They went through the motions, with Barry explaining what would happen at every step. It went pretty fast, which was good, because, like Bash, Carter was hungry. So when Barry told them they were good to go, everyone headed out to the restaurant.
Bash rode with him.
“Taking Rhonda tonight, huh?” he asked on the way.
“Yeah. She’s my date.” Nothing like taking your ’67 Mustang Shelby as your date for the night. She was also going to be his date tomorrow. Less complicated that way. He typically didn’t bring a date to a wedding, and he especially didn’t need or want one at this event. He had enough issues to deal with.
They were going to have dinner in Tulsa at the Polo Grill on Utica Square. Emma’s parents had provided the rehearsal dinner, and Georgia Burnett had fine dining down to an art form. She’d booked a private room, so they all gathered in there, where cocktails were provided.
Carter headed for the bar to order a whiskey, straight up, determined to ignore Molly the rest of the night.
Except she was dragged to the bar by Jane and Chelsea and Emma before he had a chance to get out of the way and go hide among his friends.
“Carter. You brought Rhonda with you tonight,” Chelsea said.
“Yup.”
Molly cocked a brow, then looked around. “Who’s Rhonda?”
“His car.”
She smirked. “You named your car?”
He shot her a look. “You named your car.”
“That’s different,” she said with a shrug.
“In what way?”
“Never mind.”
He took another drink, figuring the less said, the better, since their first meeting didn’t go all that well.
“Oh, you have to see Rhonda,” Jane said to Molly. “You’ll understand then. Let’s go outside and you can show her, Carter.”
Such a bad idea. But Emma already had Molly by the hand, pulling her toward the door, so he downed the contents of his whiskey in one swallow, then followed the women outside.
There was no doubt about it, Rhonda was impressive. He always kept her gleaming, and her navy body paint with white stripes stood out in the crowded parking lot. She got a lot of looks from passersby as well.
“Oh. So that’s Rhonda,” Molly said.
“Yup.”
“I can see why you’d name her. She’s a beauty.” Molly turned to face him. “It was always your dream to own a ’67 Shelby.”
He was surprised she remembered. “Yeah, it was.”
“You must be doing very well.”
“I’m doing okay.”
“He’s doing better than okay. He owns four auto repair shops now,” Emma said with a wide smile. “Worked his butt off over the years. At least that’s what Luke tells me.”
“Worth the hard work for something like Rhonda. She’d go very well with my hair,” Chelsea said with a wink.
“I’ll take you for a ride in her sometime.”
“It’d be more fun if I got to drive her.”
Carter shook his head. “No one drives Rhonda but me.”
Chelsea sighed. “You’re no fun, Carter.”
He slanted his gaze toward Molly, who looked as miserable as he felt.
“We’d better go back inside before people start missing us,” Emma said.
Carter held open the door as the women walked inside. He caught a whiff of Molly’s scent—something vanilla—as she walked by. He got in line behind her as they made their way back to the private dining room, trying not to notice the tension in her shoulders, the stiffness in her back, or the sultry sway of her hips that was more natural than affected, because she was definitely tense walking in front of him.
When they got back to the room, she went one way, and he went the other.
Wasn’t this going to be fun?
He did a lot more drinking than eating during dinner, and it was a good thing he didn’t have to give any toasts because he was starting to feel the effects of the whiskey. Emma’s parents toasted, wishing the couple well, and Martha and her husband, Ben, did as well. He barely tasted the food, which was a shame, because the steak looked really good.
All he could think about was Molly, who kept her focus on her sister. She smiled at the appropriate times, and laughed when someone told a joke. But her laugh didn’t meet her eyes, and she no doubt wanted this to be over as much as he did.
He was just going to sit here and wait for everyone to leave and have another drink.
“You okay?” Luke asked as the party broke up and everyone started to leave.
Carter looked up, smiled, and nodded. “I’m fine. I’ll see you tomorrow.”
“Okay.”
After everyone left, he headed to the bar and asked for another whiskey. Then another. He was going to have one hell of a headache tomorrow, but he’d deal with it.
Tonight, he just wanted to forget.
MOLLY CLIMBED INTO her car and turned the starter, listening to George cough as he struggled to come to life.
She also noticed Carter’s Mustang still sitting in the parking lot. Everyone else had left.
She shouldn’t care, but she’d noticed—out of the corner of her eye when she shouldn’t have been looking, but couldn’t seem to help herself—that he’d been downing a lot of whiskeys tonight. She also noticed—even though she shouldn’t—the look on his face.
Misery. Unhappiness.
Not her problem. She was miserable and unhappy being here, too.
George sputtered and conked out on her.
Dammit. She’d just wait five minutes, like usual, and start him up again.
She should have just ridden with her parents as they’d suggested. But her independent streak refused to allow her to sit in the back like she had when she’d been a kid. She wanted the option to flee if necessary.
Currently, there’d be no fleeing.
As she counted down the minutes, she stared at Carter’s car—or, Rhonda, as she was called. She sure was pretty. She hoped Carter wouldn’t stumble out of the bar drunk as hell and bash Rhonda into some tree.
Not that it would be her problem if he did.
She tapped her fingers on the steering wheel.
Well, hell. Taking her keys out of George’s ignition, she slid them into her purse and went back inside, figuring it wouldn’t hurt to just check.
Maybe he was meeting someone here, like a date, and she could just duck out, satisfied that some woman would be driving him home.