The Wedding Bargain

by Lisette Belisle

  With Olivia looking on, Drew climbed into the driver’s seat, then turned the ignition. Nothing happened.

  “When did you first notice something was wrong?” he asked.

  In response, she spared him none of the details. “It was running fine when I left Bangor after dropping off my brother and his family at the airport. Then I had lunch and did a couple of errands. It all took longer than I hoped. The car was still fine when I started driving home. Then it got dark.”

  “Then what?”

  “When I turned on the lights, they were dim. And they got dimmer. I’m lucky I got this far.”

  Lucky for whom?

  Sorting through all the information, Drew said, “Sounds like the battery might be going. How old is it?”

  She looked at the car. “I bought it secondhand.”

  “When was that?”

  “About four years ago. They said all the equipment was original.” She beamed—as if that was a good thing.

  Drew grunted some response. Her optimism was beginning to wear thin. “Let’s have a look.” He propped the hood open, then bent over the engine. “The battery terminals look corroded.”

  “Hmm.” She got out an umbrella—a yellow flowered one, then tried to hold it steady over his head while he cleaned the terminals. The wind blew, rain lashed in four directions.

  Before long, they were both soaked. She sneezed.

  Drew glanced at her. “Why don’t you go back inside?”

  “You might need my help.” She smiled at him, her eyes wide and gray, as crystal clear and guileless as a mountain stream.

  He stared for a long moment. Something about her seemed familiar. “What did you say your name was?”

  “Olivia DeAngelis.”

  His gaze skimmed over her delicate flower-face, her pale hair. Irrepressible as her, it curled like a gold halo around her head. “You don’t look Italian.”

  In her black leather jacket and jeans, she was an intriguing blend of worldliness and innocence. A wayward angel.

  “I’m not. I was adopted.” She didn’t add any details.

  “You’re not from around here originally.”

  She tilted her head. “How did you guess?”

  “The accent gave you away.” He’d gone to college and met people from the West Coast. “California breeze.”

  She laughed. “I’m not sure that’s a compliment.”

  When he remained silent, her smile faded.

  So he’d finally burst her bubble of cheer. In a way, Drew regretted it, but perhaps it was just as well. He didn’t need a woman like her cluttering his life. He had no connections; his family had disowned him. Under the circumstances, he didn’t really blame them. His list of transgressions was long.

  He’d hurt some innocent people and served time in an out-of-state minimum-security prison—not his idea of a country club by any stretch of the imagination. Society had exacted a price, and he’d paid. Would that satisfy his detractors and earn forgiveness? He was going home to face the same people who judged him guilty and sent him to prison. Beyond that, he had no plans—except to pick up his few belongings, then head out somewhere.

  He had no clear destination in mind—as long as it was as far from his past as he could get.

  Only one thing was certain—no one would miss him.

  Not a soul.

  Did he care?

  He wasn’t sure. The admission left him empty.

  At his deliberate attempt to distance himself, Olivia shivered in the cold autumn night. She tried to shake off Drew’s easy dismissal. People usually liked her; she worked hard to make sure they did.

  Unexpectedly hurt and not willing to examine the reason too closely since all six-foot-two of him was standing less than a yard away, she decided to treat his rudeness with silence. That lasted about a minute.

  Now he was glowering at the engine!

  Alarmed, she leaned over for a closer look—brushing his hard elbow with her own.

  “What’s wrong with it?” she asked, confused by the mess of greasy gears and wires.

  “Nothing.” He inched his arm away, leaving her feeling colder than before. “I just cleaned and reset the wires. With a jump-start, you can be on your way.”

  “Oh.” What had she expected?

  Surprisingly he gave her a direct glance. “Look, I’m sorry if I’ve been rude.”

  His mouth was set in a rigid line, his brow was furrowed. He didn’t look sorry. His chiseled features looked hard, with deep-set eyes that looked older than the rest of him. Despite that bit of insight, Olivia hardened her sympathetic heart.

  She didn’t flinch from the truth. “You think I’m an airhead.” Why did that hurt? Why should she care what this man thought? She’d survived worse.

  Drew heard the defensive note in her voice. “I didn’t say that.” All right, so maybe he did think she was a mental lightweight. He couldn’t deny that. But he also thought she was very young—far too young and vulnerable to be out alone, forced to rely on strangers for help.

  If she belonged to him, he’d—

  He stopped the thought before it went anywhere.

  She wasn’t his. There had been many women in his life, but only one had touched his heart and left it permanently scarred. There was no room for another, which was exactly the way he wanted it.

  Wasn’t it?

  Before they got mired any deeper in this conversation, Drew decided to put an end to it. “Look, I didn’t mean to offend you.”

  She lifted her dainty chin. “You didn’t.”

  He tried to keep a note of impatience from creeping into his voice. “I don’t know you. I offered to fix your car. That’s it. We’re never going to see each other again, so my opinion hardly matters. Does it?”

  Her heart-shaped face, with delicate brows and mouth, remained soft—even though she was visibly annoyed. “No, it doesn’t.”

  At her aggrieved tone, he hid a smile.

  “Then how about handing me that wrench?” He held out his hand.

  “This one?” She slapped the hard metal into his outstretched palm.

  The impact stung.

  “Thanks,” he said dryly. Despite her diminutive size, Olivia DeAngelis packed a wallop.

  “I think I’ll wait in the car.” She coolly folded her umbrella, then turned away.

  In silence Drew watched her climb into the car, firmly resisting the urge to call her back, to apologize. He winced when she slammed the door.

  Drew bent to his task again. Moments later, a trucker stopped and offered the use of his jumper cables. Before long, with the battery recharged, the car started on the first try. Drew dropped the hood with a satisfied “thud.” With a tip of his hat, the trucker drove away.

  “Guess that does it.” Drew wiped his hands on a rag.

  Olivia sat in the driver’s seat. Unsmiling, she rolled down the window. “Thank you so much for your help. I’d like to pay you something for your trouble.”

  At her offer, Drew backed away. “No thanks.”

  Olivia frowned, her fine brows arched. “But I would have paid a mechanic.”

  Drew shook his head, absorbing the fact that she was different from so many women he’d known in his life who wanted something from him. Being broke eliminated that worry.

  “It’s not necessary.” He wouldn’t accept money from her, even though he could use it. The fact that she’d probably guessed stung his pride.

  But when he looked into her wide gray eyes, he didn’t see pity, just understanding. Acceptance. He was down on his luck, there was no hiding it.

  After a lifetime of trying to live up to everyone’s expectations, and failing badly, Drew was free of the Pierce wealth, free of all the family trappings—which left him in the middle of nowhere—with the lonely night bearing down on him with each passing second, and the rain carrying the cold sting of autumn.

  “Thank you,” she said simply.

  “You’re welcome.” With an ironic smile, Drew turned away,
leaving her with a half-mocking, “So long, Angel.”

  Chapter Two

  Angel.

  Olivia smiled ruefully.

  He’d obviously forgotten her name.

  She didn’t watch him walk away. She refused to let his careless dismissal hurt. No matter how intriguing, Drew Pierce was nothing more than a passing stranger—and not a very friendly one at that.

  Men like him were good at one thing—walking away from a woman. She wasn’t sure how she knew that after such a brief encounter, but she did. Her smooth brow knit into a pensive frown. It occurred to her that Drew was the type of man who would make an ideal husband for her purposes—an absent one.

  Despite the obvious benefits of such an arrangement, Olivia shuddered at the mere thought of marriage as a clear-cut business arrangement, even a temporary one. It was unthinkable, but then, so was losing Stone’s End.

  When the wind blew a few fat drops of rain through the open car window, she rolled it up, then turned on the heat, along with the radio. Warm air took off the chill, soft music poured into the silent void, drowning out her troubled thoughts.

  She didn’t want to think beyond getting to Stone’s End—while she could still call it home. Unless she could find a legal method to break her birth father’s will, it wouldn’t be home much longer. Had she found Stone’s End only to lose it?

  At the age of nineteen, she’d connected with her birth family through a detective the family had hired to search for clues concerning a long-lost daughter.

  Admittedly wary when first approached and afraid of building her hopes too high, Olivia had learned that her mother had been married to Ira Carlisle for a number of years. When the marriage ended, Avis left without informing Ira that a third child was on the way. As a result, Olivia had grown up not knowing she had a father, and an older brother and sister. Finding out she had a family was a lifelong dream; and typically, the reality didn’t live up to the fantasy.

  When Ira died six months ago, Olivia had sincerely mourned the loss. He’d divided his beloved farm equally between his three grown children. Jared and Jessie had each received their generous portions when they married, so the terms of the will no longer governed their lives. But it created havoc with Olivia’s life.

  Leave it to Ira not to leave any loose ends—particularly concerning his long-lost daughter, Olivia thought with a dispirited sigh. In his ironclad will, Ira left her a share of Stone’s End, which included the original farmhouse and a fair parcel of land.

  There was only one small catch. She needed a wedding certificate in order to claim it. The terms gave her a year to find a husband and tie the knot.

  She had only six months left.

  Olivia shifted the car into gear. A red warning light in the dashboard caught her attention; her gas tank was nearly empty.

  Fortunately the gas station attached to the diner was still open. She filled up, then stocked up on a few snacks from a vending machine. A couple of candy bars and bottled water should tide her over until she got home.

  Moments later, when she turned the car key in the ignition, nothing happened. Holding her breath, she tried again. When the engine roared to life, Olivia released a deep sigh of relief.

  She wouldn’t let herself think of the long lonely stretch of road ahead or the empty house waiting.

  By now, the diner was flashing a Closed sign.

  A couple of motorcycles roared past. Trucks pulled out, heading east, west, south, anywhere but north—her direction.

  At the first crossroads, Olivia slowed when she observed a deep shadow on the edge of the road. A hitchhiker. The man’s features were shadowed, but she instantly identified the tall wiry build. She should keep driving. But Drew Pierce had generously repaired her car and asked for nothing in return.

  How could she leave him stranded in the rain?

  The small powder-blue car slowed to a stop.

  Drew groaned inwardly. He thought he’d seen the last of her. Olivia. Now here she was again. He kept walking, hoping she’d get the message and drive on.

  No such luck.

  The horn beeped once, twice. Her persistence simply amazed him. When she reached to open the door, heat rushed out of the car.

  “Do you want a ride?” she asked, her voice casual, but friendly, with that soft feminine persuasive note that could probably melt an iceberg.

  Drew wasn’t totally immune.

  For a moment, he searched his brain for any excuse, some glimmer of common sense that would keep him from accepting her invitation and getting further involved with her, this woman who made him ache just by looking at her.

  He looked up and then down the highway, hoping for a reprieve, any sort of transportation that didn’t come with a delicate blonde in the driver’s seat. Unfortunately no one else was going his way. Just then, he felt the rain penetrate another layer of his clothes. Despite the chilling reminder of his present circumstances, he was still tempted to refuse her offer.

  Then common sense came to his rescue.

  Drew tossed his gear into the back seat. Avoiding Olivia DeAngelis wasn’t worth getting a case of pneumonia. He hoped.

  “Thanks,” he muttered, folding his considerable length into the small passenger seat of her car. He couldn’t resist an irritated, “Do you make a habit of picking up strange men?”

  Her eyes widened. “But I know you.”

  He sighed. “Lady, you don’t know the first thing about me.”

  “The waitress vouched for you.”

  Biting off a few choice words, Drew said, “She never set eyes on me before I walked in there tonight.”

  “But she knows your family.”

  Drew stared at her in disbelief. “And that does it for you?”

  “Why not? Is there something wrong with them?”

  “No, of course not,” Drew muttered, refusing to be drawn into that sensitive topic. “But that isn’t the point.”

  “Then, exactly what is?” She tilted her head. Definitely not an airhead, he decided. Sharp intelligence and stubborn determination gleamed in her gray eyes when she insisted, “You did me a favor when you repaired my car. I always pay my debts.”

  Always?

  He wondered if that was true.

  For a moment, the overhead light illuminated the interior of the car, flickering over her bright hair and fair skin. In that instant, every detail about her registered in his mind, like an indelible stamp that would linger long after she did.

  His gaze drifted lower. At some point, she’d unzipped her black leather jacket. Underneath, she wore a white tailored shirt and a snug-fitting suede vest. The look might have been severe, except for the whimsical needlework, roses and primroses, embroidered along the front panels. The vest hugged her, drawing his attention to the slender curve of her waist, the faint shadow between her breasts.

  Drew dragged his eyes away from that sweetness, taking in the fine pulse beating in her throat. Her eyes looked wide—and wary—not totally trusting. Apparently she wasn’t as brave, or as bold, as she appeared on the surface.

  That look of vulnerability melted his irritation.

  The interior car light wavered, then blinked off, shutting out her image.

  “Just drive,” Drew said, trying to dismiss her.

  But his senses were filled with her. He smelled chocolate, and apples, and Olivia—a floral scent he couldn’t quite identify though it nagged at him, tantalizing, yet innocent and fresh. Soft music played on the radio, flutes and drums—no doubt meant to be soothing—but the rhythm and the rain threatened his last ounce of resistance.

  He hadn’t been this close to a woman in five years—and he didn’t plan to start with a delicate blonde with a sweet smile and false bravado. She was obviously too young, early twenties, he guessed, and she made him feel every single one of his thirty-two years. He’d gone into prison a cocky young man and come out older. The gap between them was more than years and couldn’t be breached.

  An awkward silence fell between t
hem, splitting the air with tension. They drove north, at times passing a town, a blur on the landscape. Long stretches of open farmland and deep dark forests that looked dense and forbidding at night whizzed by.

  At an intersection, her voice startled him. “I forgot to ask—you are going to Henderson?”

  “Yes.”

  “Are you staying long?”

  So now they were going to make conversation. “Only a few days. That’s it.”

  “Oh.” After a couple more failed attempts at conversation, she subsided into silence.

  Drew preferred that to expanding their acquaintance. A relationship—even a fleeting one—wasn’t in the cards. Nevertheless, he was aware of her. A few miles later, when she visibly drooped, he noticed. “Why don’t I take over?”

  The offer surprised Olivia.

  “Thank you. I could use a break,” she said, grateful for his consideration. She was exhausted.

  They traded places. Olivia slid along the seat, while Drew got out and went around to the driver’s side. After adjusting the seat to accommodate his long legs, he shifted the car into gear.

  Olivia reached for a blanket from the back seat, then wrapped it around her shoulders. She sighed. Her eyes felt scratchy. Yet she couldn’t sleep. She dreaded going home alone.

  Stone’s End would seem empty, the rooms filled with everyday reminders of Ira. Like so many, her memories of him were bittersweet. Nothing in Olivia’s life had ever been simple. From the first, Ira had seen past her flimsy defenses.

  Through some hereditary alchemy, he’d recognized a certain trait in her and known how desperately she wanted to belong, how much she loved Stone’s End and everyone there—long before she knew it herself. Over the last four years, she’d grown to love Ira Carlisle; she thought he loved her. But then, he left the will, and now she wasn’t so sure.

  Why did love always have conditions?

  Why wasn’t she ever enough?

  Earlier that day, she’d consulted a lawyer who termed the situation “awkward,” as if finding a husband to meet the terms of her father’s will was nothing more than an easy stroll down the aisle with a besotted bridegroom. Olivia had seen what love could do, and undo. Far better to rely on herself. In any case, there was no groom in sight, besotted or otherwise.