Though he’d met her only twice now, John had taken a liking to Courtney’s best friend and her quirky sense of humor. “I don’t know, you’ll have to see.”
“Daddy’s one of a kind,” Katie informed her proudly, repeating something she’d heard.
“I can believe that.” Circling him, Mandy feathered her hand along the back of his jacket, brushing off an imaginary hair. If his shoulders were any broader, they could have been declared a road.
John heard her sigh behind him. Their eyes met in the mirror.
Mandy’s smile widened. “You and I have a date, Johnny. Two years from today, at noon. Church steps. If Court’s crazy enough to throw you away then, I get first dibs.” Reaching up, she placed her hands on his shoulders and turned him around to face her. “Promise?”
Maybe it was the bottled water they drank. Whatever the cause, the women in this zip code were all crazy, he thought. But at least Mandy was entertaining. Courtney was something else again. Just what he wasn’t sure.
He laughed, gently removing her hands. “Sorry, but I’ll be out of the game by then.”
“Too bad.” Mandy sighed again, this time for effect. “Although if I know Court, she’ll come to her senses and hang on to you.” What woman wouldn’t? She allowed herself one last, longing look. “Her daddy sure knew what he was doing.”
Mandy turned her attention to Katie. She had come here for a reason. “C’mon, Katie, you have to throw flower petals around so your new stepmom can walk on them.” She took Katie’s hand in hers, then looked over her shoulder at John. “As for you, the priest wants to see you at the altar, pronto. Dead center.”
Dead was the word for it, he thought as the door closed again. The click the lock made as it slipped into the groove sounded like the first nail being hammered into his coffin.
Two years. By the time this afternoon was over, he was going to sign away two years of his life.
Two years were going to seem like forever.
He’d thought that nothing could have topped the impression Courtney Tamberlaine created in her bikini.
He’d thought wrong.
She looked incredible now, drifting toward him down the aisle like a fantasy he had conjured up in the small hours of the night when his heart needed comforting. A fantasy that embodied the perfect woman.
He knew she was far from perfect, but she was still a vision. As John Gabriel watched the woman who was to be his wife in name only approach him with slow, rhythmic steps, he thought he had never seen anything so beautiful in his life.
It made him ache for a moment to know that none of this was true.
Having emptied out the contents of her basket in her stroll down the aisle, his daughter was now sitting in the first pew. Beside her, keeping a watchful eye on Katie, was a woman he’d been introduced to as Courtney’s Aunt Lisa, who’d flown in just for the occasion.
Katie whispered something to her and the woman smiled, nodding. Katie had made another friend, he thought. It didn’t surprise him. She’d probably make friends with everyone here by the time the reception was over. The bride’s side of the church was filled with people.
That made the church half-full. His side was conspicuously empty. Though his circle of friends wasn’t large, John had deliberately refrained from inviting anyone he knew to this fiasco. He would have passed on having a best man as well, but Courtney had told him that if he didn’t have anyone in mind, she would provide someone to stand up for him.
That had galvanized him. The wedding and subsequent marriage might be a sham, but John didn’t want one of Courtney’s former lovers, or perhaps her present one, standing beside him and sneering while he promised to love and cherish her.
So he’d invited Rick to be his best man. A friend since their first year in college, Rick never passed judgment on anyone and rarely asked questions. It made him the perfect friend as far as John was concerned.
Rick leaned over to him now as Courtney drew closer. “I don’t know how the hell you got this lucky, Gabe, or how you managed to keep her a secret from me, but damn, she makes a man’s mouth water.” Rick only grinned when he saw John’s dark eyebrows rise. “Sorry, just had to get that out.”
John looked at the approaching woman, nodding at his friend’s apology. He could understand Rick’s reaction. Courtney was stunning. She would have been stunning if she had elected to walk up the aisle wearing a garment bag.
Beautiful on the outside, empty on the inside, he reminded himself. He’d been on that merry-go-round before. Except this time he knew exactly what he was getting himself into, and why.
He’d known why before, he remembered. Back then, he’d thought he was doing it for love. A love so strong that it hurt him just to breathe.
He was breathing just fine now. In a way, without love to complicate things, the burden was taken off. Maybe it was better this way, after all.
If he worked at it, perhaps he would eventually convince himself.
Without a father or an uncle to pinch-hit, Courtney could have easily marched down the aisle alone. Instead, Courtney had purposely selected Edwin Parsons’s arm to be the one she leaned on this day of all days.
When the first strains of the wedding march wafted through the air, Courtney had suppressed a smug smile and taken Parsons’s arm. She wanted the man to witness from a front-row seat this charade that she’d been forced to undertake. This way, there would be no room for doubt.
As they began to walk, he still seemed somewhat confused by it all.
She’d come in person to ask him to be the one who escorted her down the aisle. There was no way she was going to miss seeing his expression when he first heard that she was going to fulfill her father’s mandate.
She wasn’t disappointed.
For once, Parsons’s normally dour expression cracked. He’d stared at her, momentarily dumbstruck, as if he couldn’t believe that she had finally capitulated. “Then you are going through with this?”
It was evident to her that Parsons thought she was lying in hopes he’d believe her. A lie wouldn’t have gotten her anywhere and they both knew it.
“Absolutely.” She’d placed a hand over her breast, as if taking a solemn oath. “It was love at first sight. John Gabriel is everything Daddy ever wanted for me. I’m only grateful that Daddy found a way to direct me, even after he was gone.”
Parsons had looked at her skeptically. Courtney knew she had laid it on a bit thick, but she was enjoying herself.
She wasn’t enjoying herself now, she thought. The wedding march echoed in her brain, sounding louder and louder as she drew closer to the altar. Courtney felt as if her knees had suddenly turned to jelly and wouldn’t support her. She’d been so sure of herself just a few minutes earlier. Where had this flood of feelings and anxiety come from?
Something within her felt like dying.
She’d lied when she said she’d had no illusions. She did. There was still one illusion left. She’d really thought that when she finally got married, it wouldn’t be just a temporary union. That it would be a bonding not just of names spoken by a priest, but of souls.
Next time, she promised herself. Next time it would be real.
And forever.
Moving down the aisle, Courtney nodded toward several people who tried to catch her eye. She made certain that no matter what the condition of her stomach and her knees, her smile remained regal, bright. They’d come for a festive time and she was going to see that they got it.
She saw Katie looking at her. Courtney winked at her and Katie waved. Dimples deepened on both side of her face as she grinned.
The little girl was going to be a knockout when she grew up, Courtney thought. Gabriel had his work cut out for him.
Gabriel. Courtney turned her eyes toward him. Toward the man she’d bought for herself, she thought sarcastically.
The mild contempt she felt faded, and then vanished. Her mouth turned dry. As dry as the desert baking beneath the noonday sun.
She was already aware that he was good-looking— gorgeous, really—but she’d had no idea that he would look this heart stopping in a tuxedo. When she thought about it, she’d assumed that, if anything, Gabriel would look out of place, uncomfortable, in the dark garment. Like a sow’s ear instead of a silk purse, to coin a phrase.
But he looked as if he was born to wear a tuxedo. There was an underlying sensuality about him that the finely tailored lines seemed to enhance.
Courtney didn’t have to turn to the rear of the church to know that every woman’s eyes were firmly riveted on him and not her.
She reached the altar walking on someone else’s feet. Somewhere in a haze, she heard the priest ask, “Who gives this woman in holy matrimony?” and was only vaguely aware of Parsons’s response.
A light tap on her elbow reminded her to hand Mandy the bouquet she was clutching. She would have gone on holding it just to ground herself to reality.
“Jackpot,” Mandy whispered, taking the flowers from her.
Not really, Courtney thought. But maybe, for the benefit of everyone today, if not herself, she could pretend.
“Ready?”
The whispered question ruffled the veil along her cheek. She turned her eyes to John. There was a hint of something, perhaps amusement, in his eyes. At her expense, no doubt.
It served to rally her.
“Geronimo,” she whispered back. Not exactly romantic, but it got the message across.
She got through it, even the part about cherishing, without bolting, balking or blowing it. It was only when the priest had pronounced them joined before God and man and urged Gabriel to kiss the bride that she had faltered. When Gabriel leaned into her, she managed to just graze his mouth with her own and then turned instantly to walk down the aisle.
Physical contact, she’d already told him when they’d gone over the prenuptial agreement at Mr. Matthew’s office, was to be kept at a minimum. Kissing was at the top of that list.
Courtney had thought the worst was over after they’d finally reached the reception, but she discovered she was wrong.
She’d forgotten about the first dance.
Not quite knowing what sort of endurance test this was going to be, she braced herself as Gabriel took her hand and led her to the dance floor.
She was pleasantly surprised. His lean, hard body moved as if the music had filled it. Allowing herself to lean into him, Courtney tried to relax. It was a futile effort and that annoyed her. She wasn’t accustomed to feeling on edge.
But she was.
“You dance well,” she murmured.
And you hold a woman even better. But that part really didn’t surprise her. A man who looked like Gabriel had to have had plenty of practice holding a woman. He’d probably been fighting women off for a very long time. She held him accountable for that, too, although she couldn’t have easily explained why.
From the look on her face when he had led her to the dance floor, she’d probably expected to have her feet crushed.
John pressed his hand along the small of her back, bringing her closer to him. He could feel his body respending to hers and tried to curb his reaction. But a dead man would have responded to the body that was brushing against his.
“Dancing was invented by the peasant class to entertain themselves. It was one of the few pleasures that the aristocracy couldn’t tax out of existence.”
Courtney raised her chin defiantly. She wished he wouldn’t hold her like that. But there was no way she could pull away from him without causing a scene.
And no way she could block out the feel of his hard body along hers.
“I was giving you a compliment,” she retorted between clenched teeth.
He looked down into her face, his expression mildly impassive. “I was giving you history.”
She knew exactly what he was up to. He was baiting her, trying to make her angry. And he was succeeding, damn him.
But she couldn’t afford that. “There are people present,” she admonished in a whisper. “I don’t think we should be trying to draw blood so soon after the ceremony.”
He curved his hand over hers and rested it against his chest. Maybe he was being a little touchy.
“Sorry.” He saw Rick take Mandy’s hand and lead her to the floor. At least someone was enjoying himself. “I’m just uncomfortable with this.”
That made two of them. “But you did go through with it.” Obviously his need for comfort didn’t outweigh his desire for money.
There was no reason to tell her that he’d had no choice. That he refused to approach the hospital to consider Katie’s surgery as a charity case. He couldn’t do that to Katie, not if there was a way out. Instead, he simply nodded. She was vulnerable here, on her home turf, with her lawyer looking on like some medieval gatekeeper. He decided to give her a break.
“Yes, I went through with it and you don’t have to worry. I’ll live up to my part. And I won’t embarrass you.”
He was serious, she thought. Maybe he wasn’t so bad, after all. “The transfer’s been completed,” she whispered against his ear.
Her breath warmed him. He had to concentrate to keep his mind on the conversation. “Transfer?”
“The fifty thousand. I had it done just before I left for the church.”
He nodded, feeling oddly hollow. But this was why he had gone through with the wedding—the money. No other reasons. “I appreciate that.”
“Yes,” she murmured. “I know.”
He thought she sounded sad, but told himself he was imagining things. She was getting exactly what she wanted: her inheritance with no strings.
He became aware of a clinking sound rising above the soft, bluesy song the orchestra was playing. The din swelled until it all but blotted out the music. He looked over his shoulder at the tables that were scattered around the lush green manicured lawn. Almost all the guests who were seated at them were tapping the backs of their forks against their water glasses.
“Does that mean the same thing in your world that it does in mine?”
He had his answer when she stiffened in his arms.
“Just ignore it.”
The noise increased. It was absolutely juvenile, Courtney thought. Whoever came up with the idea of striking water glasses with eating utensils to satisfy some voyeur istic need should have been shot. Well, they could all just go on clinking their glasses until the glasses shattered for all she cared. She wasn’t about to perform like some trained monkey in a circus.
If she hadn’t actually kissed Gabriel at the altar after the priest had pronounced them husband and wife, she wasn’t going to do it now.
John looked down at her face. If he didn’t know better, he would have said that Courtney was afraid to kiss him. He found the idea amusing.
“I can ignore it very easily, but I don’t think they’re going to stop until we give them what they want.” He saw Courtney set her mouth stubbornly. John nodded toward the head table. “Don’t look now, but I think that your lawyer is getting a tad suspicious about your maidenly reluctance.”
Cornered, Courtney blew out breath. There was fire in her eyes when she looked at him. Fire he found even more arousing than the brush of her body along his.
“All right, let’s get this over with.” Jerking her chin up, Courtney presented her mouth to him. She braced herself for the inevitable.
Or what she thought was the inevitable.
He didn’t live up to her expectations.
Or rather, down to them.
Courtney had thought that, in all likelihood, playing the macho man, Gabriel would pull her to him roughly and claim what everyone here thought was his. And in the final analysis, it would just be a matter of skin rubbing along skin, nothing more.
She wasn’t prepared for the light touch of his hand as it skimmed along her cheek, wasn’t prepared for Gabriel cupping the back of her neck as he tilted her head even more toward him.
And she was nowhere near prepared for the achingly light
touch of his lips along hers as they passed first once, then twice, before finally settling and getting down to the business at hand.
Most of all, she wasn’t prepared to be swept away and sucked into the heart of a blinding hurricane.
Chapter Six
It began like a ride down a long, slanted chute that was smooth as silk. There were no warning signs posted, no indication of the turbulence—the exhilarating turbulence—that lay just ahead for her.
It caught Courtney completely off guard. Senses lulled, she was taken prisoner in less time than it took to take a breath.
It wasn’t a kiss, it was an experience.
Courtney felt almost limp and yet wildly alive as Gabriel’s mouth worked over hers, breathing life into her that was unlike anything she’d known. In a matter of seconds, it reduced her from a worldly, sophisticated woman to Alice, propelled into Wonderland and hopelessly lost.
She clutched on to his shoulders for support. Courtney had never felt this disoriented. She wasn’t even sure where she was anymore.
Damn, he couldn’t do this to her.
He was doing this to her.
With almost superhuman effort, she managed to pull herself back up to the surface. Courtney absolutely refused to go down for the third time. Not without taking Gabriel with her.
He felt the explosion the moment it happened. One minute she was pliant, supple in his arms, as weak and as soft as a kitten. The next, it was as if fireworks had suddenly exploded between them. He could feel them.
Fireworks.
A noisy, smoking cherry bomb, all flash and fire. And with the powerful kick of a mule.
John had almost been undone by the sweetness he had tasted when he first pressed his lips to hers. But it was nothing compared to this. This was almost pure rapture. There was passion, anger, raw sensuality.
Everything.
He pressed her body closer to his, completely captivated by the rush that kissing her created.
A deep-rooted sense of reality, of responsibility, fought its way forward. He knew he had to rein himself in before he succumbed and turned this into the threering circus he’d abhorred. Before he swept her into his arms, said the hell with the reception and carried Courtney up to her bedroom.
Wanted: Husband, Will Train Page 7
