There were enough telling glances from Nick’s university friends to realise that some of them had been expecting to see Natalie at his side today. Perhaps that wasn’t surprising, for shehadonce been part of their friendship group.
Over the next few hours, I laughed hard enough to bring tears to my eyes as I listened to Nick’s friends regale the table with stories of their past, which frankly made my own university exploits sound decidedly tame. Their reminiscences revealed another side to Nick, a more playful, light-hearted version. I liked the boy he’d once been almost as much as I did the man he’d become.
It was no surprise to discover that I liked Nick’s friends a lot too. With a different throw of the dice, these people could have beenmyfriends, and it made me nostalgic for all the times I’d never get to share with them.
*
The bride’s dad gave a speech that made me cry. I thought I’d done a good job of hiding my emotions, but Nick still noticed.
‘Are you okay?’ he asked, bridging the space between our chairs to whisper into my ear.
‘Yes, I’m fine,’ I said, as I scrabbled in my small but virtually useless evening bag for a tissue. Nick took the folded handkerchief from the breast pocket of his suit and pressed it into my palm. ‘It’s a wedding thing,’ I explained, taking the silk square and dabbing the corner of my eye. ‘It’s bad form not to cry at least once.’
‘You don’t have to explain,’ he said. And when I lifted my watery gaze to his, I realised he was right. I didn’t have to. Because he understood me, in a way that no one – except possibly Amelia – had ever done before. Was I really going to walk away from a connection this strong? Could I be making the biggest and most stupid mistake of my life?
‘Okay, there’s something about me I really ought to have told you before now.’ Nick’s tone was suddenly serious and snapped my thoughts back to the present. He waited until he saw he had my whole attention. ‘I can’t dance. No rhythm, no co-ordination, no style or grace whatsoever.’
His eyes were on my lips, waiting for the amusement to appear, which of course it did.
‘Is this your way of telling me you won’t be taking to the dance floor tonight?’
He surprised me then by springing immediately to his feet as the first chords of the band struck up. He held out his hands and pulled me from my chair.
‘Hell no. I love dancing. I’m just bloody awful at it.’
I’d like to say he had exaggerated, but I had two bruised toes that would beg to differ. You had to love someone who threw themselves with such enthusiasm into something they were patently crap at doing. I faltered midway through a spinning twirl that could easily end with me flat on my back.
You had to love someone.
You had to love someone…
The words were ricocheting in time to the music, the beat of which Nick consistently failed to follow. He didn’t care. He was laughing and smiling at me, and I knew then that I would always remember this, because it was the moment I realised I loved him.
When the music eventually slowed down, and the smoky voice of the band’s vocalist began to sing about him and Mrs Jones, I went into Nick’s arms as though I’d never been held by him before. Everything felt new and fragile and incredibly precious. The curves of my body fitted perfectly against the planes of his as he pulled me closer. I could feel the warmth of his breath against the side of my neck, and the graze of his lips as his mouth brushed against my pulse point, which was hammering like crazy.
Two or three songs in, and I had to keep reminding myself we were in a public venue and that the thoughts running through my mind had no place among a roomful of strangers. When I lifted my head from where it had settled on Nick’s shoulder, I saw a cobalt flame flickering in his eyes. It scorched all sense from me.
‘Can we get out of here?’ I asked huskily.
Nick seemed to struggle to formulate a reply, which I took as a very encouraging sign. He simply nodded, his eyes never leaving my mouth.
‘Let’s go,’ he said at last, his voice a mixture of velvet and gravel.
He led me from the dance floor, weaving a pathway between couples who were now gyrating to a well-known banger, guaranteed to get everyone on their feet.
‘Shouldn’t we say goodbye to your friends?’ I asked, suddenly aware he’d already collected my bag from our table, and we were now in the hotel foyer.
‘I love that you think I have enough control to handle a round of goodbyes as well as the twenty-minute drive to get back to my place.’
He was looking down at me, and my already erratic pulse broke free from its moorings and began to race.
‘Twenty minutes?’ I asked, my voice weirdly breathy.
‘Eighteen, if I’m lucky with every set of lights.’
‘Are you feeling lucky?’ I asked, biting my lower lip. I wasn’t usually this provocative, but Nick was bringing out a whole new side of me.
He pulled me to him and kissed me with a preview of the passion I knew we’d be sharing in roughly twenty minutes – eighteen, if all went well.
