Just A Little Fling

“Did you know that Steffi and I are soro…soror…sorory sisters?” She tried to get a grip on her drink, giggling when it sloshed over its rim and splashed red liquid onto the white linen tablecloth. “Oopsie! What was I saying? Oh, yeah—me and Steffi. We are just like that.” She squinted, trying to focus long enough to put her index fingers together. “Like that.”

“I got it.”

Tipping over to one side, she propped herself up on an elbow. “You are so cute, y’know?”

“Uh, sure. Whatever.” When she waited expectantly, he hastened to add, “And you, too. You’re beautiful. But you already know that.”

“Well, duh. Come on, don’t I see myself in the mirror? Like, news flash.”

Okay, not even for a few hours could he put up with this. He started to rise.

“Hey, where you goin’? Am I invited?”

He tried to remind himself that he wasn’t looking for conversation, just one night of guilt-free seduction, nothing too taxing, nothing too clingy, just fun and a few fireworks. What was he going to do otherwise? Go back to his room by himself, drink the other half of the bottle of Scotch, and fall into a depressed stupor. Yeah, that sounded enticing.

Feather gave him a sly wink, winding her tongue around a cherry she’d plucked from someone else’s drink. After fooling with it for a few seconds, she popped it out of her mouth with the stem neatly tied in a knot. “Everybody has to have a talent,” she giggled.

Ian sat back down.

“LUCIE,” DELILAH ANNOUNCED, “I think we need to find some guys and fast. You and I—and especially you—need a fling.”

“A fling?” By this time, Lucie had ditched her shoes under the table and rolled up her sleeves, and she was feeling much better. She’d also switched from champagne to strawberry margaritas, and she swirled sugar onto her tongue while she considered her fellow bridesmaid’s idea. “You mean like a one-night stand? Why exactly do I need that?”

“Dying on the vine, my dear. Dying on the vine. I mean, here we are, bridesmaids at this big, ugly ol’ wedding with a million guys running around, and what are we doing? Talking to each other.” Delilah shook her head sadly. “We need to get out there and find us some guys. You know, for overnight. Or maybe not even overnight, just a couple of hours. Heck, just a couple of minutes!”

“You are so bad,” Lucie returned in a stage whisper. She said with determination, “If I’m doing it, I’m not settling for a couple of minutes. Not tonight.”

“You go, girl!”

“Darn right.” Lucie lifted her chin. “Did I tell you it’s my birthday? And not just any birthday. The big 3-0.”

Delilah’s mouth dropped open. “Get out! You’re thirty? Today? Okay, now I know I’m right. Lucie, honey, you are in dire need of a little nookie, a little fun, some snap and crackle, y’know? I mean, good grief.”

“I don’t know….”

“Oh, come on!” Delilah’s speech picked up speed and volume as she gained enthusiasm. “Go for it! Have a fling! You’ll never turn thirty again. Besides, you’re a bridesmaid. It’s what bridesmaids do. Look around you—everyone is pairing up.”

Through the mist of a few too many alcoholic beverages, Lucie surveyed the rapidly thinning crowd in the ballroom. “Oh, my god. You’re right. There are trysts forming before my very eyes!”

In fact, directly in her line of vision, she saw Ian, the handsome best man, sitting very close to Steffi’s maid of honor, the one with the silicone-inflated cleavage and legs up to her chin. From here, it looked as if the two of them were getting cozy. Very cozy. Yuck.

And if she looked the other way, her gaze hit snippy little Steffi, out on the dance floor in her white lace wedding dress, clinging to her handsome groom like there was no tomorrow.

Steffi, twenty-one and married to a drop-dead gorgeous guy in his thirties. Her hideous maid of honor, also twenty-something, also attached to a gorgeous guy in his thirties.

And here sat Lucie, thirty and alone. “Well,” she said with spirit, “isn’t that a kick in the pants?”

AS IAN TRIED to decide where he was going with this, Feather made her move. Bending in close enough to give him a full view of her dangerously round breasts, she slid a hand onto his knee, teasing the edge of his kilt. She whispered, “Are you feeling what I’m feeling?”

“What are you feeling?”

“Hot. Hot, hot, hot.”

He smiled. Okay, so he was human, and when a woman put her hand under his kilt, he had the obvious reaction. “Maybe.”

“I know you’re as turned on as I am,” she mouthed. “Tell you what—just give me your key, and we’ll take this upstairs.” As he made no move, she pouted and tried, “Come on, Ian. Everybody knows the best man and the maid of honor are supposed to make it on the wedding night. It’s kind of a…” She winked at him. “A tradition.”

He told himself not to be an idiot. She might not be the swiftest boat in the fleet, but Feather was a beautiful, willing, sexy woman. Was he really going to turn her down?

Not on your life. He reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out the key. The number 2-0-3 caught the light of a nearby candle as he slipped it across the table.

Feather offered a triumphant smile, nabbing the key and sticking it quickly into the small plaid handbag looped around her wrist. “You go ahead,” she said in a breathy voice. “I’ll just freshen up and then I’ll be right with you.”

As she toddled off in the direction of the ladies’ room, Ian pondered the odds of her actually making it up the stairs to his room. Fifty-fifty, he decided. But hey, that was like letting fate decide whether a horizontal tango with Feather was meant to be.

He grabbed the bottle of Scotch on the table, stopped by the front desk for another key to his room, and strolled up to the second floor, still in a very dark and cynical frame of mind.

If Feather made the climb or if she didn’t, it was no big deal to him.

“IT’S WHAT HAPPENS at weddings, Luce. It’s like they pump something into the air. All the sexual tension, the weepy till-death-do-us-part stuff, everyone thinking about honeymoons and garters and sloppy kisses and white lace and roses and…Well, the open bar doesn’t hurt, either.”

“Okay, so everyone else is doing it. That doesn’t mean I have to,” Lucie protested. “I’m just not that kind of person.” She hiccuped delicately. “Besides, my father would have a fit.”

“What’s he got to do with it?” Delilah argued. “And why would he even have to know?”

“He wouldn’t, I suppose. It’s just…he’s very hung up on toeing the line, not making waves, not doing anything that would embarrass him.”

“Let me get this straight. This is the same man whose daughter just foisted this Scottish monstrosity of a wedding on about four hundred people?” Delilah shook her head so hard she looked dizzy. “Lucie, you are thirty years old. What your father does or doesn’t like is hardly important at this point—especially when the old jerk let Steffi have her wedding on your birthday.”

“Oh, I’m sure none of them remembered. It’s not like it was intentional,” Lucie assured her new friend.

“That’s even worse.”

“Not really—”

“I’m telling you, Luce,” Delilah interrupted. “Tonight, for a few hours, you deserve to think about you, to celebrate the big 3-0, to be as wild and wicked as you’ve always wanted to be.”

Still, Lucie hesitated.

The other bridesmaid demanded, “Come on, Lucie, what are you afraid of?”

What was she afraid of?

“Don’t be shy—don’t even think about it,” Delilah counseled. “After all, it’s no biggie.” There was a spark of mischief in her smile. “Just a harmless little fling.”

2

JUST A LITTLE FLING.

It might not sound scary to Delilah, but it was like jumping off a cliff to Lucie.

“I don’t know if I can,” she hedged. But a tiny, reckless voice inside her whispered, You know you want to. “I—I don’t know.”

“Which is exactly why you’re sitting here by yourself on your birthday, with nobody warm and friendly to curl up to.” Delilah pushed herself to her feet. “Harsh words, my dear, but true. Don’t look now, but my best shot at my own fling is heading for the bar, and I think I can intercept him. Paolo has my name written all over him.”

With a determined glint in her eye, Delilah stalked off in search of big game.

“Paolo?” Lucie muttered, squinting after Delilah. “Who is Paolo? Oh, good heavens. It’s the cranky busboy.”

Dejected, Lucie watched the candle flame sputter into a wisp of smoke in front of her. The bride and groom had left. Ian and his bimbo had left. Delilah was hot on the trail of a busboy. And Lucie was alone at her table.

Alone on her thirtieth birthday. This was just wrong.

“I’m going to do it,” she said suddenly. Fortifying herself by chugging the last of her margarita, Lucie stood up and unsteadily surveyed the ballroom. “Who’s it going to be?”

She frowned, weighing the prospects. It couldn’t be just anyone. Her head might be buzzing with champagne and tequila, but she still wasn’t stupid enough to put the moves on just anybody. Nobody with a wedding ring. Nobody who looked too old or too young or too…scary.

But then who? Shaking her head from side to side, Lucie tried to clear her mind enough to make a rational decision. Not that there was anything rational about any of this.

It’s my birthday, the brash, foolhardy side of her brain argued. You didn’t get even one present. You deserve this!

Okay, okay. The fling was on. So who was the lucky guy?

There was a relatively cute guy over by the dance floor giving her the eye, but he looked kind of strange. Or maybe just a little too eager.

And then there was Baker Burns.

Good old Baker. Feeling sentimental all of a sudden, Lucie smiled. He gave her a friendly wave from the cake table, where he was casually eating dessert, not a care in the world. He, too, was all by himself. Hmm…Okay, so he wasn’t terribly exciting. But he was safe, and that seemed like a good idea at the moment. Safe, predictable, boring Baker Burns…

“He’s perfect,” she whispered. All she wanted was one night of—what had Delilah called it?—nookie. One night of nookie. No future. No trouble. Just one night. Who else but Baker Burns fit that bill?

So she grabbed her tartan purse, the useless little thing Steffi had given them all as bridesmaid’s presents, and padded purposefully to the cake table.

“Hello, Baker,” she began, working hard to keep that breathless, tipsy tremble out of her voice.

“Hiya, Luce,” he said calmly, holding up a plate in each hand. “Did you want white or chocolate? Don’t worry—only the icing is plaid.”

Naturally he assumed she was trolling for extra wedding cake. “Oh, no. None for me, thanks.” As he set down the plates, she forged ahead, determined to be bold. What did vampy, flirty girls do in these situations? Maybe a little eyelash batting? “Having a good time, Baker?” she inquired coyly, leaning in nearer and flapping her lashes to beat the band.

He’d turned away to retrieve his own cake, but he stopped, his fork in midair. With concern, he asked, “Is there something wrong with your eye?”

Oh, hell. Eyelash batting was a bust.

“Listen, Baker,” she said, coming right out with it, “I’m by myself, you’re by yourself, and it’s my birthday. I was wondering whether you were interested in getting together tonight. You and me.”

“You? A-a-and me?” It sounded as if a hunk of cake had lodged in his windpipe. He choked, “D-did you just…?”

“Right. You and me. What do you say?” When he still couldn’t manage to get out any words, Lucie snapped, “Come on, I haven’t got all day. Do you want to sleep with me or not?”

Baker’s eyebrows rose past his receding hairline. “Are you drunk?”

“Heavens, no.” Lucie paused, wondering if the cake behind Baker was really tilting or her eyesight had gone wacky. Best not to think about it. “Well, maybe I’ve had a little more to drink than normal,” she admitted. “But that’s not what this is about. I’m serious, Baker. What do you think about a wedding-night fling with an old friend?”

“Y-yes. Sure! Now? Do you want to leave now?”

“Yes, I want to leave now. Right this minute.” Before I lose my tequila-induced nerve.

“Okay.” He paused, carefully placing his plate back on the table behind him. Taking a deep breath, he peered at her, as if he couldn’t quite believe what was happening. She knew the feeling. “Where? I mean, your room or mine? I mean, you do want to go to a room, right? You don’t have fantasies about, like, the 18th green or a phone booth or the hood of a Corvette or something, do you?”

Lucie’s mouth dropped open. Clearly, there was more to Baker than she’d realized. Eighteenth green? Phone booth? Hood of a Corvette? She swallowed. “Actually, I was thinking of a, uh, bed.”

A bed. Good lord. Bed. She’d no more said the word than hazy, smoky images assailed her. Images of sheets tangled around sweaty, naked skin. Pillows and blankets scattered to the four winds in reckless, passionate abandon. Springs squeaking in protest as bodies thrashed above them. And a man, pressed so close she could hear his heartbeat, feel his heat, touch his…

Baker cleared his throat. “Um, Lucie?”

She jumped, wobbling onto one foot, as her erotic reverie ended in a hurry. Get a grip, she told herself curtly, fanning herself with the miniature handbag. We’re talking Baker here. Forget tangled sheets and mad passion. This is Baker.

“Listen…” He wiped his brow with the back of one hand, reaching into the pocket of his jacket with the other. “About the room thing. Mine’s fine, if you want to. I mean, I’m in…” he peered at his key. “…uh, 302. Where are you?”

She glanced at the brass key in his hand. Curving script that read Highland Inn was etched into the metal, and then the number 302. “You mean Steffi put you up here, in the Inn?”

Oh, sure! Baker had a room at the Inn. Probably every single member of the wedding party except Lucie got to stay right here. But her? Not even close. “I’m in some junky motel halfway to Wisconsin,” she told him with more than a touch of annoyance. “I’m not even checked in yet.”

“Uh, right.” Baker blinked. “Well, it doesn’t sound like we want to have our, uh, liaison there. So I guess it’s my room then. You know, if you want to give me a few minutes, I could go on up and arrange some champagne and candles and stuff. That might be nice.”

Lucie barely heard him. She was still seething over the way Steffi managed to diss her, even when it came to a hotel. He awkwardly handed her the key, and without thinking, she grabbed it and dropped it into the bottom of her tiny purse.

“All right then,” he told her, his words tumbling over each other. “But I want you to know, if you change your mind, I won’t hold it against you. I’ll just wait, oh, I don’t know, a half hour, and if you’re not there, I’ll blow out the candles and forget it ever happened. Okay?”

“Right. Half an hour.” And then she realized what she’d done. She’d just taken Baker’s key. They had made an official…assignation.

It’s not too late to back out, the timid half of her brain put in. Are you really sure you want to do this?

But Baker was already scooting off to the stairs, sending her encouraging glances over his shoulder.

“Baker,” she called out, “about what you said, about how I might need to, maybe, I don’t know, reserve the right to, you know…”

Change my mind? But he was gone.

“What have I done?” Lucie cried. With the ribbon ties on her purse clutched in both hands, she swung one way and then the other, looking for something in the room that would give her courage or help her make up her mind. “The ladies’ room!”

She had no idea why that would help, but it always seemed to. The few times she’d been on rotten dates and she was trying to decide whether to bolt or stick it out, a trip to the rest room had been really comforting, really useful. She could splash cool water on her face, sit down for a sec, give herself time to think. At the very least, she could loosen her uncomfortable skirt and get a little more blood flowing.

“A time-out is just what I need,” she decided, making a beeline for the ladies’ room out in the hall on the other side of the ballroom.

She pushed open the door in a rush, giving herself a pep talk and not really paying attention to much else. Momentarily blinded by a cloud of perfume and hair spray, she almost collided with the same giggly blonde she’d seen sticking her hands under Ian Mackintosh’s kilt earlier, Steffi’s insipid, snobby maid of honor, the one with the stupid name. Flora? Fauna? No, more like Finger. Flicker?

Whatever her name, she was exactly the person Lucie did not want to run into.

“Would you watch where you’re going?” the girl snarled. “What a klutz.” Only it came out more like klush. With a huff, she turned back to the process of peering at herself in the mirror over the sink, attempting to add another layer of lipstick to already overglossed lips.

One look and Lucie could tell that the maid of honor was sloshed to the gills. Maybe it was the flushed cheeks or the drooping eyelids or the slurred speech. Or the way the girl’s head bobbled back and forth as she tried to focus on keeping the lipstick remotely inside her lipline.

“Isn’t that attractive?” Lucie muttered.

“Can I borrow that?” another twenty-something chirped, popping up at the first one’s elbow. “It’s mocha cocoa muck, isn’t it? I love that color on you, Feather.”

Oh, right. Feather. Worse than Flora or Fauna.

“It is not mocha cocoa muck. It’s Poisonberry Smog. It’s all I ever wear. And no, you cannot borrow it,” Feather returned, giving herself another thick coat of the stuff, smacking her lips at the mirror. “I need it. All of it. I want to leave marks all over him.” She swung one arm wide, almost hitting her friend. With a smirk, she added, “Three days from now, Ian Mackintosh is still going to be finding traces of Poisonberry Smog.”

Lucie narrowed her eyes. The idea of Feather applying Poisonberry lip-prints all over Ian Mackintosh was too disgusting to contemplate.

And then the blonde made it even worse. Giggling, she trotted over to a small machine attached to the wall, started spinning the crank, and scooped little multicolored packets out of it like there was no tomorrow. “Free condoms!” she cooed. “And I plan to use every single one of them.”

“Excuse me, but don’t you think you should leave some for the rest of us?” Lucie interrupted, skirting around the sink and honing in. “I think the machine is there as a courtesy, not for your private stock.”

“Oh, yeah, like you expect me to believe you need one. Puh-leez.” Her nose in the air, Feather tossed about ten of them into her plaid minibag and closed the drawstring with a vicious jerk.

Really starting to get ticked off here, Lucie grabbed a handful herself, whipped out her own identical purse, and shoved in the rainbow assortment of small squares. She made a point of yanking her ribbons, too, with the same show of force. Only she yanked too hard and the whole purse went flying, like a slingshot, smacking Feather in the right eye.

“Oh, my God!” Feather howled, dropping her bag, strewing condoms and cosmetics every which way as she covered her injured eye. “She tried to kill me!”

“I’m so sorry,” Lucie tried immediately, hovering there. “Are you all right?”

“Do I look all right? I’m probably blind, you idiot!” She began to wail loudly, as her friend attempted to pry her fingers away.

“Feather, I think it looks okay. Really.” The other girl bent to gather the scattered items. “Your lipstick rolled under the sink, but I got it. Don’t move, because the blush and mascara and stuff are right by your foot. Where’s your purse?” She glanced between the two matching plaid bags lying side by side on the floor. “Which one is which?”

“No problem. We’ll just look inside. I think this one is mine,” Lucie said awkwardly, reaching for the closest purse. She opened it quickly, finding seven or eight condoms and a Highland Inn key right on top. Yeah, that’s what should be in her purse. But just to be sure, she pulled out the key. “Room 203,” she read. That was what she recalled Baker had said.

“Give me my purse!” Feather cried tearfully. “If that’s yours, I want mine. With all my stuff in it. I need to fix my eye. My mascara is running!”

“I put everything back. It’s fine,” the friend said soothingly. “Look, here’s your makeup and your room key and, see, I’m putting all your condoms back…”

Deciding a quick exit was in everyone’s best interests, Lucie got out of there, clasping the small tartan bag securely to her chest. But where was she going to go?

The reception hall was almost empty as she passed through. It seemed everyone had either paired up or gone home. Walking slowly into the front hall, Lucie hesitated. It had started to rain again during the reception, and she could hear the steady pitter-patter of the downpour against the windows.

On one side was the main door, leading to the outside world. On the other was the big double staircase leading to the second floor and the hotel part of the Inn.

Which way? Should she march out the front door into the rain, find the parking lot and her car, and drive an hour to that cut-rate motel in the middle of nowhere when she’d been drinking? Or should she pull out the key to room 203, climb the stairs, and have her cozy little rendezvous with Baker Burns?

She’d been over all the reasons she wanted to do this, all about her neglected birthday and her nine-years-younger sister marrying the perfect man and now poor Baker up there with champagne, depending on her, and her in no condition to drive…She licked her lip, gazing around at the Highland Inn, at the flickering candles casting a romantic glow on the soft stone walls and that wide, inviting, dangerous staircase.

“Lucie, are you a woman or a worm?” she asked out loud. “You’re not a child, you’re not a virgin, and you have condoms. What more do you need? Lightning bolts?”

As if some cosmic force had heard her words, there was a huge clap of thunder, and the front hall lit up with the slash of accompanying lightning. Lucie jumped about a foot.

“Okay, so I got the lightning bolt.”

A rushing sound filled her ears, as she stumbled up the stairs, one hand stuck to the heavy wooden railing and the other clutching the key. “What’s that number again?” she murmured, squinting down into her hand as she hit the landing. “Was it 302? No, 203.” Bad time to turn dyslexic. Maybe she was just nervous.

Nervous? No, she was petrified!

But lo and behold, there was room 203 right in front of her. She tiptoed up, she slid the key into the hole, and easy as you please, the door yawned open.

Her heart pounding, the rushing sound getting louder, Lucie took one step inside. Inky blackness greeted her.

So much for candles and champagne. She must not have made it upstairs within the allotted time. Poor Baker must’ve decided not to wait. That was okay. In her newfound boldness, she would simply wake him. In a way, it was less scary like this. She would strip off her clothes, climb in with him, and ease them both into this fling thing.

Lucie paused, waiting for her eyes to adjust, but it didn’t help much. She could make out a large, square blob directly ahead, with a few other indistinct shapes looming here and there. A canopy bed, maybe, with curtains pulled around it. And a desk? There was no light coming in at all to relieve the unrelenting darkness.

“Baker?” she whispered.

No answer. Had she said his name out loud or only thought it? If only she hadn’t drunk so much champagne and knocked back all those margaritas. If only her brain were functioning.

But if she hadn’t, or if it were, she wouldn’t be here, would she?

She took another step. Her stocking foot slid on a pile of fabric lying right in her path. Although it gave her a moment of panic when she began to slip, she caught herself and then stood still for a second, trying to refocus her swimming head. Peering down, she also identified the nubby wool still cloaking her foot. A kilt. A black-and-red Mackintosh tartan, just like all the groomsmen had been wearing. Baker’s kilt.