“What if I’m not?” she asked lightly.
“Abigail, don’t go there.”
Her hands gripped the club too tightly and she had to force herself to relax.
“Abigail,” she repeated. “Shit, now you sound just like my brothers.”
She was bent over from the waist, lining up her shot when Tucker’s feet entered her peripheral.
“Cooper is bad news. You think I was an asshole this morning? He’d sleep with you before dinner, grab another woman at cocktail time, and once he’s done with her, he’d be on to the next.”
She glanced up at Tucker before taking her shot.
“And your point is…”
Tucker looked really pissed off now. Interesting.
A shot of adrenaline pulsed through Abby as she stared him down. His cheeks were red, his hands were clasped into fists, and the look on his face was not nice. It was fierce, almost…possessive.
“My point is that a guy like Cooper isn’t the right guy for someone like you.”
“And my point is, that if you want your parents and family off your back about us, a little harmless flirting on my part will probably do it.”
“No,” he said roughly. “That’s a bad idea.”
Abby relaxed her grip, settled her hips and loosened her shoulders. She exhaled and hit her ball, a nice clean sweep, watching it soar through the air to land on the green within a foot of the hole.
The devil might have been nipping at her heels. Or maybe it was the fact that she suddenly felt as if she had nothing left to lose. But the fire in Tucker’s eyes told her something. It told her that maybe he was jealous at the thought of Abby and his cousin together.
Jealous.
And that meant that maybe there was something between them. Maybe that hot and heavy thing was exactly what she wanted it to be. A spark. A flame. Maybe it could turn into a goddamn volcano.
Call her crazy, but Abby figured there was only one way to find out—the question was how to get it done without actually sleeping with Cooper?
She smiled and tucked her club back into her bag and slid back into cart. “Let’s go,” she said lightly.
There were several holes to get through. There was the rehearsal dinner.
And there was the illusive Cooper Simon to pretend-seduce.
What could go wrong?
Chapter Seven
Tucker grabbed a cold beer from the waiter and leaned back against the bar as his family began to gather in the hotel restaurant for dinner. The impressive group of Simons had just come from the Fernham estate twenty minutes away, which boasted an old antebellum mansion where the wedding rehearsal had taken place and where the wedding ceremony would be performed tomorrow.
Tucker wasn’t in
the actual wedding party, so he’d passed on heading out there to watch, and instead after golf, had relaxed in his suite while Betty had taken Abby to the spa to get their toes done.
He glanced at his watch and scowled. That was nearly three and a half hours ago. How long did it take a woman to get her damn toes done? He’d had time to make several business calls, shower and change, and was already on to his second beer.
He took another swig, eyes narrowed as his cousins Cooper and Rick arrived at the reception. Their younger sister, Calista, was the bride and both of them were standing up for the groom.
Cooper hadn’t shown for golf this morning and Tucker was guessing either a woman or a bottle of Gray Goose was to blame. He thought about is some more. Probably both.
Rick nodded and elbowed his brother as Cooper turned toward Tucker. It was eerie how much Cooper looked like Beau. Hell, they could pass as brothers, well, except Beau wasn’t an asshole.