by KC Klein
Katie hadn’t seen Jett in over three years and had to admit he cut an impressive figure. Rumpled hair, bare chest, and cotton boxers. Jett had put on weight and by the look of him, it was all muscle. His teeth, at one time his only flaw with a slight gap in the middle, were now Hollywood ready. And if women had had a hard time resisting him before, they had no prayer now.
“You need to marry us,” Cole said.
“What?” Jett whipped his head back around to stare at Cole open-mouthed.
“What!” Katie yelled, echoing Jett.
“Right here, right now, perform the ceremony.” Cole was cool and calm as if he was merely watching grass grow.
“Cole, this is stupid,” she said, and wrenched her arm from his grasp. “I’m not marrying you. We are not getting married. I don’t—”
Cole grabbed her arm again and turned her so she faced him. “Don’t talk. You’ll ruin the whole thing. When you’re asked a question, just nod your head.” Cole turned to Jett. “What are you waiting for? Let’s go.”
“Ah.” Jett ran his hands over his eyes, fully awake now. “I’m waiting to make sure both parties are agreeable. I don’t do coerced marriages, even for you, Cole.”
Cole looked back at her. She shook her head, as if waking from a dream. “Cole, this is ridiculous. You don’t even have a ring. I’m marrying some—”
Cole reached into his pocket and pulled out a black velvet box.
She couldn’t breathe. She wanted to run, but couldn’t feel her legs. “Don’t do this. Don’t, not now.”
Cole released her and slowly opened the box. A diamond ring flashed. Her heart skipped, and then sped up into a painful rhythm.
“When did you? I mean . . .” Her voice faded; she couldn’t finish.
“Three years ago. I didn’t lie then, and I’m not now.” Cole’s gaze never left her face. “Jett . . .”
Jett must’ve figured she’d given enough of a consent, that or he wanted to get them the hell out of his house. “We’re gathered here together to witness—”
“For Christ’s sake, cut to the vows,” Cole snapped.
Jett startled. Nervous, he seemed to be trying to remember what came next. “You need to exchange rings first.”
Cole took Katie’s left hand. Thomas’s engagement diamond sparkled large between them. “Let’s finish what we started. Take the ring off.”
“Cole, no, I need to think.”
“The one time I need you to be impulsive and you want to stop and think? Take it off.”
Was she crazy? Had she lost her mind? This couldn’t really be happening. No, it was a dream or drug-induced fantasy. In her mind, she’d married Cole hundreds of times. That’s what this was—just a dream. She’d wake up and be back in her own bed with Thomas’s ring on her finger. She wasn’t betraying him, because this wasn’t really happening. Cole slipped Thomas’s ring off, and put it in her right hand. Then, there on her wedding finger, was Cole’s ring. The one she should’ve worn when she was eighteen and head over heels in love with him.
“Ah, yeah, okay. Cole, do you take this woman for your lawfully wedded wife?” Jett seemed to get more nervous with each passing moment, shifting his weight from foot to foot.
“Yes.” Cole spoke as if he was so sure. Never a doubt.
Panic filled her. Maybe this was real. She just needed to think. And breathe.
“Katie, do you take this man as your lawfully wedded husband?”
A person couldn’t marry like this. This wasn’t even legal, was it?
Cole stepped closer. The blue of his eyes was the only thing real. The room spun and yet, his face was so clear, an anchor when she couldn’t remember her own name.
“Just nod your head, Katie. No, don’t speak. Just nod and I’ll take care of the rest.” Cole lowered to one knee, and held her hand within his. And she couldn’t breathe. Her vision blurred.
“Please, Katie.” His voice broke.
His hand trembled in hers, and she closed her eyes. A sob broke through, and God forgive her, but she nodded. She freed her hand and covered her face. “Yes.”
“Then I pronounce you man and wife . . .”
There was more to what Jett was saying, but that was all she heard since she couldn’t stop crying. What had she done? His betrayal had almost killed her once, and if he walked away again, she’d never survive.
Jett said something, and then Cole was peeling her hands away from her face. She knew him, this man who stood before her. And so she lost herself in the depth of his eyes.
“Kiss me,” Cole said.
She shook her head, a tiny movement, but she couldn’t go there. Kissing would make being with Cole too real.
He cradled her face in his hands and lowered his lips to hers. Soft, a promise of a kiss, and then she exhaled and dissolved against him. Water in the desert, shelter in a storm, shade in the summer, and this was home. He pulled her closer, hands drifting lower, putting heated body parts in contact.
A throat cleared.
Cole pulled back and let the pads of his thumbs stroke her dampened cheeks. He closed his eyes, the black crescent of his lashes like half-moons on his dark cheeks, and breathed deep. His eyes opened and pierced her with the bluest gaze. “Katie.”
He spoke her name with more reverence than any of the vows they’d exchanged, more holy than a fervent prayer. And she was awed. She placed her lips against his, letting her body show him her response, and melted into him.
Someone coughed loudly right by her ear. Katie pulled back, startled. Cole’s gaze didn’t leave her face and slowly, like sunlight peeking from behind a cloud, he smiled. Lazy, one-sided, his dimple punctuating his cheek, but it was enough.
“So ah, guess you’ll be on your way,” Jett said. His gaze darted toward the hallway and back at Cole.
Cole laughed. He sounded the most relaxed he’d been since she’d come home. “Sorry, man, didn’t mean to ruin your night. Go back to whoever you’ve got hidden in your room.” He glanced down at Katie. His hand caressed down her cheek, arm, finally ending in a small squeeze of her hand.
“Jett? What’s going on? You coming back to bed?” said a woman’s voice from behind Cole.
Cole’s eyes widened, his face ashen, and for one moment Katie thought he was going to be sick. He whipped his head around. “Nikki?”
“Cole?” Nikki’s voice came out all high-pitched and squeaky, as she frantically pulled closed a man’s white dress shirt to cover her nothing else underneath.
Cole rounded on Jett. Gone was his ashen look, replaced with the red of an enraged man. “Jett,” Cole growled.
Jett’s hands went up, fingers spread wide. He took a step back. “Cole.”
Cole’s fist connected with Jett’s face. Jett went down. Cole followed. They rolled, crashing into a glass coffee table. An empty tequila bottle clattered to the floor. Cole on top, then Jett. Cole. Jett.
“Wait, just listen,” Jett said, before Cole’s fist landed in his gut. Jett lost the advantage, and Cole lost no time.
Once on top, Cole swung. Nikki screamed.
“You slept with my sister!” Cole shouted.
Jett did a quick upper cut, throwing Cole off top position. The two men rolled until one hit the leg of the kitchen table, knocking car keys off onto the floor. “Cole. Dammit, it wasn’t like that.”
Katie jumped out of the way to avoid getting taken down. Pa had once told her the best way to stop two alpha dogs from fighting was to cool them off. Well, it was worth a shot. Turning on the kitchen faucet to full force, she pulled out the hand-held sprayer, and took aim.
It took a lot of water. Copious amounts of water. Water that formed pools and started to seep toward Katie’s boots.
Cole got a dose right in the face as he turned toward her, hand up. “Okay. Okay! Geesh, woman, you’re not putting out a fire or anything.”
With Jett free, Nikki rushed over and knelt by his side. “Are you okay?”
Jett nodded, but his movement was hi
ndered as he tried to stem the flow of blood from his nose. His gaze found Cole’s. “I should’ve never taught you how to fight so well.”
“You should’ve never screwed my sister,” he said, pushing to his feet.
“You’re such a hypocrite, Cole,” Nikki said, and grabbed the nearest dish towel to place against Jett’s face. “Did you ever think that maybe I wanted to be screwed with?”
Rage flushed Cole’s face, and he balled his fist, ready for another round. “Did he get you drunk? So help me God, if you’re drunk, I’m gonna kill him.”
Jett threw the bloodstained cloth at Cole’s chest. “That’s what you think of me? Your best friend since second grade, and I don’t even get the benefit of the doubt?”
“What do you expect me to think?” Cole shot back. “This place reeks of tequila. You sleep with anything on two legs, and here’s my sister dressed in—God, I don’t even want to say—in the middle of the night.”
The blood on Jett’s face smeared across his cheek. His nose was slightly crooked, his perfect profile forever ruined. Cole didn’t look much better. If he didn’t get some ice on his face, he’d be seeing out of one eye for the next week.
Nikki put her body between Jett and Cole to prevent any more blows. Maybe Katie was the only one not drinking, because she wouldn’t have stepped between them for all the money in the world.
Cole stood in front of Nikki, and with his finger angled her face into the light. A dark bruise showed across her cheekbone. “What happened to you? Who did this?”
Jett jumped to his feet. “If you even ask it, I swear to God, I’ll kill you myself.”
Cole dropped his hand. “No, Jett, you don’t hit women, you just screw them over in every other way.”
Katie winced. Cole was always an SOB when he drank.
“If you’d given me the chance, I would’ve told you. . . .” Jett’s voice trailed off, and he glanced at Nikki as if suddenly embarrassed. “I would’ve told you that it wasn’t like that.”
“Than what’s it like, Jett? Enlighten me, please.”
Jett wiped at his face with the back of his hand and looked at the tile floor. Then his deep brown eyes found Nikki’s blue ones. “I love her. I’ve loved her for sure since she was seventeen and probably before that.”
Cole was silenced, along with everyone else.
Nikki wrapped the shirt even tighter around her middle, doubling the fabric over. “Jett . . . I . . . you said this wasn’t about that. You said this would be no big deal.”
“I slept with my best friend’s sister. Jeopardized the closest thing I have to a brother. It’s a big deal, Nik.”
“I can’t do that, Jett. I can’t. . . .” Her voice trailed off.
Jett put up his hand to stop the flow of words. “Don’t. It’s not a big deal.” He stood and brushed Cole’s shoulder as he walked off.
Katie’s heart broke as she watched Nikki’s face leach of all color and tears fill her eyes. Cole, apparently still trying to wrap his brain around the fact that his sister had had sex, cut in to break the awkward moment. “What the heck did you do to your hair?”
“I think it looks nice.” Katie jumped to Nikki’s defense. “The black with the blond streaks brings out the blue in her eyes.”
“It’s the way it makes her look all pale and ghostly, like the walking dead, that brings out her eyes,” Cole grumbled.
And that much was true, except Katie didn’t know if the paleness was because of Nikki’s new hair, or the fact that she’d just heard Jett’s declaration.
Either way, Cole wasn’t finished. “And really . . . Jett? I think he’s the town’s version of a male ho.”
Just what every gal wants to hear. But Cole’s lack of tact was legendary.
Nikki ran off with a hand clasped to her mouth. Cole looked to Katie as if seeking support, but all she could do was shake her head.
Cole shrugged. “What? How did I get to be the bad guy here?”
Katie arched her eyebrows and crossed her arms. “Uh, I don’t know. By being an insensitive prick?” She rolled her eyes. “I can’t believe this is my wedding night,” she mumbled and left, leaving Cole alone, standing in the kitchen.
Chapter 20
Katie drove Cole’s truck down the main road while Cole sat reclined in the passenger’s seat. Nikki was huddled in the back, eyes wide and panic in her pale face. Katie felt sorry for Nikki. Even though they were nearer in age than she and Cole, she and Nikki had never been close. There had always been a low-level hostility in Nikki’s attitude to her. Jealousy? Pride? She wasn’t sure, but their past didn’t stop Katie’s heart from breaking as she watched Nikki deal with her feelings. Because regardless of what Nikki had said earlier, there was definitely more going on between her and Jett than just a one-night stand.
Cole moaned, a bag of mixed veggies that Katie’d snagged from Jett’s fridge over one eye.
“If you’re going to get sick, make sure you put your head out the window,” she grumbled, but still let her gaze linger on the man sprawled out beside her. There was a reason buttons were made to be . . . well, buttoned. Could the man never finish dressing himself? His shirt was wide open, nicely displaying a tan, broad chest. And his jeans, riding deliciously low on his hips, had her wondering if he wore anything underneath.
The front tire hit a pothole, and Cole groaned when his head knocked against the glass. “Hey, careful. You’re supposed to be nice to me. We’re on our honeymoon.”
Refusing to rise to the bait, Katie found the automatic button and rolled down his window. The fresh air would do him good. He needed to cool off.
On second thought, she needed her window down as well. The wind in her face was a cheap imitation of a cold shower, but it would keep her eyes open. And after last night she needed all the help she could get. What had she been thinking? The whole night seemed surreal, like a really bad weekend in Vegas. She looked down at her fingers gripping the steering wheel, an engagement ring on her right hand, and a wedding ring on her left. Christ, what had she gotten herself into?
Hell, what had they all gotten themselves into? With a quick glance in her rearview mirror, Katie guessed Nikki, who looked like she was going to pass out or cry, was probably asking herself the exact same question. Men! Could nothing be simple?
Katie pulled into the driveway, the tires crunching over the dirt drive. She’d barely put the truck into park before Nikki bolted, boots in hand, bare feet barely touching the ground as she ran into the house. Her heart ached for her, but there was nothing Katie could do; she had her own mess to deal with.
She stole a glance at her “husband” with a frozen plastic bag over half his face, and then down at her own nightshirt, no bra. What had happened last night was not a wedding, and no amount of Cole referencing the “honeymoon” was going to make it true. She needed to set the record straight. “About this wedding thing,” she said.
“What, trying to back out already?” His voice was muffled behind the plastic bag.
Katie rolled her eyes and sighed. She glanced over at Cole. “What happened last night wasn’t legal, and it sure wasn’t a wedding.”
Cole groaned as he pulled himself to an upright position. The veggies dropped into his lap. His eye, already swollen and a tad blue around the corner, gave him the look of a rebel.
“Nothing a little consummation wouldn’t fix, and in case you are worried”—he gestured toward his eye—“this doesn’t put me out of commission. I’m still game.”
“If that’s your pickup line, no wonder you’re all hot and bothered to be married,” she said dryly, but couldn’t help the hint of a smile around her lips.
“I just don’t want it to be said that I don’t take my husbandly duties seriously.”
“Noted.”
Out of the corner of her eye she watched Cole flip down the visor and peer into the passenger mirror. He tenderly touched his face. “Damn, I never should’ve taught Jett how to fight.”
“He said he ta
ught you.” She was unable to resist the jab to his male ego.
“He should’ve taught me how to duck.”
Katie laughed, couldn’t help it. The whole situation was crazy, and she was a bit punchy from lack of sleep.
He flipped up the visor, and gave her his full attention. “I’m just worried that people are gonna get the wrong idea about us when they see our wedding pictures. It’s a small town, and you know how fast rumors get around. But I have to warn you, no one will ever believe that I deserved it.”
Her smile faded at his talk of the wedding.
“Enough, Cole, it’s not funny.” She got out of the truck and slammed the door behind her, putting an exclamation point on her words.
Cole jumped out to follow her. “Whoa, honey, this might be a work truck, but she still wants to be treated like a lady.” He patted the hood as if to smooth any hurt feelings.
Cole needed to get serious. Then she stole a glance and gleaned from his expression that he was serious, but about his truck. She’d had enough. If he wasn’t willing to talk about it, she didn’t have to wait around.
“Wait, Katie.” Cole caught up to her and snagged her by her back jeans pocket, pulling her toward him. She turned. Then he slipped two fingers in her belt loop and pulled her even closer. Her thighs brushed his and her heart sped up a bit. Cole’s hair had fallen over his eyes, and he shoved it back behind his ear. The gesture had her throat tightening. She longed to brush his hair out of his eyes herself.
“You need a haircut,” she said softly.
“Yeah.” His eyes grew warm as if he was saying yes to something else altogether.
She took in the dark circles under his eyes and his almost-full beard and couldn’t help herself, she ran her hand over his whiskers. “And a shave.”
“Yeah,” he whispered again, but then turned his face and laid his lips against her palm.
Her speeding heart came to a painful stop. She withdrew her hand and shoved it into her coat pocket. All of a sudden she didn’t want to talk about their sham of a marriage. “Cole, I need to go. I have to be at the hospital soon.”
