The Mistake (Bad Bridesmaids #1) - Noelle Adams Page 0,3

was convinced by that. She giggled and wiped away a few tears before giving her another hug.

Amanda managed to hold on to the pose of unadulterated joy until she turned away from her sister. Then she took a ragged breath and swallowed over a painful lump in her throat.

Stacey might have had a crush on Dave—her sister’s best friend—for most of her life. But Amanda had been in love with him. He had always been the prince of her daydreams too, but she didn’t get the fairy-tale ending.

Because two hours ago he’d married her little sister.

A server walked past her just then with a tray of filled glasses of champagne. Amanda grabbed one and took a couple of gulps.

It was the lower quality champagne that they’d switched to after the first hour of the reception, but it was decent. The dry, bubbly liquid hit her tongue and then her throat. She took another deep breath, feeling more like her normal, poised, always-in-control self.

She was prepared to face the day again. She only had a couple of hours left before she could escape.

She could do this.

She didn’t really have a choice.

In the middle of her mental pep talk, her eyes happened to land on a man standing alone across the room. He was leaning against the wall, sipping a glass of what appeared to be whisky.

He was watching her, and for some reason she knew he saw more than she wanted him to.

He saw everything.

She was hit with a wave of uncomfortable vulnerability. A feeling she wasn’t used to at all. She’d never spent a lot of time thinking about Robert Castleman, although she could remember almost every conversation she’d ever had with him, starting with that night outside the restaurant. Mostly he’d been Taylor’s uncle in her mind but also someone who made encounters strangely exhilarating. Although their families had always been friends, he’d been living in London while Amanda was in high school and college, so he hadn’t even been on her radar back then. But ever since he’d moved back to Richmond four years ago when his father died and his mother needed extra help, he’d been part of Amanda’s extended social circle.

She saw him semiregularly. At weddings and funerals and birthday parties and occasional random run-ins. She’d always labeled him in her mind as smart and kind of exciting but distant. She could always have a fun conversation with him. About books or politics or movies or people. But he also always seemed to see inside her. Too deeply. Too intimately. If she thought too much about it, it made her uncomfortable, and the only way she’d come to deal with it was knowing that he saw the world through a standoffish, impersonal lens.

Yes, maybe he could see what she’d prefer to hide, but he didn’t really care about it—about her—so it was fine. But it didn’t feel fine today.

She shivered when she met his gaze, and suddenly she felt completely naked. What the hell right did he have to watch her like that? To see beyond the surface that way? To recognize that she’d been close to tears all day despite her convincing act of joy at the occasion?

She scowled at him before she could stop herself.

Then she took a couple more gulps of champagne.

Turning away from Robert intentionally, she silenced a groan when her gaze ended up on her sister and Dave. He was as handsome today as she’d ever seen him—thick brown hair, deep brown eyes, the strong, solid build of a football player. He smiled at her and waved when he noticed her watching him, and she grinned back, waving like an idiot to make sure he didn’t question her mood.

Dave and Stacey had started dating only two months ago, and they’d gotten engaged only a few weeks after that. Ever since Amanda had learned they were together, she’d been working on putting her own feelings behind her, and she’d done a pretty good job if she did say so herself.

She wasn’t going to be the kind of person to yearn for her sister’s husband. She wasn’t like that. She’d never been like that. But that didn’t mean today wasn’t still hard—it signaled the final death of daydreams she’d had for fifteen years.

“Amanda!”

She turned toward the sound of her mother’s voice, steeling herself for what was likely to be an annoying conversation. Her smile never wavered as she said, “Did you need something, Mom?”

Amanda’s mother was still an attractive woman with the same