AVERY (The Corbin Brothers Book 2) by Lexie Ray Page B

said, casting a look around, trying to find some outlet of escape. I could only see the bar.
    “If you get through this reception without embarrassing either of us, I’ll make it up to you tonight,” she promised, biting her lower lip.
    With divorce papers? That was the only thing that would make me feel better about any of this — an immediate escape.
    “I’m not sure I know what you’re proposing,” I said, crooking my finger at one of the waiters drifting around the tent.
    “We’re married, dummy,” she said. “I’m talking about sex. Good sex. Wedding night sex.”
    But my cock didn’t so much as twitch. Sex with Paisley had been good, sure, but the fact that we were married now made all my worldly desires curdle and disappear.
    “Don’t bother,” I said. “I’d never want you to do anything you didn’t want to do.”
    “Who says I don’t want to have sex with you?” she asked, drawing her eyebrows together. “We’re married now. We can have sex all we want.”
    “People don’t have to be married to have all the sex they want,” I retorted. “You and I had sex prior to tying ourselves together, remember?”
    “Are you going to be like this for the entirety of the night?”
    “Like what?”
    Paisley almost threw her hands in the air but restrained herself at the last moment. “Like this. Angry. Embarrassing.”
    “All I want to do is to enjoy myself for the sake of these people and then go to bed,” I said. “It’s been a long day, don’t you think?”
    “I suppose it has.” Paisley looked out over the tent at all of the people finding their carefully organized seats — all my brothers were seated together, and her father was seated with a few of his remaining close friends — and I wondered if she was filled with just as many regrets as I was. Had all of this truly been worth it for her?
    “Just don’t get too drunk to mess up our first dance,” she said, standing abruptly. “I’m going to go chat with people.”
    “First dance?” I snagged her by her wrist, detaining her departure. “I don’t dance, Paisley.”
    “Everyone dances at their own weddings,” she said, looking down at me. “I told you this. We’ll be dancing to the song — our song — I had the guitarist play at the ceremony. You agreed to it.”
    I agreed to a lot of things, I was realizing, that I really didn’t like.
    “The first dance better be sooner rather than later,” I said, gulping down another whiskey. “To get it over with.”
    Paisley narrowed her eyes again. “I’ll have a word with the DJ.”
    The rest of the evening was something of a whiskey-tinged blur, people stopping by my chair to yammer inanities, a constant stream of crap I forgot to do, numerous toasts and dinner tucked away in there. I got through the dance, Paisley smiling gently like she didn’t actually want to murder me, and returned to my drinks, wishing that everyone would just go home and stop staring at me. This was natural, right? That’s what Emmett had said. It was natural to have the jitters. Was it okay if they continued well after the deed had already been done?
    “I’m feeling like it might be time to go,” Paisley said, much later, placing her arm gently on my shoulder. I shrugged her off.
    “I’m not ready.” The bar was free, the liquor was flowing, and Sam Summers was footing the bill as a part of the stipulations of the contract I’d just entered into. I’d signed away my life for my family’s ranch. I wasn’t going to leave my own party until I was good and ready, and that meant shit faced.
    “I hate to break it to you, husband, but you’re probably twice as drunk now as you were when I took you home that night,” she said, glancing around, trying to gauge whether we were about to make a scene.
    “Just leave me alone,” I said. “All I want to do is sit here and drink. I’m not hurting anyone.”
    “You’re hurting your reputation, and mine,” Paisley said. “You also look twice as