Sharon hadn’t been particularly communicative with him - she hadn’t even informed him what she was going to do - and she definitely hadn’t gotten his consent before throwing him in her aunt’s way.

“Shouldn’t a lady appreciate a man’s muscles?” Sharon asked, just as loudly as before, with a high-pitched fake giggle that grated on Jake like nails on a chalkboard. “I appreciate a man who is good with his hands.”

It was all Jake could do not to cringe as she rubbed her hands over his arm.

“Have you been drinking?” her mother asked, her tone veering toward shrill.

Rolling her eyes, Sharon linked her arm back through Jake’s while he did his best to pretend he was invisible. Or at least, not a part of this. More than one person in the room was now looking at him with a kind of pity, as if wondering what he was doing with someone like Sharon.

While that did make him want to jump to her defense, just a little, he also couldn’t blame them. At the moment, he was kind of wondering what he was doing here too. He’d signed up to be her date, not to have her talk down about his job or try to show him off like he was some kind of trophy beefcake that she’d picked up to taunt her family with. A blue-collar trophy, since they apparently had a problem with that.

He grit his teeth, looking anywhere but at the little vixen who was pressed up against his side.

“No, but that’s a great idea,” Sharon said cheerfully, deciding that she’d held off Aunt Lorraine long enough for Melinda to escape to wherever it was her cousin had been trying to escape to. She had probably just needed to get out of her mother’s sight for a bit. It was obvious that tonight everything was being done to Aunt Lorraine’s specifications, whereas Melinda and Mark were completely in charge of the reception tomorrow.

That was why the rehearsal dinner was filled with people who weren’t part of the wedding party or immediate family; because Aunt Lorraine hadn’t had control of the reception. Mark’s family was much more relaxed than Melinda’s, and Melinda had refused to accept a dime from her parents for the wedding, because she’d wanted to be able to do things her way. The compromise had been to let Aunt Lorraine have full control of the rehearsal dinner, which was basically like a mini-reception.

“Come on, Jakie-poo, let’s go get something to drink,” she said, tugging at his arm and pulling him away.