by Taylor Hart
The Midnight Groom
Last Play Christmas Romances
Taylor Hart
Copyright
All rights reserved.
© 2015 ArchStone Ink
No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior permission of the publisher. The only exception is brief quotations in printed reviews. The reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form whether electronic, mechanical or other means, known or hereafter invented, including xerography, photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, is forbidden without the written consent of the publisher and/or author. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author. This edition is published by ArchStone Ink LLC.
First eBook Edition: 2015
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the creation of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events or locales is entirely coincidental.
Contents
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Epilogue
The Betting Groom: Last Play Christmas Romances - Will’s story
The Risky Groom: Last Play Christmas Romances
The Haunted Groom by Karly Stratford
The About Face Groom: Last Play Christmas Romance Karly Stratford
Also by Taylor Hart
About the Author
Prologue
“I’m pregnant,” Katherine Cruz whispered into her cell phone.
There was a pause, and Katherine knew her husband was tearing up. This had been a long, hard-fought battle. They’d spent four years trying to get pregnant, including two full rounds of IVF treatments.
“Re-ally?” Cam’s voice broke, and she could imagine him standing at his desk and staring out at Storm Stadium.
“Yeah.” She sniffed as she walked out of the clinic and toward her car. Since the process had been so long, they’d promised each other they wouldn’t make a big deal out of today. She wasn’t sure it was a promise she could keep.
“Kat,” he whispered. “That’s amazing.”
A laugh escaped from somewhere deep inside of her. She’d been so afraid that she hadn’t been able to hope for it.
Cam laughed too. “Whoop!”
“Go Storm!” she yelled, putting her fist into the air.
“That’s right, baby,” he said. “Go Storm!” They always did that cheer when they got good news. After all, Cameron was the owner of the Denver Storm.
She found herself doing a little leap to the car. “Meet me downtown for dinner. Francesca’s!” It was their go-to Italian place, next to their downtown high-rise apartment.
“Ah, you’re craving carbs. You must be in a good mood.”
“It’s carbs for nine months, baby! I’m going to get so big you won’t recognize me. I’ll be as big as a house! You’ll be embarrassed to say I’m yours.”
Another whoop came from his end. “Never, Katherine Foster Cruz. You’re mine forever! I’ll just get as big as a house with you!”
Despite the tears in her eyes, she laughed as she climbed into her car. “Love you! See you in a couple of minutes.”
“Coming now. Love you. Be safe.”
She clicked off the phone, buckled her seat belt, and glanced in the rearview mirror to haphazardly blot the tears under her eyes. They were having a baby! As she drove out of the parking lot and headed toward the freeway, she turned on the radio and sang the popular Sloane Kent song at the top of her lungs: “Make it rain, baby! Make it rain!”
Memories of when she’d first met Cam in Jackson played through her mind. She hadn’t even known who he was, and she’d told him she was engaged when she wasn’t. The love story had been epic, and she was ready to move on to this next chapter of having a family.
Katherine’s mother would be so happy. They had the best relationship now. Katherine would call her father too, even though he’d been absent from her life for a couple of years. He was holed up somewhere on the Maine coast, writing the next great American novel. Another rippling laugh came out of her. She didn’t even feel sad thinking about her dad. Nothing could touch her!
She thought of Cam’s sister, Alicia, and her husband and their two boys. They lived in Cheyenne, and she and Cam saw them all the time. Often, they would go down to the ranch and ride horses. She loved his sister. They would have to call Alicia and let her know the good news later tonight.
Katherine turned onto her exit, suddenly voracious. She’d gone completely off carbs, trying to be thinner, but not now. No way. Sure, she’d take care of herself, but tonight, they would enjoy pasta. And cheesecake! Francesca’s had the best cheesecake.
Once she’d pulled into their garage and parked in her spot, she texted Cam. I’ll meet you at Francesca’s. I’m ordering the garlic bread to start.
She practically skipped through the exit that led to the street. As she waited at the stoplight to cross the street, she muttered a prayer of gratitude. “Thank you, Lord, for the strength to carry a baby. Thank you, Lord, for the man I married and his love and care. Thank you, Lord, for all things.”
The light for pedestrians sounded, and she walked across the street, noting it wasn’t busy right now. There really wasn’t anyone on the roads; it was only three thirty in the afternoon.
The last thing she heard was a horn blaring before she felt the truck hit her and throw her. She barely registered a crunching sound from somewhere nearby, and then it went dark.
Chapter 1
1 Year Later
Cameron Cruz stood on the edge of the cruise ship and stared into the black night. He’d stood in front of a judge three weeks ago, and he remembered the pity in the judge’s eyes as he’d read the account of what the paparazzi had said to him about Kat.
“Will it be hard for you to handle Christmas this year without your wife?” the reporter had asked that day in late November. Cam had been able to ignore the reporter until he’d added, “Are you still trying to find the guy who hit your wife?”
Bam! He’d smashed the reporter’s camera against the ground, then punched the guy square in the jaw.
Anger and a surge of adrenaline coursed through Cam every time he thought about the reporter’s question. That fury was just an echo. When it had actually happened, Cam had wanted to punish the reporter like he would have punished the guy who’d killed Kat.
Pulling out his phone, he sifted through the last ten emails from different PIs he had hired to keep the investigation open. They still didn’t know who had killed his wife and unborn baby. Cam had watched the only video footage the police had confiscated for their investigation roughly a thousand times. Over and over, looking for anything. He watched the pickup run into her and mow her down, back up and run over her again. Finally, the guy got out of the truck. He’d run to her, checked her pulse, and then climbed in the truck and sped away. The guy was roughly six feet with buzz-cut hair. His face wasn’
t visible in the footage. Cam had personally gone to every building owner and asked for any footage, but this was it. It’d been a year, and this was all they had.
Well, and the star. There had been a star on the inside of the guy’s wrist, a tattoo that wasn’t spectacular. They couldn’t pin him to any gangs or any prison groups. Plus, the truck had been stolen, so the trail had gone cold.
Cam’s heart had gone cold with it. When he’d watched Kat’s coffin lower into the ground, he’d felt frozen. Like stone.
Strike that. He’d also felt fierce, seething anger. Anger that had him hiring and firing some of his best players on a whim over the past year. Anger that had the media buzzing with worry about the Storm. When Will Kent injured his shoulder last month, it had only added to the anger. The Storm had a shot at the championship game, and he didn’t need problems with his quarterback’s shoulder.
When the reporter had badgered Cam, he’d been an easy target to strike at. Cam was lucky that the reporter, Grimm, hadn’t pressed charges. No, that wasn’t quite right. Cameron let out a grunt. Grimm had taken the payout, but the judge had still sentenced Cameron to twelve weeks of mandatory therapy three times a week. Three times a week felt extreme to Cam, but his attorneys had accepted it.
The only reason he was on this cruise was because his sister, Alicia, had shown up and begged the judge in private chambers to give him a week off for a seven-day cruise with the family for Christmas. She’d told him it would be the best therapy—to get away and spend time with his family. Cam didn’t know how Alicia had done it, but the judge had agreed, so here he was.
He clicked over to the video he’d already seen a hundred times and re-watched the scene at the charity event for the children’s hospital from last night. His hand clenched into a fist. The same reporter who had messed with him had bludgeoned his players, and unsurprisingly, the players were behaving like idiots! They would pay when he got back.
The past two days had taken a lot out of him. Going on the excursions and smiling for his sister, her husband, and her kids had exhausted him. Being a “happy uncle” wasn’t easy anymore.
Two days down, five to go. He wished he could have stayed holed up at home, getting more information from his PIs. While he’d considered having his personal helicopter fly out here in the Caribbean to pick him up, it would take special permission from the judge, and he was only semi-confident he could make it happen. The other thing holding him back was the fact that his sister had jumped through a ton of hoops to make this happen, and he adored his twin sister. Not to mention her boys and her husband and the ranch they ran outside of Cheyenne, Wyoming.
He had no one else. Emotion clogged his throat for a second, and he sucked in a breath. Alicia deserved a brother who acted like his old self.
He’d gone to three weeks of therapy before this, so that was nine appointments. Cam had thought they would be a joke, but he liked Dr. Houston, who mostly asked him probing questions that Cam didn’t have to answer. In fact, in the first two weeks, Cam hadn’t answered at all, but last week, he’d started to talk a bit.
Dr. Houston said the one thing that had stood out to him was that Cam never let himself relax. Breathe, Cam, he’d told him. When you feel like it’s starting to overwhelm you, just breathe. Cam sucked in another breath now. At least the air was cool out here on deck.
He would admit that even though the days were brutal on this cruise playing pretend, the evenings were cool and less crazy when he could stand by the rail and think. He could breathe. Of course, his mind always wandered back to Kat. He wished she were here. He gripped the edge of the rail harder, and it almost felt like she put her hand on top of his.
Closing his eyes, he thought about how she’d been the only woman for him. When he’d found her, it’d been the stuff of sickeningly sweet holiday love stories. The stuff of love ballads. In fact, he’d written a song about it and performed it with Montana Crew. He had so many good memories—at least he had that.
“Cam, I wish you would get some rest.” His sister’s voice was quiet as she drew close.
He snorted. “You know I don’t sleep much these days.”
“I worry about you.”
He cocked an eyebrow at her. “You can back it off a tad, sis.”
She leaned into him. She’d never been the back-it-off type. “Are you having fun?”
He thought of the excursion to the beach on the first day, where he and his nephews had built sandcastles and played volleyball and Frisbee. Today, they’d toured some Inca ruins and eaten amazing lobster tails. Gently, he put his hand over hers. Everyone was trying hard, not just him. “It’s going great.”
“I’m glad it worked out for you to come.”
He nodded. “Me too.”
She stood straighter. “Well, I’m bushed, and Craig’s waiting on me.”
“You don’t need to check on me, Alicia.” He said it pointedly. His twin sister had always felt like she had to take care of him, especially after their father had passed five years ago, but she didn’t.
Putting a soft hand on his shoulder, she leaned up and gently kissed his cheek. “I want to.”
Any annoyance he felt toward her evaporated.
“I love you, Cam. Even when you’re at your worst. Even when you go through hard crap and shut me out and do stupid stuff, I’ll always love you—so just get over it.” She moved to turn away.
He grabbed her hand. So often over the last year, he hadn’t thought about anyone else’s pain except his own. “Thank you.”
Her brow furrowed. “We all loved her, Cam. Of course, not like you loved her. But you have to let this go. This obsession with finding the hit-and-run guy. Holding on to that, it’s eating you from the inside out. You need to … forgive him.”
Abruptly, he let go of her hand and turned back to the ocean. “Forgive the man who killed my wife?” He bent over the rail, and anger surged. He kept his voice controlled. “I need to bring him to justice. That’s what I need.”
“Is it?” She leaned over the rail, too.
Jerking to face her, he asked, “Are you kidding me?”
“It’s your job to make the man pay?”
“I’m her husband, so yeah, it’s my job.” He jerked a thumb at his chest. “It’s my right.”
They stood together silently. She sighed and pulled back.
His heart pounded, and he thought about how it might feel to slam the door on that man’s prison cell.
“Forgiveness, Cam.”
He held up a hand, but didn’t turn. “Stop.”
“Cam, I just think that—”
“Alicia, you need to understand something. I may be on this trip, but I don’t want to hear this the whole time.” He jerked his head back to meet her eyes. “I can’t let go. I can’t give up trying to find this …” There were so many inappropriate words he wanted to say, but he didn’t want to disrespect his sister by saying them. “Don’t ask things of me that both of us know aren’t possible. I have to check in with the PIs several times a day, and now, I have a bunch of players on my team running around acting like idiots.”
She blinked, and her face softened. “Okay.” She sighed. “It’s been nice to see the real Cameron Cruz come out the past two days.”
“Oh? Who is that?” he challenged, finding it ironic that he’d felt like a complete faker for the past two days.
“The one who jokes and plays with his nephews, the one who builds sandcastles. Whether you like it or not, it’s good for you to be here, to focus on something else.” Her smile widened. “The one I adore.”
“He’s always been here,” he said softly and guiltily.
She pointed at him. “When he’s not on his phone.”
People used to say he was relentless as a quarterback, but those people should meet his sister. Then they’d understand.
She tilted her head to the side. “The Cameron Cruz I know always finds someone to help out at Christmas. Have you done that?”
“What?” Was
she really asking if he was Secret Santa-ing? He blew out a breath and turned away from her. “No. I guess that man’s gone.”
She hesitated. “Look, I’m sorry.”
Silence.
“Cam, I … it just … it would have been nice to have you at dinner with all of us in the dining room.”
Did she realize how hard this was for him? He stared into the face of the sister he’d adored his whole life. “Okay, I’ll come to the dinners with you guys from now on.”
She cocked an eyebrow. “You know there’s a singles’ group who came on this ship too. A few of them were in there dancing.”
“No.” That was not happening. “No way.”
“Cam, if you love me—and I know you do, because I’m your big sister by two minutes who beat up kids in grade school when they picked on you—give me your phone.”
It was true. She had beaten up a few kids when he’d gone through a really awkward phase.
She squeezed his hand. “Please, let me have your phone. You need to take a vacation from the PIs and the little boys on your team. Just for the next five days. Please.” She sighed. “You know the judge asked me to report back to him.”
He shook his head and let out a breath. Dang, the woman wouldn’t give up. It might be stupid, but his sister was right about taking a break. He was obsessed with finding this guy, and it would be really hard to stop looking at his phone.
“Please, Cam, can we just be together? Can you just relax? Don’t make me talk about Dad and what he would want for you.”
“Don’t bring up Dad either.” He missed his dad, who had passed the year before he’d met Kat. Passed while driving to Denver to watch one of his games. His father’s passing was one of the reasons he met Kat. He’d been hiding out from the media in Jackson, Wyoming.
