BRIDAL JEOPARDY

by Rebecca York

  We don’t know what happened back at Reynard’s estate. I don’t even know if my father is all right.

  He is. I saw him duck under a table.

  Well, he got what he wanted. Reynard paid his debts, and I didn’t have to marry the man.

  She let her head drop to Craig’s shoulder, and he held her close, marveling that she was in his arms and the two of them were finally safe.

  Rachel broke into their silent conversation.

  “The plantation’s a good place for you to hide out—until we get the mess straightened out.”

  “You think we can?”

  “Yes,” she answered with conviction. “And I hope you want to join us in our group defense efforts.”

  “Of course,” Craig said. “What you did back there was pretty impressive. How did you do that trick with the lightning bolt?”

  “It’s not difficult. We can teach you.” She huffed out a breath. “I’m sorry we didn’t come to help you sooner, but we had to be sure about you.”

  “About our being children from the clinic?”

  In the driver’s seat, Jake made a wry sound. “No. That part was pretty obvious. She means sure that you were friendly. The first people we met from the clinic tried to kill us.”

  Stephanie gasped. “Why?”

  “They thought they were the only ones with our kind of mental powers, and they couldn’t stand the idea of anyone else having them.”

  “Nice,” Craig answered.

  “You were a twin?” Rachel asked Craig.

  “Yes. My brother, Sam, and I must have developed powers together right from the beginning. When he was killed, I thought I’d never find that again.” He pulled Stephanie closer as he spoke. “Then I found Stephanie and discovered there was more than what Sam and I had shared.”

  As they drove to Lafayette, Jake and Rachel told them about the plantation. And they spoke about the clinic.

  “Right now, the two of you probably want to decompress,” Jake said.

  “There are guest cottages on the grounds,” Rachel said. “You can have one.”

  Craig was still feeling dazed as they pulled onto the Lafayette plantation property. He blinked when he saw the sign for Chez Gabriella.

  “She was a pastry chef in New Orleans,” Jake explained. “She’s funding the plantation with this restaurant in the main house—where she grew up. But it’s only open on the weekends. That gives us the run of the place the rest of the time. We’re going to move the housing farther from the restaurant, but we haven’t gotten around to it.”

  When he pulled up in front of a semicircle of cottages, another man and woman came walking down from the main house.

  “Gabriella and Luke,” Jake said.

  They climbed out, and the newcomers hurried forward.

  Jake made the introductions.

  “It’s so great to meet you. We wanted to come along, but Jake said we needed to stay here,” Gabriella said.

  They all shook hands, and Craig cleared his throat. “Try to imagine me with hair. I shaved my head for a disguise.”

  “We’ll wait for the real you to emerge,” Stephanie said. “Trust me, he’s a handsome guy. And twenty pounds lighter than he looks.”

  “There’s so much to tell you,” Gabriella said, “but I know the two of you want some alone time.”

  “The restaurant’s closed today, but I’m cooking for us. Come over around seven and we’ll all have dinner.”

  “Thank you so much,” Craig answered.

  Gabriella showed them to one of the cottages. They stepped inside, and Craig had only a vague impression of antique furnishings because he was too focused on Stephanie to notice anything else. He reached for her and folded her into his arms. They hugged each other fiercely, both of them hardly able to believe that they’d escaped from Reynard’s compound.

  “Thank God you got there,” Stephanie murmured.

  “Thank God you kept your head and helped me.”

  He cut off the conversation by lowering his mouth to hers for a kiss that spoke of all the powerful emotions surging through him.

  You were alone for so long. You never have to be again.

  I have you.

  And you showed me what it is to have a partner who is everything two people can be to each other—and more.

  It’s just sinking in how much danger you put yourself in—for me.

  For us.

  I had to. You know I had to. And it worked out.

  When they finally came up for air, she ran her hands up and down his arms, over his back, and he knew she was reassuring herself by the contact with his strong body.

  “This place must have a bedroom.”

  “I hope so.”

  Linking his hand with hers, he led her into the next room and stepped far enough away to look at her outfit.

  “How could you put on a halter top and shorts under your wedding gown?”

  She laughed. “I did it while Claire was out of the room. I knew I couldn’t run very far in that gown.”

  “You looked so beautiful, and then you ripped the dress apart.”

  “We’ll get another one—for us.”

  He laughed. “Is that a proposal?”

  When she flushed, he kissed her. I’m just teasing. You know I want the same thing you do.

  He untied the halter. Convenient. No bra.

  His eyes were warm as he looked at her.

  She reached for the buttons of his shirt, then found another layer underneath—and another. “Not so convenient.”

  He helped her unbutton the shirts and shrugged out of them.

  She ran her hand across his broad chest, winnowing her fingers through the crinkly hair she found there.

  He sighed and pulled her close, swaying her breasts against his chest.

  His mouth came back to her, his tongue playing with the seam of her lips. She opened for him, closing her eyes as he deepened the kiss while he cupped her breasts in his hands and slid his thumbs over the taut peaks, wringing a glad cry from her.

  * * *

  JOY SURGED THROUGH STEPHANIE. She was free to be with Craig now, and that thought sent hot, needy sensations curling through her body.

  He unbuttoned her shorts and lowered the zipper, pushing the garment down her legs, along with her panties, so he could touch her intimately, sending heat pounding through her.

  He had brought her to climax the night before. Now she needed more. And she needed to return the pleasure he had given her.

  She pulled back the covers, bringing him down to the surface of the bed with her, clasping him to her before rising up and trailing kisses along his body, moving ever downward, knowing he was tensing with anticipation. And when she found his erection with her mouth and closed around him, she felt his pleasure zinging through her.

  He didn’t have to tell her when to stop. She knew. And she knew when to straddle his body and bring him inside her.

  She was dizzy with desire. And she knew he was, too.

  She had kept things slow. Now an explosion of need had her moving in a frantic rhythm that sent them both flying off into space.

  When she came down to earth, he was there to catch her.

  Emotions flooded through her as they looked at each other.

  “This is so much more than I ever expected from my life. Oh, Craig, I love you so much.”

  “I love you. And I’m going to make sure nobody can snatch you away from me.”

  “You think we’re still in danger?” she breathed.

  “I think we have to stay hidden until we find out who was after us.” He dragged in a breath and let it out. “I came to New Orleans to punish my brother’s killer, because I thought that satisfaction was all I could expect. Then I m
et you, and I knew that there was so much more.”

  “Never alone again,” she whispered as she snuggled against him, marveling at what she had found with this man. Now and for the rest of her life.

  * * * * *

  Keep reading for an excerpt from THE SECRET OF CHEROKEE COVE by Paula Graves.

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  Chapter One

  She entered the Bitterwood Community Center banquet hall with no fanfare, a tall, fit woman in her early thirties. Fanfare or not, Walker Nix found his gaze drawn her way, taking in her appearance with the practiced eye of an investigator. She had sleek auburn hair worn straight and intelligent green eyes that scanned the room with a specific goal in mind, narrowing as she failed to find her target.

  I should paint her, he thought. She wasn’t pretty, exactly, but he found her striking features interesting.

  Conversation died to nothing as most of the partygoers turned to look at the newcomer. Laney Hanvey, standing near the front of the hall with her mother and sister, crossed quickly to the woman, a smile on her face. She passed Walker, leaving him with a whiff of her light jasmine scent, and extended her hand to the taller woman. “Dana. You look just like your photo. It’s so nice to finally meet you!”

  Chief’s sister, Nix thought, his interest tempered by the impracticality of lusting after a woman whose brother was his boss. Her impending arrival had been the talk of the police station from the time the chief had mentioned to one of the file clerks that she was coming. She’d be in town only a few days, just long enough to get to know her brother’s fiancée and catch up on their lives, before heading back to her job in Atlanta.

  Still, his gaze lingered on Dana Massey’s face as she smiled at Laney and took her hand with what appeared to be genuine pleasure. She really would be a fascinating subject to paint.

  “I’m so happy to finally meet you, Laney!” Dana maintained eye contact as if oblivious to the interested stares of everyone else in the room. Nix dragged his gaze away from the meeting of the future sisters-in-law and let it skim across the other faces in the hall. To his surprise, he saw several looks of shock and one or two expressions of near hostility.

  Odd, he thought. As far as he knew, this was Dana Massey’s first visit to Bitterwood. And what little he’d heard about her wouldn’t elicit hostility from anyone but the fugitives she chased in her job as a deputy U.S. marshal.

  “Doyle is late,” Laney was saying as she and Dana passed Nix’s position near the doorway. “I tried calling his phone, but he’s not answering.”

  “He’s probably lost it somewhere,” Dana murmured in the tone of a sister used to her younger brother’s foibles. “He loses a phone every year, I swear.”

  They passed out of earshot, and Nix made himself look at his watch, not Dana Massey’s shapely backside. Almost eight. The party had officially started at seven-thirty. And while Bitterwood chief of police Doyle Massey had a reputation for being a bit more laid-back than his predecessor, he’d never shown a tendency toward tardiness.

  Nix bumped gazes with one of his fellow detectives, small, dark-eyed Ivy Calhoun. She was newly married, tanned golden from her recent honeymoon in the Bahamas and looking happier than he’d ever seen her. She flashed a smile at him, and he wandered over to where she stood with her new husband, Sutton Calhoun.

  “Nix.” Sutton greeted him with a nod. They were both Bitterwood natives, but Sutton was a few years younger than Nix. He was better acquainted with Nix’s younger brother, Lavelle, which might explain the wariness in Sutton’s gaze. Lavelle had never been anything but trouble.

  “Calhoun,” Nix responded in kind, saving his smile for Sutton’s bride. “Have you heard from the chief?”

  Ivy shook her head. “Laney said he told her he had to pick up something from the office before he came to the party. But that was nearly an hour ago.”

  It didn’t take an hour to get anywhere in Bitterwood. “Have you tried calling the station to see if he showed up?”

  Ivy cocked her head slightly to one side, her gaze narrowing. “You think something’s wrong?”

  “One of your hunches?” Sutton added, not without a hint of sarcasm.

  “No,” Nix lied, even though his hunch meter was going off like a klaxon. “Just doesn’t seem much like the chief to keep his girl waiting.”

  “Is that his sister?” Ivy nodded toward Dana Massey, who stood at the front talking to Laney and her family.

  “Yes,” Nix answered. “She didn’t seem worried about her brother’s lateness.”

  Sutton took a sip from the cup of red punch he held in his right hand. With a grimace, he set the cup on a nearby table. “Maybe she knows stuff about him we don’t.”

  “Maybe,” Nix conceded.

  “But you don’t think so,” Ivy prodded.

  He gave her a warning look, but her eyebrows merely rose a notch and her dark eyes flashed with amusement.

  She thought it was all great fun, having a genuine Cherokee soothsayer on the police force, and most of the time Nix didn’t try to squelch her enjoyment. He wasn’t a soothsayer, of course—his hunches were usually based on deduction, not intuition. And he was only part Cherokee. The rest was pure Appalachian Scots-Irish, as his brother Lavelle’s headstrong ways would attest. But playing the inscrutable Indian could have its advantages, especially during interrogations.

  “I’ll give the station a call, see what’s what.” He wandered away and pulled out his cell phone to call the main switchboard.

  The night shift dispatcher, Briar Blackwood, answered, “Bitterwood P.D.”

  “Hey, Briar, it’s Nix. Have you seen the chief?”

  “He called about seven to say he was heading in to pick something up from his office, but he didn’t show. I figured he might have been running late and decided to come by after the party.”

  Nix frowned. “Yeah, that’s probably it.”

  “What’s wrong?” Briar asked.

  “Probably nothing.”

  “Nix—”

  “Later, Briar.” He hung up before she could ask any more questions he couldn’t answer and crossed back to where Ivy and Sutton stood, talking to a tall redhead and an even taller man with dark hair and a rangy but powerful build.

  Ivy introduced the pair as Natalie and J. D. Cooper, friends of the chief’s. “Natalie used to work with the chief down South,” Ivy added as Nix shook hands.

  Natalie smiled, but he saw concern hovering behind her green eyes. “Ivy says Doyle’s late. Doyle’s never late. He may come across as an overgrown frat boy sometimes, but he’s as dependable as they come.”

  Her alarm exacerbated his own growing concern. Keeping his voice low, he told them about his call to the station. “That was an hour ago.”

  Ivy looked from Natalie’s face back to Nix’s. “Should we go look for him?”

  “I’ll do it,” Nix v
olunteered. “You stay here and make sure Laney doesn’t start worrying too much until we know what’s what.”

  Unspoken between them was the fact that there might well be a damned good reason to worry. Only three months earlier, Doyle Massey had crossed swords with a man named Merritt Cortland, whose thirst for power had led him to kill his father and several others in a deadly explosion. He’d tried to make the chief another of his victims, but Massey had fought him off. After Cortland had fallen down a steep incline, landing on the rocks below, he’d been thought dead, but by the time paramedics arrived at the base of the bluff, his body was gone.

  Was Merritt Cortland still alive? It was a question that nobody had been able to answer to anyone’s satisfaction. Nix figured it was possible the man’s injuries weren’t fatal as the chief had assumed. It was equally possible that one of Cortland’s ragtag cohort of meth cookers, anarchists and radical militia soldiers had recovered the body and was keeping it on ice in order to keep the legend alive.

  Under Merritt Cortland’s father, Wayne, the criminal operation had flourished, and even Cortland the younger had somehow managed to keep the enterprise afloat, despite the disparate elements involved. But if Merritt Cortland was dead, how long would the conspiracy thrive?

  Outside the community center, night had fallen deep and blue. After a mild day, the temperature had dropped into the forties, driving Nix deeper into his leather jacket. As he started down the concrete steps to the sidewalk, the door opened behind him and footsteps clicked across the hard surface.

  “Are you going to look for Doyle?”

  The low female voice rippled along his nerves as if she’d run a finger down his spine. He turned to find Dana Massey standing on the steps behind him, her intelligent eyes full of stubborn intent.

  Lying would do no good. She seemed like the kind of woman who never asked a question if she didn’t already know the answer. “I thought I’d see what’s keeping him.”

  “How late is he?”