Seven Groomsmen from Hell (Love by Numbers 6)

“Loud and clear,” I responded to her. “Anything else, mistress?”

Khloe sighed. “As much as I hate to admit it, my name is attached to this, so please don’t embarrass me.” She turned and groaned like she was about to take a party of six year olds into a McDonalds play place and started to trudge forward. “Let’s go.”

We all raced inside, and I intentionally stayed behind Khloe to watch her hips sway in the flowing skirt she was wearing. We entered and she stopped to talk to a woman dressed in a white button-up shirt, and a pair of tight short-shorts. She handed her an envelope and then shook her hand, and turned back around towards the door, jumping a little when she nearly ran into me.

“Well, I’m surprised you aren’t in a boob sandwich right now,” she hissed at me.

“The night’s still young,” I responded. “Besides, I’m an ass man.”

Khloe gagged and then looked over her shoulder at the sound of resounding applause. One of the women was already topless and had Kent by the hand and was leading him into a private room and shutting the door.

Khloe shook her head. “This practice is barbaric,” she turned back towards me, “and if he cheats on Anna, I’m holding you responsible.”

“He’s not gonna cheat on Anna. Believe me, I’ve tried to get him to,” I responded.

Khloe’s nose turned up into an entirely grossed out expression. “You are a terrible human being.”

“I’ll take that as a compliment.” I took off my shirt and swirled it around above my head. Khloe pretended to be disgusted, but I could see her checking me out. Her eyes even danced with curiosity over the other guys as they floated around as well. “So, you came all the way out here. Why don’t you let me buy you a drink?” I reached out and grabbed her hip and pulled her closer to me. “I’ll make it worth your while.”

Khloe snatched away from me, reeled her hand back, and slapped the dog shit out of me. It sent jolts of excitement straight to my dick. I wanted her more than words could say.

“Keep your hands off of me,” Khloe murmured despite the bright red blush across her cheeks.

I chuckled evilly before risking it all to lean in and give her a kiss on the cheek, just barely managing to duck out of the way as she swung at me again, and made my way down to the join the guys and strippers.

Game, set, match, Khloe DuBois; you will pay for that slap.

8

Khloe

As I watched the landscape of Texas disappear beneath the clouds, I began to wonder exactly where I had gone wrong in my life. Had I unintentionally pissed off some god or crossed fate poorly or somehow earned myself a steaming hot plate of bad karma? I’d planned everything so perfectly. I demanded that I be put in charge of booking the plane tickets so that I could intentionally situate myself as far away from the groomsmen as possible. In fact, I’d even sacrificed comfort to do so, placing myself in coach while all the guys were sitting up in first class, but wouldn’t you know it, the person who was sitting next to me in my original seat had a baby with a special accommodation need. The airline was very apologetic for the mixup, and bumped me up to first class to meet the needs of the other passenger, and the flight attendant had a blush and a grin as she informed me I was being moved to sit between two of the most attractive men she’d ever seen. Little did she know, they were also two of the biggest assholes on the flight, Luke Heath and Dr. Cody Williams.

Any other two groomsmen would have been sufficient. I could have held my own against David, Brett, Mason, Bram, or Christian, but Luke and Cody were the two groomsmen I hated the most. Luke was an extraordinary asshole, but Dr. Cody was in a league all his own. He went out of his way to make me feel small, insignificant and dumb. Every time he looks at me, my chest goes tight, and I can feel his judgment weighing down on me like a thousand bricks. It was going to be a miserable near 5-hour flight.

“Uh oh, doctor,” Luke started as soon as I sat down. “The babysitter has arrived.”

Cody looked down at me through his piercing, deep green eyes. “I suppose we had better be on our best behavior then, yes?”

I just ignored them. I shuffled myself into the seat between them, put my headphones in, and immediately went to ignoring them entirely. My brain went a little hazy and the intermingling smell of Luke’s more sweet smelling cologne with Cody’s dusky one. The flight attendant wasn’t wrong by any stretch of the imagination. Luke and Cody were good-looking men; they were drop dead gorgeous. In fact, Kent’s groomsmen were a veritable walking men’s calendar. From the outside, they seemed like the perfect men, but in reality they were pretty presents with shitty gifts inside, but my eyes often betrayed me and sent the wrong message to my heart and… other parts of my body.