“Oh. My. Goddess,” I exclaimed out loud the minute the conclusion jumped into my head. “You two made a bet about us, didn’t you?”
William’s head wheeled around and he looked at me. “A bet? What kind of bet?”
They didn’t even have to answer my question. I could tell by the way Adam was looking away as if I hadn’t said a thing, and by the fact that Mia was turning as red as a non-medieval era tomato. I was right.
“A bet?” Adam finally looked at me and said. “That’s silly. What kind of bet would we make about you?”
I narrowed my eyes. “Well, I’m guessing that whoever wins gets to set the wedding date…and that you’re betting about William and me sleeping together.”
Adam’s reserve slipped—just for a moment—but it was Mia’s reaction that gave me all the information I needed. Her eyes widened and she had guilty written all over her face.
“What?” William said, shooting out of his seat to loom over the rest of us. He glared at his cousin. “Is that why you’ve been giving me helpful advice? You had a motive behind it?”
Adam held up an open hand to his cousin. “Sit down, man. We can talk about this later. The princess is about to get captured by the bad guy.”
But instead, William grabbed a plastic toy sword—I had no idea where it came from—and pointed it at his cousin. Adam’s eyes widened, but he grabbed the end of the sword and shoved it away. “Hey! Point that thing someplace else.”
The tip of the play sword then returned right back in Adam’s face. “Tell me the truth…what was the bet about?” William demanded of his cousin.
Adam rolled his eyes. “I’m your ride home. Don’t piss me off or I’ll leave you here, stranded.”
William slapped his cousin’s shoulder with the sword. Most likely it didn’t hurt, but Adam stood. “Liam, calm the fuck down.”
William jabbed at him again with his faux blade. That’s when I heard some kid say, “Hey, that man has my sword!”
Adam stepped back, muttering, and Mia laughed, saying to Adam that he was getting what he deserved. William lunged at him again, and the two men promptly headed up the stairs and out the doors that led toward the lobby. Mia and I exchanged glances, grabbed our stuff and followed them out.
“Who’s betting what, here?” I asked her as we rushed up the stairs after the two combatants.
She heaved a sigh. “I knew it was a bad idea. It just started out as a joke. But Adam was positive he was going to win.”
“And the stakes?”
“You were right. Winner names the wedding date. Adam said that William was going to—in his words—‘score’ with you. And I said no, that William isn’t just into something casual.”
“Well, thanks a lot for calling me ‘something casual.’ I think I’m on Adam’s side with this.”
“I’m sorry, Jenna. I didn’t mean it as an insult, but—you know how you are every bit as much as I do. The whole relationship thing is only temporary for you.”
“So? And it’s not a positive thing that Wil could finally lose it?”
“It means more than that to him.”
“He’s a guy. I guarantee that it doesn’t mean more than that.” Even though I knew otherwise, I still said it. Mostly because I hoped it.
We pushed through the doors and instantly heard the sound of hard plastic whacking against hard plastic. Apparently, Adam had grabbed a sword of his own and was fending off William’s blows.
“Dude. Stop the Inigo Montoya act before I really have to hurt you,” Adam said in time with William’s aggressive thwacks against his blade. A couple of times, Adam failed to block William’s onslaught and caught the flat of a “blade” across his thigh or shoulder.
“How dare you!” William said between clenched teeth.
“It was a joke. Shit. Fuck—that hurt, Liam. Goddamn it!” And then Adam began beating William back in earnest.
Mia stepped forward before I could say anything. Not that I was going to. I was completely bewildered by these two well-built grown men going at each other with all of their strength—with plastic swords, no less.
“Hold up!” Mia said, but they completely ignored her. I was stunned, mostly because both of them adored her so I’d figured her word was the law. But they weren’t listening, shoving each other and whacking each other by turns.
People at the bar and the nearby gift shops had come out to watch, and at the periphery of my vision, I saw a uniformed security guard headed their way.
“Guys, you’re about to get arrested—” I began.
“Take this outside!” Mia yelled even louder than before. That they listened to.
“Did they even pay for those swords?” I asked as we pushed out of the glass doors and into the parking lot.
“I threw a bill at the guy when I grabbed the sword,” Adam said between gritted teeth as he glared at his cousin. “And asked them to take a new one to the kid Liam swiped his from.”
William shook his head, muttering. I fell into step beside him, looking at him closely. He was tense from head to toe. I caught Mia’s eye and we placed ourselves in between the two men, who were still winded and glaring at each other.
“Are we going to be able to go home in the same car?” Mia asked the two of them. “Because I don’t want to get caught between four hundred pounds of male bonehead going at it in the back of a limo.”
“You two should really save all that pent-up energy for your practice tomorrow,” I said, suppressing laughter at the thought of “Plastic Swords, Part 2” playing out in the martial arts studio. “You could wail on each other with real weapons then. And if things go your way, William, you’ll injure him so badly that he won’t be able to set a date for the wedding even if he were to win the bet.”
“Why are you even making a bet to determine something as important as your wedding date, anyway?” William huffed. “This isn’t the first time the two of you have behaved so childishly. You should let me set the date.”
Mia’s mouth dropped open.
“Well, that was kind of the idea,” Adam cracked, and Mia elbowed him in the rib cage.
Awkward.
We rode home in silence. Mia finally got the nerve to say something before we got to my house. “I’m sorry, you guys. We didn’t mean to make things weird for the two of you.”