Melinda Curtis - Marrying The Wedding Crasher

“What’s her name?” His older brother Gabe was nearly silenced by the whir of the tile saw and the punch-punch-punch of a nail gun. “And what’s that noise? Where are you?”

“They’re remodeling my local Starbucks.” Lying, Vince pulled his focus away from Harley. He was part of a crew working on a huge remodel in a fancy neighborhood outside of Houston. “And, no, I won’t tell you her name. The last time I introduced you to my girlfriend, you stole her, Gabe.”

Mandy Zapien, a girl with a heart of gold. He hoped she was married to somebody stable and had three kids by now.

“That was high school,” Gabe scoffed. “There is no girlfriend, admit it. All the more reason Vince needs to come home so we can straighten out his life.”

Vince’s life was fine as long as his brothers stayed out of it. Not that he didn’t love them. He just didn’t want to answer for every decision he’d made, every confidence he’d kept.

“The fake girlfriend is your tell.” Joe sounded disappointed. “The last time you bluffed about one, you’d been clipped by a stray bullet in a bar fight.”

“I wasn’t actually in the bar fight.” He’d been collateral damage, which seemed to be the story of his life. Vince set his jaw. “I’m not bluffing. There’s a girl.”

Correction. A woman. Wearing worn blue jeans, a burgundy T-shirt with the construction company’s logo and scuffed work boots. She wiped a tile dry with a towel, examining the cut she’d made in the white marble.

“Send us a picture,” Joe prodded. “We’ll compare her to Sarah Whitfield. Did I tell you she was back in town? And still single?”

“Guys...” Vince squeezed the tail end of his patience.

“There is no girlfriend.” Gabe pounced once more. “Which means you’re in trouble. Do you need me to spot you some cash?”

“No!” Money was the last thing Vince was worried about.

Harley spared Vince a glance. She was what Texans called a tall drink of water. Long, elegant lines, delicate bone structure, straight blond hair that she kept in a long braid down her back. Everything about her appearance was at odds with her being a construction worker. That contradiction was the reason he’d asked her out. Her gentle humor and sly wit had kept him asking.

“If it’s not money, how’s that truck of yours running?” Joe jumped in on Gabe’s fun. “I could re-bore those heads again and you’d get another fifty thousand miles.”

Vince drove their father’s red-and-white 1976 pickup truck. It had a weak air conditioner, cloth seats and unreliable headlights. Dad had been a mechanic who’d struggled with mental illness, made harder on the family when Mom had left them. Despite challenges, Dad had taught his three boys his trade. Only Joe had followed in Dad’s footsteps. Gabe was a lifer in the military, currently on leave for Joe’s wedding. And Vince—

“Messina! Break time’s over.”

Vince’s boss rounded the far corner of the house they were remodeling. Jerry wore a frown and a sunburn from a weekend spent bass fishing. “That deck’s got to be finished today.”

Vince held up a hand, acknowledging the older man. “I’m fine,” Vince said into the phone. “The truck is fine. My bank account is fine. Harley is fine.” This last came out like a backfire through a rust-ridden muffler.

His brothers crowed over his slip.

“Retire Dad’s truck,” Gabe said when he stopped laughing. “I’ll reserve you a room at the Lambridge Bed and Breakfast where I’m staying.”

“Bring me some of that oil you dredge up on that rig of yours,” Joe said, gasping for breath. “Gas in California is expensive. And a girlfriend? Sarah is going to be so disappointed.”

Vince wasn’t working on an oil rig, hadn’t been for over a year since it’d exploded.

He wasn’t retiring Dad’s truck. Other than the faulty headlight wiring, it ran like a champ.

He wasn’t dating Harley, not since she’d broken up with him.

And he had no idea if he was going to go to his brother’s wedding.

* * *

HARLEY O’HANNIGAN FINISHED wiping the grout from the shower tile in the master bathroom and sat back to admire her effort.

Carrera marble countertops. Chrome fixtures. White and black glass accents. It was luxury at its finest, not to mention it was bigger than the bedroom she’d had growing up and reminded her of the condo she used to rent in a high-rise downtown. That was six months and another lifetime ago.

“Harley!” The male voice, deep and angry, reverberated off the walls in the empty house and shook Harley’s stomach.

She moved into the master bedroom. Most of the construction crew had left for the day, except for Vince, who was sanding the deck outside the bedroom’s French doors. She wished he’d left, too.

There’s a mistake I won’t repeat.

“Harley!” Dan’s voice was as hard as his footsteps on the wood floor. “I know you’re here.”

“I’m in the back.”

And then so was her former boss, standing in the bedroom doorway.

On first glance, Dan looked like any other young, hipster architect, the kind of man her brother would roll his eyes at—close-cropped blond hair, neatly trimmed goatee, pink cotton, button-down and tight, white cigarette pants. He looked like the worst damage he could do was post a bad review online. But take a second look and you’d register cold gray eyes, an openmouthed sneer, and fingers flexing into fists. You’d recognize a desperate snake ready to strike.

Fear stuck in Harley’s throat. Why hadn’t she seen Dan’s reptilian side when he’d hired her, a fledgling architect, a year ago? Suddenly she was glad Vince was still around.

“Your design can’t be done,” Dan said in an ominous voice that conjured images of cop dramas and crimes about to be committed. “You knew this would happen.”

“Yes,” she choked out, hating that she sounded scared. “And so did you. I told you not to do it.” Not to steal her unfinished sketch. Not to present it to high-profile clients. Not to promise it could be built.

He’d stolen more than her architectural plans. He’d stolen her joy in the work and her confidence in her abilities.

Dan’s brows dropped to the locked-and-loaded position. “The structural engineers are demanding to see the plans from you. I put them off another two weeks, but that’s it.”

“Give the money back, Dan.” He’d won an international design award with her conceptual drawings of a playhouse with balconies that seemed to float in the sky. And then the city of Houston had agreed to pay Dan millions to build it.

“Give it back?” He choked on the words and then seemed angered to have done so. His face reddened. “I spent the advance on things like salaries and tuition reimbursement.” For her.

“And on cars and a new house.” An over-the-top place some other architect had designed. Dan had little talent of his own. He was drunk on new business and higher fees.

As usual, her arguments fell on deaf ears. Dan made a guttural hiss.

The fear in Harley’s throat plummeted to her legs, weakening them. He’d never confronted her alone in an isolated place before. Every instinct she had urged her to run, to get out of the house and away from Dan.

Before Harley had a chance to move, Dan did. He closed the distance between them and shoved her, hard.

As she fell, Harley’s vision tunneled until all she saw were angry eyes.

She couldn’t catch her breath. She was from a good home, a stable family. People in her world didn’t get in physical fights.

Her legs gave out and she felt cold from her head to her toes.

She became aware of a scuffling noise. Someone might have shouted. Someone who sounded vaguely like Dan.