Strip Search (Tap That)

Finally, Leighton spotted Winnie Schwartz, the bride who had won a spot on Wedding Crashers. The way the show worked was Sadie’s team came in, did a whirlwind makeover of the wedding that the bride and groom had planned, then blew on back out. Leighton usually arrived a week in advance to secure a new venue and arrange for floral, catering, etc, while Sadie flew in the day before the actual wedding. Leighton didn’t do any filming. It was all presented as if every creative idea and venue hot spot was Sadie’s idea, not Leighton’s. But because this particular couple did not have a gut-wrenching backstory to film, Sadie wanted Leighton to manufacture some outrageous moments. A crew was meeting her here in twenty minutes to get some clips of the bride with her friends at her bachelorette party. They would film three or four hours so they had plenty of shots and moments to draw from to get about sixty seconds of footage. Surely Leighton could force herself to be witty or adorable or probing and pushy or something in that timeframe to force a reaction.

She found herself desperately wishing her mother were here. Barbie Van Buren knew how to make drama happen.

Winnie, having met with her that afternoon, recognized Leighton and stood up. She enthusiastically waved her over.

Yep, Leighton had chosen the wrong outfit. Winnie was in tight jeans and an equally form-hugging T-shirt that read “Cheers, Bitches.” There was a veil on her head and a large dildo on a string of beads around her neck. She was going to have to lose the penis before filming. Leighton hated to be a cockblock but they were a so-called family show.

Winnie reached out and enveloped her in a hug when she got to the table. Having come from a family who avoided physical affection like an IRS audit, Leighton was always startled when people she barely knew invaded her personal space. But in the interest of bringing it, she hugged Winnie back. They had clicked when they’d met that afternoon. Winnie had zero social awkwardness and Leighton envied that. She had also thought Winnie seemed genuinely in love with her fiancé and happy with her career as a dog groomer. It must be nice to have everything you’d ever wanted. Or at least confidence in what you said.

Leighton had never had that. She’d developed a stutter by age three and her mother’s insistence that beauty pageants would fix the problem had done nothing but erode her already shaky confidence. The stutter had eventually gone away, the anxiety had not. Even as she hugged Winnie back and asked her if she were having fun, she was wishing they could sit down. Standing in the middle of a crowd of seated people made her far too much the center of attention. All she could think was that everyone was looking at her and were probably annoyed that she was blocking their view.

“Sit, sit!” Winnie said, grabbing an empty chair from the next table and pulling it next to her.

It was jutting out into the aisle and blocking the server’s path, but at least Leighton could sink down into obscurity. Loud social events just wrung her nerves.

That blissful relief lasted all of one minute before an attractive and fit brunette bounded onto the stage with a mic and shouted, “Let’s hear it for our bachelorette party! Congrats to Winnie Schwartz on her upcoming nuptials to Todd Lawrence!”

Winnie gave an ear-splitting shriek of excitement.

The Wedding Crashers cameraman, Jackson, appeared at Leighton’s side, hunched down so he could talk to her. “It’s going to be hard to set anything up in here,” he yelled, cupping his hand to her ear. “We don’t have any room for lighting or a mic it’s so crowded. Do you think we can clear some of these people out?”

Leighton studied the enthusiastic women drinking and having fun. “Uh, no. I’m not throwing these people out of a Friday night hot spot.” She envisioned being punched in the face by an irate Minnesotan. “Just get a few shots of Winnie and then we can interview her in the parking lot.”

“Come on up here, Winnie,” the woma

n up front with the mic said. “The Tap That Dancers want to congratulate you.”

Winnie leapt up with a dexterity that made Leighton’s eyes widen. It was like she’d won ten million dollars.

“Come on, girls!” she said to her bridesmaids.

Four women around the table stood up with varying degrees of enthusiasm, but they were all good-natured.

“You, too, Leighton!” Winnie grabbed her arm.

“Oh, no…” She shook her head in horror. “It’s your wedding, I couldn’t. No, no.”

“I insist!” Winnie tugged harder.

Leighton shot a look of panic at Jackson, who had known her for two years.

He grinned. “Go for it.”

“Traitor.” She had thought he would save her. But he looked amused by the prospect. “I can’t do this, Jackson.”

“Of course you can.” He gave her a double thumbs up. “Have some fun for a change.”

Fun. Why couldn’t people ever appreciate that her idea of fun did not involve booty grinding? Her fun was a book, a cup of tea, and smelling the roses. Literally. Not dancing on a platform.

But before she could figure out a strategy to hide behind one of the muscled men and give a few tepid dance moves, Winnie shoved her up on stage and she collided with the hockey player. “Oh, my God, I’m sorry,” she murmured, feeling her cheeks burn.

“No problem.” He tried to move past her and they both went the same way and bumped into each other again. He laughed.

Leighton was horrified. She jumped backward and landed against a wall. Only that wall had arms that reached out and steadied her. Anxiety causing her throat to constrict, she whirled around and found herself face-to-face with the stern and super sexy cop. She had to raise her chin to look into his eyes and what she saw there made her want to die. He wasn’t laughing. She opened her mouth to apologize but nothing came out.

It was at that moment one of Winnie’s bridesmaids felt compelled to twerk. On Leighton’s ass. A strangled gasp emerged from her mouth and she felt sandwiched between a rock and a hard place. Trapped between a jiggly female booty and a very firm, very unrelenting stripper cop, Leighton had no idea where to go or what to do. She felt the telltale rush of heat up her neck and to her temples, the one that said she was about to have a full-blown panic attack.

Her expression must have revealed her distress because the man said, “It’s okay. Take a deep breath.”