Cassie Miles - Wedding Captives

They swooped away from the stone house, suspended from a thread and climbing. Don’t look down!

But she didn’t even have to look down. An awful sensation, of the earth dropping away, her stomach falling, her heart racing, rushed over her. Frantically groping, Thea clutched Spence’s hand.

And before she knew what she was doing, her face was buried against his shoulder. This was wrong, all wrong. And yet, in her heart, she knew if Spence hadn’t been beside her, she’d have found herself in the throes of a full-blown panic attack.

In her heart, she wondered what Spence had to do with it.

JORDAN AND EMILY stood beside the stone house, waving at the gondola as it climbed slowly across the precipitous chasm toward the castle which was entirely hidden by dark January clouds. Jordan pulled Emily closer, protecting her from a chill that wasn’t entirely due to the weather.

“There’s something about this wedding,” he said, “that makes me uneasy.”

“Leaving the cell phones behind seemed odd. And why was the butler late?” She shrugged. “Maybe we’re the ones who are paranoid, imagining a threat at every turn.”

After the fugitive hunt that had brought them together, Jordan wouldn’t be surprised if he and Emily were overly sensitive to danger. Especially when Spence was involved. If it hadn’t been for the good doctor’s help, Jordan would probably be in jail on death row. “Spence will be okay.”

She frowned. “I’m sure you’re right. I hope things work out for him and Thea. I liked her.”

“Me, too.” Jordan turned away from the gondola. “Let’s go.”

She dug the toe of her boot into the snow, scanning the dark, threatening skies. “You’re right. We should try to beat the storm back to Cascadia.”

He nodded. Jordan hated the snow, but he loved sitting in front of a roaring fire with his beautiful new wife.

Emily tracked the progress of the gondola car moving through space toward the Castle in the Clouds. “Did you notice how scared Thea was to get on that thing?”

Jordan shrugged. “Some people are. What’s really worrying you? If there’s a problem, Spence will call.”

“And then what? Take a look at that place. It’s a search-and-rescue nightmare. Jagged cliffs on every side. The only way out in an emergency would be helicopter rescue.”

“Hold on,” he said, teasing her gently. “Earlier, you said the castle reminded you of princesses and jousts.”

Emily shivered hard in the blistering cold. “That was before I remembered that dragons also live in castles.”

THE SLOWLY ASCENDING gondola car shuddered in the swirling mountain winds, but Spence was unconcerned about the surrounding glacial landscape. The scope of his universe had shrunk to a bell jar. Starting with the moment Thea’s forehead touched his shoulder, his consciousness focused entirely upon her. He actually enjoyed the feel of her slender fingers clutching his hand in a white-knuckled death grip of terror. Her fear of heights—something he had never suspected in her—had worked to his advantage.

Spence held himself very still, not wanting to disturb this moment. He knew better than to whisper reassurances that she might take as condescension. Nor did he reach across her body to fully embrace her. His job was simply to be there for her, solid as a rock, trustworthy. Sooner or later, she’d wake up and realize that he was basically a good guy.

Maybe it would be sooner. After all, she’d instinctively turned to him when she was scared, which might mean that on a visceral, almost cellular level, she still trusted him. Or it might mean nothing more than that she would’ve grabbed anybody sitting beside her in the gondola car. Spence didn’t care. He was grateful for this hint of their former intimacy. Careful not to disturb her, he inhaled the clean fragrance of her soft chestnut-brown hair. Through the layers of their parkas and turtlenecks, he felt the subtle outline of her slender body.

In a strangled whisper, she asked, “How much farther?”

“Ten minutes.”

He wanted to tell her it wasn’t so bad, but he was feeling a little queasy himself. Like a giant yo-yo, deprived of gravity’s solace, the gondola bounced in space, hundreds of feet above towering ice splinters. In this hostile environment, the tall conifers marched up the mountainside like a snow-encrusted army guarding the Castle in the Clouds.

At the front of the gondola, Lawrence the butler stood before a simple control panel. The reverend and Dr. Mona were seated, staring and mesmerized by the spectacular view. Only Travis was in motion, ducking down to peer from the windows on one side, then the other.

“Hey, Larry,” Travis said, “how did this castle get built, anyway?”

“I prefer to be called Lawrence,” the butler said.

“Okay, Lawrence,” Travis drawled. “How’d they build this place?”

“I assume you are referring to the apparent impossibility of transporting building materials to such an extremely isolated location.”

“Well, yeah,” Travis muttered as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.

With a shrug of his round shoulders, Lawrence explained, “The opposite wall of this peak was a marble quarry. In the late 1800s, some of the finest marble in the world was quarried here, then cut and polished by artisans who came from Italy. A narrow-gauge railroad transported the stones which were used in monuments throughout North America.”

“So?” Travis said. “Are you saying that the rear approach to the castle isn’t so steep?”

“Quite the contrary.” Lawrence continued, “In seeking the most excellent veins of marble, the walls were literally shaved back into steep cliffs.”

“Interesting,” Dr. Mona said. “The castle appears to be the domain of someone seeking total isolation, but that wasn’t the case.”

“Not at all,” Lawrence said. “Though the first owner was known to be a cutthroat entrepreneur, he built this castle to please his wife, a proper Bostonian lady who insisted that the quarry be shut down on Sunday, the day of rest.”

The reverend murmured his approval.

Lawrence added, “There’s a chapel in the castle.”

Spence felt Thea’s grip on his hand begin to relax as she listened to the history of the Castle in the Clouds. Though he was glad her fear had begun to abate, he hoped she wouldn’t pull away from him. He wanted the connection with her, no matter how tenuous.

“And yet,” Lawrence said, “no one would mistake the castle for a cathedral. The bridal suite—which you can see from here—at the top of the north tower where the light is lit, features some rather decadent statuary.”

The stern-faced reverend inhaled a disapproving sniff through his long red nose. “The castle’s isolation is an appropriate homily.” As if pronouncing the locale an indictment against an ill-fated wedding and a groom he had yet to meet, Joshua Hardy intoned, “It was greed that caused them to chisel away at the wall of the mountain, leaving themselves stranded and alone.”

“Dude,” Travis shuddered, “that sounds like a sermon.”

“That would be the definition of a homily,” the reverend said curtly. “An example to edify the flock.”

“Sheep?”

“Listen here, Mr. Trevain.” The reverend pointed a warning with his skeletal index finger. “I don’t appreciate your attitude. I’m here at the request of your sister to bless the holy sacrament of her marriage, and I will not be taunted.”

Travis rolled his eyes and flung himself down onto a seat, sending a tremor through the gondola car.

Thea gasped and burrowed more deeply against Spence’s shoulder. For her benefit he asked, “Lawrence, is this gondola safe?”