“So tell me everything I need to know about this wedding,” he invited, wanting to get them back on task. She looked up, and he could see the relief in her eyes at the change of subject.
“Well, it’s going to be a big deal: a destination wedding, with an intimate”—she used air quotes—“rehearsal dinner at the venue. Very sophisticated and elegant; Clayton’s parents insisted.”
Something in Daisy’s voice alerted Mason to the fact that she wasn’t too impressed with her future in-laws, and his eyes narrowed.
“Tell me about the groom.”
Daisy shifted uncomfortably. She didn’t like Clayton, she didn’t trust him, and she hated the way he made her feel. His comments about her body when nobody else was listening, so subtly insulting but couched beneath layers of bonhomie, had set her teeth on edge from the very beginning. The way he crowded her space when he spoke to her, the “accidental” brushes against her breasts when no one was looking—usually followed by insincere apologies and jokes about how her chest was hard to avoid—and the times he patted her butt with seemingly casual affection. He made her skin crawl, and she avoided being alone with him as much as possible. She hated the fact that Lia was marrying him but didn’t know how to verbalize how she felt.
The last time his hand lingered a little too long on her waist, she tried to confront him about it, and he had blinked at her innocently, affected surprise, and made her feel like she was reading way too much into the “affectionate” and “brotherly” pats.
“You’re hardly my type, Daisy doll,” he had guffawed. “Maybe you’re the one harboring less than sisterly feelings toward me. After all, it’s not uncommon for a younger sister to covet what her older sister has. But I’m a taken man, sweetheart. So don’t read too much into my hugs. I’m just trying to be brotherly.”
“Daisy?” She blinked in response to Mason’s gentle prompt and shook her head slightly as she came back to the present. “Where’d you drift off to?”
“Nowhere. Sorry. I was just trying to think of how to describe Clayton Edmonton the Third to you.”
“That’s a mouthful.” He chuckled, and she grinned.
“He insists on always being introduced that way.”
“Well, that tells me a lot more about him than you could possibly imagine,” Mason said.
“Really? Such as?”
“Such as the fact that he’s a pompous ass for one.” Daisy snorted in response to that, and he grinned. “Go on, tell me I’m wrong.”
“I can’t,” she confessed with a helpless laugh. “That was pretty much spot on.”
“You don’t like him much.”
“I don’t like him at all,” she corrected, and his gorgeous eyes went somber.
“Any particular reason? Aside from him being a pompous ass?”
“He’s not good enough for my sister. And I’m pretty sure he’ll wind up hurting her, but how do I tell her that when he’s been nothing but charming and loving to her?”
“And less than charming to you.” How the heck was he so astute? Or was she just that transparent? It was a little unnerving.
“Somewhat.”
“In what way?”
“That doesn’t matter.”
“It does to me.” His green eyes pinned her to the spot, and she felt unable to even blink. “And more importantly, it does to you.”
“It’s just little things really.” She didn’t want to tell him about Clayton’s creepiness. What if Mason dismissed her fears as her imagination too? Clayton was good looking and successful and engaged to Daisy’s very beautiful older sister. Why would he even look twice at dumpy little Daisy? So she settled for vagueness, not wanting to see the disbelief in his eyes if she told him the main reason for her dislike of Clayton. “I don’t believe he’ll be good to her.”
“Have you tried telling Lia how you feel?”
“Yes. Both Daff and I have. But it’s hard to put a damper on all that happiness. She seems genuinely in love with him, and whenever we say even the slightest negative thing about him it hurts her.”
Well, Mason could kind of relate to that; after all, he’d avoided telling Spencer about his bitch ex-girlfriend for similar reasons. But then again, they’d already broken up and telling Spencer would have achieved nothing, while it seemed like Dahlia McGregor was on the verge of making the biggest mistake of her life. Mason for damned sure wouldn’t have kept his mouth shut if Spencer and Tanya had stayed together.
“Okay, so the groom’s a douche bag, anything else I need to know?”
“His best man, Grier Wentworth Patterson, is an elitist snob who thinks that anybody from an even slightly lower income bracket is there only to serve his drinks and pander to his needs.”
“Charming.”
“Most of his other groomsmen are cut from the same cloth. I met some of them at Lia’s engagement party,” Daisy said and tried to keep her tone neutral as she thought back to that party. Shar had let it “slip” that the guys had drawn straws to see who would be partnered with Daisy. The toxic cow had then held a hand up to her lips in faux regret and tittered that she “hadn’t meant” to reveal the demeaning information. Of course she hadn’t.