“First of all, I don’t do what I don’t want, so I’m not here under duress. Second, I can’t help but wonder why you aren’t off with your friends.”
“Somebody has to keep Mom and Grandma busy.”
“Look around,” he said. “Do you see any lack of people here for them to talk to?”
“I don’t want to cramp anyone’s style,” she said, switching from one excuse to another as smoothly as lawyer on redirect. He’d hoped she was over that.
“You need to stop with the excuses. If you don’t like your siblings just say so, but quit hiding behind your injury.”
Her cheeks puffed outward as if they were filling with the angry the words he knew she was about to spew. He braced but didn’t apologize. Let her keep getting angry. Anger was better than self-pity. This probably wasn’t in his job description as a guardian angel, but so be it. When her face had finished flushing to a nice hue of pink, she could no longer contain her fury.
“How dare you? You play the funny, all-round Boy Scout, but you’re no more honest than you’re accusing me of being. I know who you are. Everyone does. And yet you mention nothing about your real life.”
“You know what used to be my life,” he said mildly. “I don’t mention it because it’s not relevant. I’ll tell you anything you want to know about my real life now.”
“Why did you lie about being a cowboy?”
“I didn’t. I work as a dispatcher at a trucking company.”
“That’s crap. You don’t just stop being the best at what you do.”
His curiosity was piqued. Did she not know his life story? The thought was shocking and slightly exhilarating.
“Sometimes you do. Do you know why I quit?”
“You lost your partner. I’m sorry. And if you wanted to quit, it’s none of my business what went into the decision. Just like it’s none of your business why I make the choices I do. You have no right to tell me what I should and shouldn’t do.”
She didn’t know. How bizarre and rare. He grinned at her.
“All right. We’ll make a pact. For tonight, there’ll be no talk about our pasts, whether that’s yesterday or ten years ago or the days we were born. Clean slate and truce.” He stuck out his hand. “Deal?”
She eyed his proffered handshake and blew out a breath. Finally she slipped her cool, soft hand into his. “Deal.”
“So it follows that we only talk about the present or the future.”
“The future?” she asked.
“Like what happens when the DJ starts and I have no desire to come up against Heidi of the Skunk.”
She sputtered a little but didn’t call him on the nickname that was more than a little unfair all these years after the episode that inspired it.
“I have five sisters who’ll all be willing to run interference.”
“The trouble with that, you see, is that I told Heidi Bisset I was here with you.”
Joely dropped her head into her hands and shook it slowly back and forth.
SHE MANAGED TO hold Alec off for forty-five minutes. As she’d promised, each of her sisters danced with him, and he made every partner look good. And after every dance he returned to his seat beside her and cheerfully told her their dance was next. She couldn’t deny how much she wished it could be. She’d once loved dancing. But watching the easy, graceful sway of bodies during slow songs, and the jumping up and down fist pumping that the upbeat tunes required, she knew beyond any doubt that her crushed calf, twisted knee, and crooked spine wouldn’t handle the moves.
Her mother danced with Alec and even Grandma Sadie took her spin with him. Afterward, he returned exhilarated.
“Your grandmother is an amazing woman. I swear she’s more flexible than I am.”
“I guarantee she’s more flexible than I am,” Joely added.
“I think you can’t make a statement like that unless you have empirical data to back it up.”
“Give it up, Morrissey,” she replied.
“How about you give it up with me, Morrissey? Or should I add Mister and be polite?” Heidi stood before them, her slinky red dress setting off her perfect, seemingly ageless body. Joely aged fifteen years in her own mind. “Could I interest you in a dance?” Heidi asked.
Alec stood and Joely stared at him. “Really?” she mouthed when he caught her eye.
“I’m sorry, Heidi,” he said. “But I just agreed to dance with Joely.”
He gave her no warning, just grabbed her hand, hauled her out of her chair, and wrapped his arm around her waist, automatically supporting her weak leg as she shifted into his embrace. Breathless, she looked into his eyes with no idea of what to do next.
“Ready?” he asked.
The shock on Heidi’s face was enough to force Joely into an immediate bid for Oscar consideration.
“Of course!”
He led her to the dance floor casually, with the same unhurried steadiness he’d offered at the church. The level floor and easy pace made this trip even easier, and Joely had no time to fret over her shuffling limp. With his hip bracing hers at each step, she didn’t feel like the awkward center of attention.
He found a relatively empty corner of the floor and took her fully into his arms. Michael Bublé sang out “Save the Last Dance for Me,” and she had just enough presence of mind to understand the irony. Her heart pounded with exertion and excitement, but try as she might to breathe deeply, her pulse refused to calm. The scent of his familiar aftershave, the firmness of his arms around her, and the brush of their torsos as he started to sway only heightened her rush of exhilaration.
“Okay,” he said. “This is above and beyond. Thank you for playing along; I owe you.”
“Maybe you planned this.” She managed to put a tease in her voice, breathe, and start concentrating on her leaden feet all at the same time.
“I wish I’d thought of it. It’s kind of brilliant.”
She stumbled slightly over one of his feet, but he held her fast.
“I can’t talk and concentrate on this at the same time,” she said. “I can barely handle smelling you and concentrating—”
She stopped, mortified. She hadn’t said that. She couldn’t have. She’d only had two glasses of wine. He started to laugh.
“Do I need to apologize? I didn’t think I’d forgotten to shower.”
“No.” She wanted to melt into the floor—but then again, falling to the floor was actually her nightmare, so she made herself look directly into his eyes. In the early evening sunlight they were almost sea green, with flecks of golden brown in a starburst around the irises. “You smell good. Whatever you have on is highly distracting.”
Heaven help her, she was making it worse. She stepped on his foot again with her good leg.
“Hey.” He stopped them and held her still, letting other couples swing around them. “Thank you. Now don’t fumble for words anymore—you don’t need to. Let’s start over and you try shifting your weight foot to foot. Get used to the new gait you have now.”
With all her heart she didn’t want the dancing to be fun. She was right about herself, damn it. She couldn’t do these things; she knew her own body. But she hadn’t figured Alec Morrissey into the equation. He turned out to be a masterful teacher and more understanding than she had a right to expect.
Before she knew it, they’d been on the floor for three songs and the fourth started—Queen’s “Crazy Little Thing Called Love.”
“Do we need to take a break?” he asked.
“One more? I love this song.”
His grin more than answered her question. “You command. I obey.”
“As it should be!”
Her bad hip ached. Her knees trembled slightly. Her “gait” hadn’t really smoothed out in fifteen minutes. But she also hadn’t enjoyed music this much in months. The songs brought genuine pleasure, and the freedom from her chair and walker was intoxicating.
“Ready to try it on your own?” Alec asked.
She frowned.
“How do you mean?”
“You’ve tried it just holding my hands, now let go. Simple. I’ll be right here.”
“Oh, I don’t know.”
“Only if you want to.”
It was the first time he hadn’t pushed. She relaxed back into his embrace and let him lead in the stripped down side-side-rock back step of swing dancing. There was no swinging, but she’d learned to rock back on her good leg and lean into his hold when the weight was on the bad one. She executed her longest string of steps for the night and accepted his cheer when he caught her to his chest.
“You’re a wonderful teacher!” She giggled. “I have to admit I was wrong.”
“So then try the last move I’ll teach you tonight. You don’t even have to let go. Just move back, hang onto my hand and spin under my arm on your uninjured leg. Plant your less solid foot when you’re facing me again and I’ll grab your shoulders.”
“Easy peasy,” she said jokingly.
He counted down the steps, then pushed her gently away. Everything went perfectly until she’d completed three-fourths of the circle. Her good knee buckled slightly, and her bad leg touched down before it was supposed to. Like a shoelace coming undone, her legs tangled and then splayed. Joely lost any hope of balance and crashed through Alec’s arms to the floor in a painful, messy heap of lavender and blue. For one moment sheer panic engulfed her as faces appeared above her and multiple voices collided with one another.
“Don’t move, Joely.”
“Does it hurt, Joely?”
“Can you hear me? Did you hit your head?”
The questions reached her through a fog the way they had eight months ago on a highway while she lay in a twisted knot of steel and broken glass. And then, in one quick second everything cleared. Her brain told her this was just another panic attack and reminded her she had them all the time. She pushed at the wedding guests bending too close and struggled to sit. Her tailbone stung and her elbow smarted, but she hadn’t hit her head.
“Hang on, now. Just wait for us to check you out and make sure you’re okay.” Alec pushed her firmly down.
She grasped his fingers and flung his hand off her shoulder. “Don’t. I’m fine.”
“You might have—”
“Believe me, after what I’ve been through, I know what I might have, and I don’t.”
She rested her uninjured knee on the floor only to find she couldn’t put enough weight on the other leg to hoist herself up. And she couldn’t kneel on the bad leg. Tears of frustration and intense embarrassment threatened to make everything even worse. And then her sisters appeared.
“Oh my gosh, Joely, honey.” Harper squatted in her gown and put her hands on Joely’s cheeks. “What happened? I’m so sorry.”
“I was being stupid,” she managed to say. “I just tripped myself.”
“Are you all right? Mia’s on her way. Let her check you out.”
“No!” Joely hadn’t thought her face could burn any hotter, but the idea of her sister the doctor having to examine her in the middle of her own wedding . . .
“Help me up.” She held a hand out to Harper, ignoring Alec, who extended his arm as well.
Her sister braced and pulled Joely to her feet. The guests on the dance floor cheered and clapped while she prayed for a fissure to open in the earth and swallow her. Making a spectacle like this had turned her nightmare into reality.
“I just need to hang onto your arm and get back to my seat,” she said quietly to Harper. “Everyone needs to stop hovering.”
“When they know you’re all right.”
“I am all right.”
“Okay, c’mon. I’ll get you back and get you some wine.”
“I don’t think I need any more of that, thanks.”
She took one wobbling step with Harper and immediately missed Alec’s rock-steady hold. All she’d have to do was turn to him and he’d take over, but that wasn’t happening. He’d gotten her into enough trouble—talking her into stupid tricks she no longer had any business attempting. He was hot, he was sweet, but more than either of those, he was dangerous.
And he took the last shred of dignity directly out of her hands by swooping in, scooping her into his arms, and striding across the floor.
“Put me down, what are you thinking?” She kicked at his hold but connected with nothing but air.
He had the audacity to laugh. “It’ll be over in three seconds.”
“Make it be over in one. Now.”
He set her in her chair and stared her down. “Calm down.”
“Don’t you dare tell me that—”
Her tirade ended when Mia appeared. “I’m fine!” Joely snapped at her. Mia only smiled.
“I believe you. Just let me ask you questions so I can ignore you for the rest of the night.”
“Anything to get everyone away from me and you back to having fun.”
“I was having a wonderful time watching you,” Mia replied. “You did great. And the slip was totally graceful.”
“How comforting.”
Once Mia was satisfied all truly was well, she kissed Joely on the cheek and went back to dancing. The crowd of worried relatives dispersed, and she was left alone with Alec.
“What can I get you to drink?” he asked, way too cheerfully.
She shook her head furiously. “I don’t want a thing from you. You’re bad for me, Alec Morrissey. You bully and trick me into things I don’t want to do, but no more. Go dance with the triplets—they all have a crush on you.”
She didn’t know that was the case, but he was exactly their type so it could be true.
“C’mon, Joely. We were having a great time.”
She sighed and tamped down her anger and then turned her tired gaze to him. “Please, Alec. Go hang out with the others. I just want to be alone for a little while.”
“Fine. I’ll come back and check on you.”
“Don’t.”
“You know what?” He shook his head. “You need to work through this injured diva act you have going. It’ll backfire on you one of these days.”
And just like that he was back to being a jerk.
Chapter Five
IT ONLY TOOK him two days to show up at her apartment door, a bouquet of daisies and yellow roses in his arms along with a six-pack of hard cider, a bag of fried chicken, and an apology on his lips that didn’t quite match the infuriating twinkle in his eyes.
She hadn’t talked to him since sending him away after her fall at the wedding. The rest of the party had gone without further humiliation—although the incidences of people clucking with concern over her well-being had never ended, which had robbed the special night of some of its glitter.
Harper and Cole had left on their honeymoon first. When they returned, Mia and Gabe would take theirs. The triplets had gone back to Denver where their restaurants flourished. Joely had returned gratefully to the cocoon of her apartment.
She’d survived the weddings.
She might even have succeeded in putting the difficult moments of it into perspective if she hadn’t had to worry about her immediate future. A future with problems she had no idea how to solve. Grandma Sadie had agreed to keep their secret until Joely could make some calls and come up with a few options. The trouble was, she’d never had to take care of such things before—she’d always had people who knew more than she did: her father, coordinators of pageants, and professors at school. Her husband. Her stomach knotted every time she thought about Tim and how little he’d ever told her about the workings of his business, of their life—of his life. Now she had no idea how to begin unraveling her predicament.
So when Alec appeared on her threshold, he represented just one more tightening tug on the knot inside of her, especially because he brought along the most beautiful flowers. She was a sucker for flowers.
“What are you doing here?” She kept her eyes on the roses rather than his face, her annoyance real but her will to fan the spark into anger weak.
&n
bsp; “I don’t like bad blood between me and anyone.”
“Bad blood.” She scoffed. “That’s a little over dramatic.”
“You started looking at me the moment you fell at the wedding as if I could and would pass on the plague in a heartbeat. The look is still there. That’s bad blood in my book.”
“I’m not looking at you any way.”
“You did when you opened the door. Thank goodness I brought the flowers or I’d have a laser hole through my forehead.” He put one hand to the skin above the bridge of his nose and rubbed. “It’s still a little warm.”
She couldn’t help but snort laughter and shake her head while she took the flowers from him. “I was not that angry. I’d only have used the laser had I actually flashed people on the dance floor. But nobody saw above my knees so . . . ”
He laughed appreciatively. “See? You do have a sense of humor about it.”
“I have a sense of humor about yellow roses and daisies. You got lucky.”
“I’ll take it. Could I maybe come in and apologize again? I did bring dinner.”
She could smell the chicken and her mouth watered.
“What would you be apologizing for?” She raised her brows.
“Whatever you need me to.”
“You don’t have any idea why I got upset, do you?”
She rolled her chair back and allowed him to enter. He stepped in, and for one moment he contemplated his answer. She waited for what was sure to be a glossy spout of slick-tongued rhetoric. To her surprise, he shook his head.
“I admit, I don’t. I understand you were embarrassed, but not why it lasted more than a minute.”
She wanted to be angry that he didn’t get it, but she could only think that it suddenly seemed a fair enough question. How could anybody understand what it felt like to need help but not want to be pushed? That it was frightening to lose part of who she had been and even more frightening to think about letting that loss show in front of the people who made up her world?
“Come on,” she said. “I’ll give you points for an honest answer.”
He stepped in and the small room got smaller. He was hardly an enormous man, but his aura, his spicy musk aftershave, and his wind-blown handsomeness all combined to overpower her senses.
The Bride Wore Starlight Page 7
