esme lifted the tissue toward Khải’s mouth, but he dodged it and kissed her again, a slow, thorough press of lips to lips. The tissue bunched up in her hand, forgotten, as he threaded his fingers into her hair and tipped her head back so he could kiss her deeper.

A throat cleared.

But this time, when Esme tried to wrench herself away, Khải’s arms wrapped around her and held her close. She looked over her shoulder and found Quân watching them with his arms crossed and a big grin on his face.

“The older folks are starting to leave,” Quân said. “You guys might wanna ... take this somewhere else. You know, so you don’t give them heart attacks.”

Khải looked from his brother to Esme and loosened his hold on her somewhat. “Do you want to go with me ... or stay?”

“I want to be with you,” she whispered.

That beautiful smile spread over his face again. “Let’s go, then.”

They separated, and Esme tucked the hair behind her ear, not sure how to act around Quân now. But he didn’t seem angry or insulted. If anything, he seemed pleased. Had he orchestrated this somehow?

Quân gave Khải one of those American handshake/one-armed-hug/back-slap things. “Call me if you need anything. Have a good night, you two.”

He winked at Esme and climbed back up the stairs, and she waved at him awkwardly. Khải opened the hand his brother had gripped earlier, and a shiny foil lay in his palm.

Heat exploded in Esme’s cheeks, but she couldn’t help grinning. Quân was the best brother ever.

Khải shifted the foil so he held it between his index and middle fingers and considered her with a steady gaze. “Will I have the chance to use this tonight?”

She bit her lip as breathless anticipation bubbled through her veins. After picking up the book he’d dropped on the ground earlier, she glanced at him over her shoulder and said, “I hope so.”