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“Good?” He balks. “I gave you—” Then he chuckles. “Yeah, okay, you taught me a thing or two, as well.”
“Why thanks,” I say, blushing. “But that thing you did last night with your…”
“Bap bap baaaaa…” Mantel sings, hands over his ears, until Jax and I both mouth sorry.
Mantel uncovers his ears and wafts a hand flippantly around the other faces in the room. “And you brought along with you to corroborate your story…”
Mitch, Lauren, Tray, Amelie, Zach, Suzuki, Coach, TJ and Jax’s dad.
Mantel points to each of them in turn, saying, “Friend, friend, teammate, friend, teammate, teammate, coach, brother, parent. Mr and Mrs Harris; can’t you find one objective witness to support your fairy tale?”
Jax and I smile widely at his dad. “Mantel, I don’t think you’ve properly been introduced to my dad. He also thinks I’m a jackass, so you two will get along like ice cream and Jello.”
Mantel clicks the end of his pen over and over, glaring at the faces in the room, then landing back on Jax and me. “Oh, this is going to be a fun case. Saddle up, kids. Let’s get started.”
EPILOGUE
WHAT HAPPENED IN VEGAS?
Sienna
This should have been me, I think as I watch Tray and Amelie renew their vows for the fourth time. Oddly, I’m pleased to be here, dressed as Marilyn Monroe.
Amelie is a good friend and I would have wanted to be here for her and Tray, to help them celebrate, but it’s not Carl’s thing. My friends aren’t Carl’s thing. It’s his fortieth birthday weekend, so it felt justified that he didn’t want us to come. I’m sure he’s happy at home with Marcela helping him celebrate. I shudder at the thought.
So, even though I’m green-eyed as I see the happy couple laughing, smiling and joking through each wedding, I’m glad to witness it. At some point, I know I’ll be relieved that Carl cheated before we were married.
There’s no denying, though, that the mandatory welcome drink at every ceremony, much like the costume changes, is taking the bitter edge off my mood – even the heavily salted margarita at ceremony two. It’s like playing the front nine (plus one for good luck) on bar hopping golf in college. Though I’ve mostly been hanging with Mitch and Lauren, I’ve got to admit the hockey boys are funny, getting more hilarious with every drink. Or maybe I’m starting to let the humor in.
My need to remember that half the guys in this room are clients, that all of them are potential clients, seems to be melting with the fluffy fuzz of alcohol.
It’s also quite possible that I am beginning to inhabit my costumes. Not only am I unwittingly swishing the mini white dress I chose on entering for this fifties-themed fourth chapel, but I’m beginning to feel a little more movie star with a blonde bob wig and a little less strait-laced and frigid PR executive.
“I think I’m starting to like this,” I tell Lauren, swishing. She’s dressed as Audrey Hepburn in Breakfast at Tiffany’s and she is rocking her little black dress and pearls.
Mitch, meanwhile, makes for a scary-looking Charlie Chaplin and for some reason, I can’t stop tweaking that tufty little moustache he’s donned.
“You should, it’s a good look on you,” says a deep voice, imitating a thick Southern twang. I turn into the hard chest of the King himself. Jax Harris presents Elvis Presley, electric-blue jumpsuit and all.
“Cute sideburns,” I tell him.
In response, he gives me the trademark, “Thank you very much. Ahaha.” Complete with a twitching upper lip that makes me smirk.
“Sienna, are you going to avoid me the whole trip?” he asks.
“I’m not avoiding you,” I say, burying my lie in my whiskey sour.
He raises one bushy brow – kinda sexy, after four cocktails. Of course, the reason Jax is a client of mine is because I’ve spared his ass multiple times from getting write-ups online for having a meaningless hook-up with the kind of girl who can’t wait to brag about bagging the hockey star before they’ve even showered.
“Okay, I’m sort of keeping my distance.”
“And why, may I ask?” He leans in and sips my sour through my short straw, slurping it through cubes of ice.
He’s so close I can see the wet look of the hair that flows out of the bottom of his helmet during games. So dark he doesn’t need a wig to complete his costume. Long enough to suggest a wild edge and that it would feel like silk – I’d bet – through my fingers. He smells the way he does when he’s dressed for a business meeting – rich, suave, delectable. Cocoa, tobacco and spice. It permeates my brain barrier that’s been weakened by intoxication, enough that I’m forced to admit…
“Because you’re my client and you’re flirtatious and enormously inappropriate. And, honestly, you’d have more fun hanging with the guys and leaving me be.”
He frowns now, the hint of a smirk around full lips. The kind I know wins the hockey girlies over. There’s no denying that Jax looks hot fully kitted up in the boy aquarium.
