Uncontrollable (37 page)

 I say smiling, “I’m so glad you were able to make
it.”

Slade and I decided to invite her. I didn’t think
she would be able to make it but she said she wouldn’t miss it for the world.
When I told Tate about her response, he just turned around and walked out of
our house. He once told me he went back up to Alaska often, but I’m starting to
think there is a different reason behind his Alaska trips, because he obviously
doesn’t care to see his mother.

 “Me too.” She laughs then gets a serious look on
her face. “I promised your mother that nothing would stop me from seeing your
wedding day.”

 “My mom?”

“After your college graduation she called me. She
and Tate were on their way back from Texas. She told me all about your
boyfriend she saw you with. She said she could just tell that he was not the
one for you. You looked happy and in love but she just knew he was not the one
that you would marry,” she says smiling.“Then she called me after you and Slade
left Tulsa. She told me you had found the one. The one who was going to bring
you as much joy as your father once brought her.”

I give her a big smile. “Well she was right.”

I hear Missy sigh, and I look to see what she is
looking at. My eyes land on Tate as he dances with some brunette that we didn’t
even invite.

Laura looks from Tate over to Missy. “You have your
work cut out for you.”

 I look at Laura wide-eyed. Is Missy’s breakdown
that obvious to people who don’t even know her?

Missy’s head turns to her, and she wears the same
surprised expression. “Excuse me?” Missy asks.

 Laura smiles at her. “Every person in this place
can see how much you love my son. And they can also see that he does not care.”

“Laura,” I scold her. Tate has already hurt Missy
enough.

“No. It’s okay,” Missy says softly. “You’re right.
He doesn’t care about me.”

 “That is not what I said.” Missy and I continue to
stare at Laura confused. “I said he doesn’t care that you love him. I didn’t
say he doesn’t care about you.”

“Is there a difference?” Missy asks.

“Of course. Your love for him can’t change him. But
he knows the love he could have for you would. Tate needs someone strong,
Missy. Tate hides things very well. He keeps things bottled up and tries to
fight all his demons by himself.”

Missy shakes her head and says, “Nothing’s going to
happen between us.”

 Laura smiles, and I have a feeling Laura knows
something that we don’t. “Just stay strong. Animals prey on the weak,” she says
with a straight face.

 I stand there looking at Laura in total shock. She
has changed so much from what I remember of her. But I know that she’s speaking
from experience. She was once the prey of an animal. An animal that would chew
her up and spit her out.

 Missy nods at her before she walks off looking
more confused than upset now.

 “Thanks again for coming,” I say and hug her once
again before I head back to my table. I smile as I sit down next to Slade.

 Courtney plops down beside me with a wad of
tissues in her hand as Holly sits down next to Slade.

 “Okay don’t be mad,” Josh says with a laugh as he
eyes Slade.

“What did you guys do?” He looks from Josh to Micah
skeptically.

 “We had made a bet,” Holly says surprising me.

We all turn to look at her. “A bet on what? That
Slade would run?” I ask with amusement.

 She laughs. “No. We made a bet that he would marry
you,” she said matter-of-fact. “And I won.” She wiggles her eyebrows before she
looks up at Micah and Josh. “So pay up, boys,” she says with a smile on her
face.

 “You made a bet we would get married?” Slade
questions sounding confused.

“Yes,” Josh answers.

 “Why would that make me mad?” he then asks.

 “Well because it was sort of a setup,” Holly says
with a smile.

I frown. “Which part?”

She lets out a long breath. “All of it.”

“I’m confused,” I say with a laugh.

“The first night at Larry’s. We set you two up.”
She smiles proudly. “All of it.”

 I sit there listening to one of my best friends as
she tells us she had planned on pairing us together. I don’t know if I want to
be mad or kiss her.

Definitely kiss her!

Her eyes turn on me. “Remember when I helped you
move into your rent house and Micah had called me while you were putting
clothes up in your closet?” I nod. “That was Micah telling me that Slade was
going out as well. Then after I left I called and told you to wear that white
dress.”

 “You told her to wear that dress?” Slade asks
surprised. Then he turns to look at me. “I loved that dress,” he says
breathlessly as if he’s remembering it.

 I laugh. “What I don’t understand is why the bet?”
I look up at the guys. “You guys bet against her?” They didn’t think we would
fall for one another?

“No. We knew it would happen. We just bet on how
long it would take for it to happen. But we all knew you two would end up
together.” Josh smiles. “Although I knew Sam would make you work for it.”

“Is that what you meant when you found us in the
hallway by the bathrooms?” I ask, remembering him walking down the hall toward
us. He had slapped Slade on the back with the words,
“Good luck with that,
Slade.”

 “Yep,” he says with a smile. “I knew he’d crash
and burn with you at first, which you did quite a few times,” he reminds Slade.
They all let out a laugh. “And I wanted a front row seat.”

Slade pushes me away from his side and turns to
face me. He places his hands on my face and smiles. “I’m pretty sure I fell in
love with you the first night you called me,” he admits. “Even if our friends
hadn’t orchestrated that first night at Larry’s, I still would have found you.”

I smile and give a little laugh when I hear
Courtney’s little sob behind me.

Josh frowns and looks over to her. “What’s wrong,
baby?” He comes around our table, and we all watch as he bends down beside her.

She holds her head in her hand as she shakes it. “I
hate these fucking pregnancy hormones. They are messing with me,” she cries.
Josh holds in his laugh with a smirk as he rubs her back softly.

“I told them,” he says quietly to her.

 I frown as her head snaps up to look at him. She
gives him a death glare. “Why? Why?” she cries. “We decided we were going to
wait.”

 He gives her a smile. “You can’t expect me to keep
that a secret, baby.”

 “What are you talking about?” I ask. “You told us
what?”

 “I should rephrase that. I told the guys,” he
adds.

Courtney sighs as if she hates what she is about to
say. “We found out that we are having...”

 “A girl?” Holly interrupts excited.

 Courtney shakes her head as tears run down her
face. “It’s too early to know the sex. We are having twins,” she announces.

 “No way,” I say looking from Josh to Courtney. I
turn to look at Slade. “You knew?”

 “Hey I just found out last night,” he says in
defense.

“We wanted to wait a little longer,” Courtney says
getting my attention. “We wanted to make sure we were out in the clear.”

 “Why? Are you having problems with your
pregnancy?” I ask worried.

She shakes her head. “We just wanted to make sure.”

 “That is amazing,” I say as tears fill my eyes
again.

 “Why is everyone over here crying?” Parker
approaches the table with his arms thrown over Holly’s cousin’s shoulders. She
smiles, and Holly frowns.

 “What are you doing?” she asks her cousin with
narrowed eyes.

This is the same cousin that she found him with at
her wedding.

 “We just finished...dancing.” She blushes at her
lie.

 “I saw everyone over here crying so I thought I
would see what was up with that,” Parker says pulling away from her.

 “We were talking about Courtney and Josh having
twins,” I inform him.

“Oh, that?” He waves a hand in the air. “I was told
that last night,” he adds as if it’s no big deal—and to him it probably isn’t.

 “Uh. Even Parker knew before I did,” I whine.

He grabs the girl’s hand and pulls her away,
probably to go to the nearest coat closet. As Tate comes up to sit down next to
us, I watch as his eyes dart over to Missy.

 She sits at the end of the table with the saddest
look on her beautiful face. She looks out over the dance floor as if in a daze.
Braxton is sitting next to her, his hand lazily running up and down her arm.
He’s softly speaking to her, but she doesn’t acknowledge him.

 Tate stares at her with an expressionless glare.
He watches as she slowly lifts her glass of wine and takes a sip. She continues
to stare off into the distance, and my heart breaks for her.

Tate’s eyes roam her face, and then he frowns. He
can see it. Whatever she is going through, he sees it. I expect him to do
something, even with Braxton sitting there with her. Tate isn’t the type of guy
to care if Braxton is here or not. If he has something to say, he will—maybe
ask her to dance—but he doesn’t. Instead he turns and looks right at me. I
should look away, pretend like I wasn’t watching him watch her, but why? He
knows I was watching him.

He arches his eyebrows as if to ask me ‘what?’ and
I just shake my head with a frown on my face.

 They will never be friends again, and I hope that
I haven’t lost her as a friend as well because of that.

I stand on the end of the
dance floor with one hand in my pocket of my dress slacks and the other holding
the second glass of scotch that my father handed me. I look over the dance
floor and smile when I see Tate twirl my wife around. I hate that she doesn’t
know who he really is. What she really means to him. It’s time she knows. It’s
time for him to sit her down and tell her the truth. And as soon as we get back
from our honeymoon, I’m going to tell her myself.

 “Woo,” Parker breathes walking up to me. “I love
weddings,” he says straightening the collar on his button up shirt.

 “Get ya some action?” I ask bringing the glass to
my lips

 “Of course,” he snorts. “What’s a wedding without
getting some ass?”

 I laugh then get serious for a second. “How are things
going at work?” I ask.

 I don’t miss the stiffening of his body. “Good,”
he says curtly. “No worries. There will be no immunity for Jax.” He did things
to guarantee that.

 He looks over at me. “How is she doing?” He nods
over to the dance floor at Angel.

 I swirl my glass of scotch. “She’s great.” She
quit waking up in the middle of the night screaming. I think the wedding and
the baby have taken her mind off of what happened. She’s always trying to show
me what our future holds not the pain of the memories in our past.

 “How are you doing?” His eyes drop down to my
scotch then back up to me.

 I shrug. “I don’t want to kill anymore,” I say
truthfully.

 “Well, that’s a start,” he responds seriously.

“Did you ever find out any information on that guy,
J?”

 He shake his head. “That Dallas guy was lying to
you.”

 I figured.
The bastard.
Should have broken
his legs as well.

 He takes a step to me and speaks quietly. “I got a
call this morning that the house is registered to a man by the name of White.
There is no paperwork trail suggesting that a man named J lives there.”

 I tilt my head to the side. “Maybe I should go
visit Jax,” I offer.

 He shrugs. “You could. But would he tell you
anything?”

“Doubtful,” I answer before taking a sip of the
scotch.

“Then I would say forget him.” He turns his body to
look over at Angel now dancing with my father, and he smiles. “She really is
perfect for you,” he states, surprising me. “You’re lucky.”

 “I know,” I say with a smile. “If you will excuse
me—” I throw back the rest of the scotch ignoring the burn. “I’m going to go
dance with my wife.”

I hand him my glass and make my way to her on the
dance floor. I see her now dancing with my father. He looks up to notice me and
steps away from her. “She’s all yours.”

 She turns to face me and smiles, but I catch the
tears that slowly roll down her face. “You don’t dance.”

I wipe them away softly with my thumbs. I know they
are from dancing with my father, and I hate it that hers wasn’t here for her.
Thankfully, my father doesn’t mind taking that role.

I wrap my arms around her waist and can’t help but
think of what she will look like three months from now. I still have to remind
myself that we are expecting a baby.

 “I wouldn’t miss this dance for anything,” I say
leaning down to kiss her. It’s slow and soft as she controls it. We still
haven’t made that move to have sex. I haven’t even tried and neither has she
since our argument that night in our kitchen.

“I love you,” she whispers as she pulls her lips
away from mine.