The Trouble With Love(50)

Tonight, he was definitely in party mode.

“Maybe he’ll make it fast,” Daisy said, squeezing Emma’s arm.

Emma gave a noncommittal noise. She wasn’t worried. Sure, he was a little tipsy, but most everyone at the party seemed to be having a good time.

She glanced around for Cassidy and saw him about to make his way toward her, when his mother grabbed his arm, whispering something and then giggling too loud before teetering slightly in her high purple heels.

Cassidy took his mother’s arm to hold her steady and gave Emma an apologetic look. She smiled, and held up a hand. Stay.

They’d have plenty of time for just the two of them after the wedding, when the circus would be over.

Her father waited for the room to quiet completely, save for the clink of glassware, before he started talking.

“Well,” he said, in a voice that would have been booming even without the microphone. “I suspect I need no introduction, but for anyone on the groom’s side of the family I haven’t had the pleasure of meeting, I’m Winston Sinclair, proud father of our blushing bride, who, I think we can all agree, looks exceptionally beautiful tonight.”

Several people turned to glance at her, and one of Cassidy’s cousins gave a wolf whistle. Emma smiled and waved awkwardly. Cassidy caught her eye and smiled. His eyes were warm as he watched her, heating her even from across the room.

The flutter Emma felt from that one simple look reminded her how lucky she was. She didn’t need his words or whistles to tell her she was beautiful. All she needed was one glance from him and she felt beautiful.

Her father was still talking and people were still laughing politely, but she had eyes only for Cassidy, and he for her.

His sometimes-blue, sometimes-green eyes were the perfect blend today, burning aqua as they held hers across the room.

Daisy pinched her arm ever so lightly to bring her attention back to her father’s speech, and Emma tried to tune in as her father told some long-winded story about how Daisy always wanted to play “wedding” when they were little, and poor Emma would always end up as the groom, and sometimes not even that when Daisy decided that their fat cat was a better life mate.

“But tonight, Emma’s finally getting her moment,” her dad said, grinning around at his adoring audience. “My baby girl is getting married tomorrow, and to a man I couldn’t have picked better myself. Oh, wait…I did pick him,” Winston Sinclair said, with a big booming glass as he took a healthy swallow of his bourbon.

Emma chuckled along with everyone else, even though she didn’t have the faintest clue what he was talking about.

“Do you think there’s any subtle way to wrestle the bourbon away from him?” Emma said out of the corner of her mouth to Daisy.

But her sister didn’t respond. Emma glanced at her, surprised to see that Daisy was looking at Cassidy, her face somewhere between nervous and guilty.

Emma looked at Cassidy just in time to see him look away. From her?

Or from Daisy?

Emma frowned. What was that about? Her sister and fiancé were friends—actually, they’d been friends before Cassidy and Emma had started dating back in college. But this felt…strange.

Emma’s attention refocused on her father, more sharply this time.

“I’m sure you fathers here tonight know there’s nothing worse than watching your baby girls grow up,” Winston was saying. “That moment when you first realize they’re wearing makeup. That first homecoming dance when they’re going with a boy you’ve never met. The first car, first boyfriend, first heartbreak…I went through all of that with Daisy, and it damn near killed me.”

Everyone smiled politely.

“But, Emma…” Her father glanced at her only briefly, lifting his glass in her direction. “Emma was my shy little girl. Never boy crazy. Which was great in high school, but by the time she was in college…well, a father starts to worry, you know?”

“What’s he talking about?” Emma asked her sister quietly.

Daisy didn’t respond.

“So imagine my relief when one of my summer interns turned out to be not only a classmate of my daughters’ at university, but also a star soccer player, a top student, and a perfect gentleman. Well, you couldn’t blame a father for interfering, could you? A kid like Alex Cassidy crosses your path, and quickly becomes your indispensable right-hand man at twenty-one, you take action. Or at least Winston Sinclair does.”

Warning bells started going off in Emma’s mind, although she couldn’t quite place her finger on why. True, Cassidy had gone to work for her father the summer after his junior year—an internship he’d gotten through his loose connection with Daisy. And, yes, her father had taken an instant liking to him…but what did he mean he’d taken action?

She glanced at Cassidy in confusion, but he didn’t look back. His eyes were locked on Winston, and the warning bells in Emma’s ears grew louder as she saw the uneasy expression on his face.

Cassidy was the most confident, self-assured person she knew. Even when the doctors told him that he’d have to give up his soccer career or risk permanent damage to his hip flexors, he’d barely flinched. He’d simply shifted gears, pouring all the energy he’d once dumped into soccer into…

Oh my God.

He’d dumped all that energy into Emma’s father’s company.