Page 50 of Most Likely to Deny Love (Yearbook #2)

MIA

I stood on the small platform in Bridal Dreams Boutique, feeling like a sausage being prepped for packaging. The skin-colored bodysuit Emily had insisted we wear clung to every curve while the seamstress, Marlene, pinned pale blue satin around me with deft movements.

“A little tighter through the waist, I think,” my mom suggested, tilting her head as she assessed me like a particularly disappointing art project. “Mia will definitely be slimming down before the wedding, won’t you, sweetie?”

I caught Marlene’s frown in the three-way mirror, the quick downward flick of her eyes before she resumed pinning. Heat crawled up my neck as I mumbled something noncommittal.

“It’s important the dresses look uniform,” Aunt Monica added helpfully, circling me like a vulture. “The photographs have to be perfect.”

The other bridesmaids, Laurel, Bethany, and Samantha, all Megan’s sorority sisters, with nearly identical blonde highlights and juice cleanse enthusiasm, nodded in synchronized agreement. They’d already been fitted, their sample dresses hanging nearby like pale blue ghosts of Christmas Future.

The seamstress moved behind me, her voice professionally neutral. “Can you pull your hair out of the way, please? I need to check the back seam.”

I gathered my hair in my hands and swept it over my shoulder, suddenly hyperaware of how exposed my neck felt.

“God, I just hope it works for you this time,” Megan sighed dramatically from her throne-like chair in the corner. “I don’t want a baby whale in my wedding party.”

Marlene gasped softly, fingers freezing mid-pin. The sorority trio tittered behind their hands while Mom made a half-hearted “now, Megan” sound that contained zero actual reprimand.

Emily launched into a blistering response, but I didn’t catch the words. Instead, I stared at my reflection, suddenly seeing myself through different eyes. Jack’s eyes.

The way he’d looked at me in Paris, like I was the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen. His hands sliding over these same curves with reverence. His mouth on my neck, right where I’d pulled my hair away, whispering against my skin how perfect I was, how fucking gorgeous.

That’s it, he’d said, watching me fall apart in his arms. So fucking beautiful.

The words echoed in my mind, drowning out the boutique chatter.

I stared harder at my reflection, trying to see the woman Jack saw when he looked at me.

The curves my mother wanted me to lose were the same ones Jack had traced with reverent hands.

The thighs my sister mocked were the same ones he’d parted with eager desire.

The body they wanted me to change was the one he worshipped.

My whole life, I’d let them convince me I needed to be fixed. Be smaller. Be less. But Jack had shown me a different truth. And suddenly, with crystal clarity, I realized I was done. Done shrinking. Done apologizing. Done letting them dictate my worth based on a measuring tape.

“Unpin me, please.” My voice was low but steady.

Marlene glanced up, surprise flickering across her face before she gave a brief nod and began removing the pins.

“What are you doing?” Megan pushed herself out of her chair, brow furrowed in confusion.

Marlene whisked the material off me and I stepped down from the platform. “I’m done with this bullshit.”

“Excuse me?” My mother’s voice went shrill.

“You heard me.” I slipped behind the changing screen, pulling the body suit off and yanking my jeans and sweater back on with trembling hands. “I’m done being your collective punching bag.”

When I emerged, Megan’s face had gone from confused to shocked. “But... the wedding...”

“Find someone else.” I grabbed my purse from the chair, adrenaline making my fingers clumsy. “Someone who fits your aesthetic better. I’m fine exactly the way I am, and I’m not spending the next four months being shamed into hating myself for your perfect photos.”

“Mia Harris!” My mother’s voice could have shattered glass. “You get back here this instant!”

Aunt Monica was staring at me, open mouthed and speechless, while the sorority trio huddled together, eyes wide with delicious scandal.

“You can’t just walk out!” Megan’s voice cracked. “This is my wedding!”

I paused at the door, looking back at my sister’s genuinely bewildered face. “Yes, it is. And now you can find someone who’ll fit the look you want, without having to starve themselves.”

“Whoop!” Emily shouted, pumping her fist in the air as my mother gasped in horror. “Go, Mia!”

The bell above the boutique door jingled as I stepped out into the crisp autumn air, my heart thundering in my chest.

I’d just quit my sister’s wedding. And I didn’t know what to think about it. All I knew was that I needed to see Jack. Now.

I drove straight to his house on autopilot, adrenaline still surging through my veins. The satisfaction of standing up for myself mixed with the lingering sting of their words, creating a cocktail of emotions that made me feel a little sick.

When I reached his door, I knocked with more force than necessary, shifting from foot to foot as I waited. The door swung open, and there he stood in gray sweatpants and a faded henley, hair slightly rumpled like he’d been running his hands through it.

“Mia?” Surprise flickered across his face. “Is everything okay?”

I pushed past him into the entryway, not trusting myself to explain what had happened without combusting. Pickles trotted up, tail wagging, but even his enthusiastic greeting couldn’t distract me from my mission.

“What’s your favorite thing about me?” The words tumbled out before Jack could close the door.

He frowned in confusion. “What?”

“Your favorite thing. About me.” I crossed my arms, chin lifted in challenge. “What is it?”

Jack stepped closer, running his knuckles down my cheek. “Hmm, let’s see. My favorite thing… It could be your grit. Or maybe it’s your intelligence. Although I do enjoy your sense of humor. And your sweetness. And the way you never back down when you know you’re right.”

My breath caught in my throat. “No, I, um, I mean physically.”

The corner of his mouth quirked up. “That’s impossible to choose.” Then his hands were cupping my face, and he was backing me against the door, his body pressing into mine as his lips claimed my mouth in a bruising kiss. I gasped into it, my hands fisting in his shirt.

When he pulled back, his eyes were dark with desire.

“But if you insist,” he murmured, burying his face against my neck and breathing deeply.

“I could start with your scent.” His hands slid under the hem of my sweater, pulling it over my head and dropping it to the floor.

Then he traced his fingertips reverently over my shoulders, down my arms. “Then there’s your skin. So soft. So fucking perfect.”

His fingers found the clasp of my bra, unhooking it with practiced ease.

As the fabric fell away, his eyes darkened further.

“These tits,” he growled, cupping their weight in his palms. “They haunt my dreams, Mia. Do you have any idea how many meetings I’ve sat through, thinking about how they would feel in my hands?

” His thumbs circled my nipples, drawing them to stiff peaks.

“And this,” he continued, dropping to his knees and pressing a kiss against my belly.

“Drives me fucking crazy.” His hands moved to the button of my jeans, opening them with deliberate slowness.

“The curve of your hips.” He slid his palms over them as he worked my jeans down. “Made to fit my hands.”

I stepped out of my jeans, and he hooked his fingers into my panties, dragging them down as well until I stood completely naked before him. His eyes traveled over me with such hunger that I felt myself grow wetter under his gaze.

“Your thighs,” he murmured, running his hands up the back of my legs. “Strong enough to hold me. Soft enough to worship.” He pressed kisses along the inside of my right thigh, working his way higher and around the back. “And this ass that makes me lose my mind every time you walk away.”

He moved then, wrapping his hands around my ankles before sliding up over my calves, behind my knees. “Definitely these legs. The way they feel wrapped around me.” He pressed a kiss to the inside of my thigh. “Or over my shoulders.”

In one fluid motion, he hooked my right leg over his shoulder, his breath hot against my center. “And this,” he murmured, his eyes locked on mine. “This perfect pussy. So responsive. So wet for me.”

His tongue found me then, broad strokes that made my knees buckle.

I grabbed his hair, the only anchor in a storm of sensation as he worshipped me with his mouth.

He groaned against me, the vibration sending shockwaves through my body.

His hands gripped my ass, holding me steady as his tongue circled my clit before sucking it gently between his lips.

“Jack,” I gasped, my hips bucking against his mouth. “God, don’t stop.”

He looked up at me from between my thighs, his eyes dark with desire as his tongue worked me relentlessly. One of his hands slid from my ass to my entrance, a finger slipping inside, then another, curling to find that spot that drove me wild.

My head fell back against the door. “I’m going to...”

“Let go.” The command vibrated against my core. “Show me how beautiful you are when you come.”

My orgasm crashed over me like a tidal wave, Jack’s name torn from my throat as my body convulsed. He worked me through it, relentless, until I was trembling and oversensitive.

Before I could catch my breath, he was on his feet, yanking his henley over his head to reveal the sculpted planes of his chest. My hands, still shaking from my release, fumbled with the drawstring of his sweatpants, shoving them down his hips.

Jack lifted me effortlessly, my legs wrapping around his waist as he pressed me harder against the door. I could feel him, hot and hard against me.

“Tell me what you want,” he growled against my neck.

“You,” I breathed. “Hard. Fast. Now.”

With one powerful thrust, he buried himself inside me, both of us groaning at the sensation. He set a punishing pace, exactly what I needed, each thrust driving me higher.

“Perfect,” he panted against my ear. “So fucking perfect.”

I clung to his shoulders, nails digging into his skin as pressure built again, impossibly soon after the first orgasm. Jack’s rhythm faltered, his breathing harsh against my neck.

“Come with me,” he urged, one hand sliding between us to circle my clit.

That was all it took. I shattered around him, crying out his name as he followed me over the edge, his release hot inside me.

For several long moments, we stayed like that, Jack still buried inside me, my legs wrapped around him, both of us struggling to catch our breath. The world had narrowed to just this, just us, everything else momentarily forgotten.

When he finally lifted his head, his eyes meeting mine, I saw everything I needed reflected there. Desire. Admiration. Something deeper I wasn’t ready to name.

“So,” he said, his voice still rough. “Want to tell me what brought this on?”

I laughed, breathless and sated, my forehead dropping to his shoulder. “I quit being a bridesmaid.”

His chuckle rumbled through his chest. “About fucking time.”