I find myself stifling a smile. What is it about her that makes it so much fun to goad her? She turns her head as though to look down the street, but I catch her gaze sliding to me.
‘Snippily? Sublimely?’ She purses her lips, fighting a smile. ‘Sinuously? Spontaneously.’ On the last one, I pull her against me, and whisper hotly in her ear, ‘I’m all out of words.’
‘Remind me not to play Scrabble with you,’ she grumbles, though I hear her smile anyway.
‘What a selfish prick I am,’ I admit, causing her to pull away just a little, her expression censorious. ‘I just promised to honour and cherish you, yet I can’t even offer you a sandwich.’
‘I could really go for a sandwich. Or a burger,’ she offers with a fervent gleam. ‘I won’t even hold the rest against you. I don’t remember you offering me any honouring before.’
‘I—’ I amnotgoing to apologise. For whatever seems to be bothering me. ‘I thought you said you were a vegetarian?’
‘I did,’ she answers, hopping from the top step to the one below. ‘But I didn’t say I was a good one.’
A bark of laughter breaks free from my chest, and I’m not the only one startled. ‘Get back up here,’ I insist, pulling on her hand.
‘What for?’ Despite her complaint, she allows me to tug her to the top step where she takes my face in her hands. ‘Did I tell you that you look rakishly handsome today?’ Her expression is perfect, her face far too beautiful. It’s an earthy kind of beauty, the human kind. Raw and sensual. Real.
‘You did not. Feel free to say so.’
‘I just did!’ Her gaze snaps left to where I hold my phone aloft. ‘What are you doing?’
‘Sayjust married!’ I take the shot.
‘Are you feeling okay?’ she enquires, a pinch of confusion settling between her brows.
‘Perfectly.’ I look up from the image, her rings catching the light, a dapple of freckles revealed from under her makeup as, eyes open, she smiles into the kiss I’d delivered. ‘Why do you ask?’
‘You’re sure you’re not getting sentimental?’ she asks, trying to curtail a saucy grin.
‘That would be you,’ I say, sliding my phone away as I take her hand. ‘Do you always cry at weddings or just your own?’
‘I don’t know. You’ll have to ask me next time I get married.’ My footsteps falter on the step, though I recover without swearing. Or glaring. Or generally being an arse. And if she notices my misstep, she doesn’t remark. ‘Did you cry the first time you got married?’ Her tone is more inquisitive than needling, though I wondered how long it would take her before she asked about it.
‘No. I saved my tears until later.’
‘I’m sorry,’ she offers softly, her free hand touching my shoulder from where she stands on the step behind.
‘Yes, I was devastated. She took my dog.’
‘You!’ The comforting gesture becomes a swat, and as I reach the pavement, I turn swiftly and place my hands on her hips.
‘No New Yorker worth their salt would go to dinner at this hour. How about something a little more relaxed?’
‘How about a hotdog from a hotdog stand?’ she suggests with the kind of excited shimmy that speaks of an insatiable appetite. Something I’m looking forward to discovering.
But a long strip of lips, tits, and arseholes is not much of a wedding feast.
‘I’ve got a much better idea.’ Then I kiss her, just once, a stealthy stolen moment as a yellow cab’s horn blares, and someone yells profanities.
‘You’ve gotta love New York City,’ she says, beaming up at me.
‘Damn, that reminds me. I meant to get us a couple of T-shirts from inside.’I got hitched in NYC.I turn as our car pulls up with Olivia giggling behind me.
‘You mean from the place selling plastic flowers, elastic wedding rings, and aluminium bow ties?’
‘I’m almost certain that word has a couple ofi’sin it. Alumin-i-um?’
‘I can’t help that you can’t say it properly,’ she taunts as I open the door for her. You’re just, like, an alien. An Englishman in New York.’
