Nya laughed. “I’ve already threatened to do that. He has a few more weeks yet.”
“Then what happens?” Ester asked, drowning her curiosity with wine.
“It’s my birthday, I told him he had until then to come to his senses.”
Ester gasped. “And if he doesn’t? You’ll walk away?” she asked, seizing Nya’s hand with a ferocity that matched her panic.
Nya pulled the back of Ester’s hand to her cheek; it was so nice that the woman worried about her. “No. If he doesn’t come to his senses by then it will be my turn to chain him to his headboard and I’ll be raiding your purse for more blue pills.”
Ester wailed with laughter.
“Ok, ding, ding,” Archer said, turning to put his beer on the dining table. “Time for Nya to go home.”
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Read on for an excerpt from:
1
“If anyone knows of any reason, lawful or otherwise, that this couple should not be legally wed, speak now or forever hold your peace.”
This was the part of the ceremony that was supposed to breeze past quickly. Claire didn’t expect to hear anything and neither did her groom, Calvin, because he smiled at her and took a breath as if he was ready to move onto the vows.
“I object.”
The booming voice echoed through the church and the murmurs in the room grew as she and Calvin turned to look at the figure at the other end of the aisle. The guy had to be six four, he was muscular and rugged with dark hair and stubble. As imposing as his stance was, he was a stranger. She didn’t recognize him at all, and he wasn’t the type of man she’d think she could forget.
Two other men rushed up behind him, forcing the imposing man to take a step forward. “What do you think you’re doing?” Calvin asked, edging her backward as he moved a few inches down the aisle. “Who the hell are you?”
“I’m her husband.”
The room gasped and Claire took a reflexive step backward.
Her husband?
The next few minutes were a blur, someone took her hand and she was put in the large room she’d used to dress. The screen in the far left corner covered the spot she’d changed in. The large windows in the corner beside that screen had couches beneath facing into the room. The full length mirrors stood in a semicircle opposite the door she’d just been put through, and she fixated on the sight of herself in this flowing white dress. Her wedding dress.
This was supposed to be the happiest day of her life, but as others piled into the room behind her, she didn’t feel particularly happy.
“Just what the hell is this?” Calvin demanded. Grabbing her hand, he pulled her toward the couches and urged her deep into the corner of the room with his mother, Diane, and his best man, Boyd on either side of her.
The imposing man and the two men who’d entered the church with him, came in and closed the door, then stayed close to the mirrors, ten feet away from where she was.
“Shane Warren,” the imposing man said and offered Calvin a hand, but he refused it with a snort.
“I don’t think this is the time for introductions, you just ruined our wedding day.”
“I know,” Shane said.
The man to his left spoke up, “That couldn’t be helped. What alternative did we have?”
Claire kept her head down, she didn’t cope well in large groups and this was all overwhelming. But when she glanced up, she caught Shane looking straight past Calvin at her and the other two men were just as fixated. “It’s good to see you, Gin.”
That shook something loose in her. “You know my real name,” she said and tried to move closer, but Calvin put out an arm to prevent her from passing him.
“How do we know these people are who they say they are?” Calvin demanded.
“That’s true,” Diane said, going to her son’s side. “You’re not the first people to claim to know our Claire.”
“Her name isn’t Claire,” the man on the left said. “Her name is Ginger.”
Ginger. That didn’t sound familiar, but nothing did. “She went missing sixteen months ago, after a boating accident.”
“Boating?” Calvin sniggered and took her hand again. “Claire hates the water.”
The man on the left spoke up again. “Actually she doesn’t. She’s a strong swimmer. She’s always loved the beach.”
Calvin was shaking his head. Shane frowned and turned to talk to the man who seemed most vocal. They exchanged some words that she couldn’t make out and the third man turned to talk to the group.
“We should call the cops,” Boyd said.
But she didn’t want anyone to call the cops. As distressing as this was, she wanted to know where she’d come from. She wanted to know who she was during the big blank space that was her life before Calvin.
Except as she watched the three men opposite her group talk to each other, she wanted to know more about who they were too. “How did you find me?”
Everyone in the room stopped talking to look at her, finding her voice had taken time and it sounded meek in comparison to the other strong male voices in the room. “We never stopped looking,” Shane said, leaving his group, but Calvin wouldn’t him get too close. “I’ve been looking for you for sixteen months.”
“What happened? I mean, I…”
“What do you remember?” the guy to the left said and she took a breath, at a loss again. “It was this, your wedding that brought us here. We have a program that’s been running, searching the internet for mentions of you.”
Calvin blustered. “Mentions of her, we don’t know her real name, she knows nothing about her past, how could—”
“Everyone thought she was dead,” the man on the left said, getting emotional. “Four bodies were pulled out the water, hers was never found and this guy.” He hit Shane’s back. “He wouldn’t give up. He wouldn’t give up on my sister until—”
“Your sister?” Diane said.
Claire’s jaw fell. “You’re my brother?”
Nodding, he smiled, though his eyes were wet. “Yes, I’m Owen, your big brother.”
“And he’s a lawyer,” the third man said.
“This is Murphy,” Shane said, introducing him. “He’s my brother.”
This was turning into a momentous day. It had always been supposed to be memorable, but not like this. “And we’re here to tell you all to back off,” Murphy said, looking meaner than his brother, when she hadn’t thought that was possible. “You don’t know the first thing about Ginger, and she’s not marrying anyone today.”
“That’s not for you to say,” Diane said.
“Actually it is,” Owen said, putting his briefcase on a side table to open it up. Inside were a bunch of files and folders, but he only took one out. “This is a copy of their original marriage certificate.”
He opened the folder and handed it over to Calvin. Claire, or as she’d now been told she was, Ginger, peeked at it past Diane and Boyd. There it was, with their names on it. Ginger Leyland was her maiden name and it had been witnessed by Owen Leyland and Murphy Warren.
“Do I have a mother?” she asked, looking to Owen for an answer.
Losing some of his professional edge, he glanced back at Shane. “You do. She’s been sick. She’s in the hospital. I told her… I told her you’d visit, when we found you, when you were up for it. I said we’d let you know where she was.”
“And a father?”
“Your dad died when you were fourteen, Bit,” Shane said, edging nearer, but that just made Calvin tense.
“This is all lovely but complete bullshit,” Calvin said.
“We have no way to prove if any of this is real,” Boyd backed up his friend, which was to be expected.
Ginger’s head was spinning and she didn’t know what to think. For sixteen months she’d been an amnesia sufferer. Calvin and his family had gotten her through, they’d supported her even through the to
ughest of times. But she couldn’t dismiss these men until she knew for sure if they were lying or telling the truth.
Except there was another pressing matter that made her mutter, “We have two hundred guests out there.”
“Want me to talk to them?”
Instead of the groom asking the question, it was Shane. She inhaled and opened her mouth, but didn’t know how to respond, especially when Calvin exclaimed. “Our wedding has nothing to do with you. You don’t know a single person out there. Why the hell would we let you talk to them?”
“I think it’s wrong for you to let Ginny worry about them,” Shane said. “Someone should already be out there telling those folks it’s not gonna happen.”
“Shane,” Owen said, taking his turn to calm the man. “I’m sure he wasn’t going to send his bride out there to talk to them.”
“Ginger hates talking to large groups,” Murphy said and she made eye contact with him.
That was true and something she hated about herself, so something had carried forward from who she was then to who she was now. “I can excuse them,” she said, though she didn’t have a clue what she’d say. The people out there were Calvin’s friends and family, most of them knew about her history, or lack of one, but she didn’t like to talk about it.
“I’ll excuse them,” Calvin said.
“You’re getting married today,” Diane asserted. “You have to get married today.”
“You can’t get married if she’s already married,” Boyd said and glanced at everyone. “It’s illegal for her to be married twice. Your marriage would be void.”
“Boyd is Calvin’s lawyer,” Ginger said and got glared at, except she didn’t know why that would be a secret.
Everyone went back to talking amongst themselves until voices were raised and it became a din. When she’d woken up in the hospital, doctors had told her that her amnesia may be temporary. Unfortunately, it hadn’t been. Calvin had been the one to find her, at the side of the road, and he’d stood by her through everything. He’d encouraged her to make a new life for herself instead of chasing the old one.
But here was not just one man from her old life, but three of them, and they had paperwork that could prove she’d made choices different to those she was making today.
“I want to talk to Mr. Warren alone,” Ginger said, her voice loud enough to silence the others although she hadn’t shouted.
Every face was again focused on her and she knew it was important to be confident. Although she was too anxious to look at Shane, so she focused on Calvin, but that didn’t really help, ‘cause he got tense. “No!” he said. “I cannot allow—”
“You have to tell the guests to leave anyway,” Owen said.
Murphy closed in behind Owen. “And this is just beginning,” he said. “You’re not going to get rid of us easily… you can’t come between a man and his wife.”
Calvin leaned closer to them, turning his back on her, blocking her from the room. “They’re not married, not really, she’s my bride, not his. I won’t leave him alone with her. If he feels entitled… if he touches her—”
“She said she wanted to talk, not fuck,” Shane said, his voice deep and husky. “I swear I’ll keep my dick in my pants.”
Again, her mouth fell open and she was glad that Calvin was giving her cover from the room because her cheeks must have reddened. Calvin and his family didn’t talk that way. They were a nice family, a rich family, who made their money in chemicals. They were traditional and conservative. In comparison, Shane wore a crumpled shirt over a dark tee-shirt and worn jeans that hadn’t seen a washer for a while, maybe he was used to trash talk, but she’d barely heard a curse word in sixteen months.
“Unless she begs,” Murphy muttered and she had to cover her mouth with her hand to conceal her shock. “He never could say no to her… on anything.”
When she peeked around Calvin, she watched Murphy nudge his brother and Shane threw a smile at him, but was serious when he turned back. “I’ll say no this time,” Shane said.
“If you even think about touching her…” Calvin said and began to walk, but she ran around him to prevent the men from coming to blows.
Spinning around, she faced Calvin. “Just a few minutes, please.”
Calvin wasn’t happy, she could tell from how his jaw popped to the side, but he inhaled. “I’ll tell everyone there’s been a change of plan… Boyd will stay right outside the door, anything happens, scream.”
It took a minute of whispering and shifting expressions for everyone to leave in an orderly fashion. Diane took some convincing, but eventually left.
Murphy was the last one still here. Hanging in the door with one hand on the handle and the other on the frame, he made eye contact with his brother. “We’ll be right out here too, bro.”
He glanced at her before he went out and then Ginger was alone with Shane. Her palms began to sweat and her mouth dried. “I won’t bite,” Shane said, and she took her time to lift her chin. “You were never into that.”
When his hand rose as though he intended to touch her face, she backed away on another surge of worry. “I… I don’t like to be touched.”
Not only did he stop his advance, but he bobbed his head and put his hands in his pockets. “Ok,” he said. “Whatever you need, Bit.” His smile slid upward. “I’m just amazed to see you again… You look beautiful.”
Well it was her wedding day, people were supposed to say that to her, but as she peered into him, she sensed he was looking at something other than the dress or her figure. “Tell me more about how you found me.”
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STANDALONE CONTEMPORARY ROMANCE
REMEMBER WHEN
THE BRANDED SERIES
BRANDED
SCARRED
MARKED
THE KINDRED SERIES
RAVEN
SWALLOW
CUCKOO
SWIFT
FALCON
FINCH
THE EXPLICIT SERIES
EXPLICIT INSTRUCTION
EXPLICIT DETAIL
EXPLICIT MEMORY
RISQUE SERIES
TAKE A RISK
RISK IT ALL
GAME OF RISK
HARROW DUET
FIGHTING FATE
FIGHTING BACK
MISTAKE DUET
MISTAKE ME NOT
SLEIGHT MISTAKE
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Scarred (Branded Book 2) Page 28
