Rebecca York - Bridal Jeopardy

“I’m not ready for marriage,” she blurted.

“You’re going to have to change your mind about that.”

“No.”

“I’m in financial trouble.”

“Whose fault is that?”

“You could say it’s my own fault, but I’m not going to go down in disgrace if someone is willing to help me. Besides, John Reynard will make a good husband. He’s rich and well connected. You’ll never want for anything.”

She felt as though she were living in the Middle Ages. Women in the twenty-first century married for love, not for the right connections.

Yet she’d long ago secretly given up on love, and maybe that was why she had finally agreed.

She didn’t want to be revealing any of that to Craig Branson. Or was it Craig Brady? She couldn’t be sure, because both names came to her strongly.

But the exchange of information was only part of what was happening between them. She felt his emotions. The emptiness that had consumed him since his brother’s death. It was like the emptiness she had always felt, only she’d had nothing to compare it to.

And below the mental connection was a sexual pull that she had never experienced before in her life.

It was as though she must make love with this man—or die. Or perhaps she would die if she made love with him.

That thought was so outrageous that she pushed it from her thoughts. Which wasn’t difficult, because sexual desire was limiting her ability to think.

Craig Branson or Brady pulled her into his arms and lowered his mouth to hers.

She wanted to push him away. No, that was a lie. She wanted him to show her the pleasure of making love—pleasure that she knew would never be hers with John Reynard.

She tried to drive that last thought from her mind as his lips moved over hers, hungry and insistent. It was too private to share with anyone, least of all the man who held her in his arms. But she knew he had picked it up and knew he was glad she understood what a mistake it would be to marry Reynard. Not just because...

Branson cut the thought off before it could fully form. She was sure that he and Reynard had never met each other before the night of the charity reception, yet he seemed to know a lot about her fiancé.

She tried to hang on to that observation, but her mind was no longer operating in any rational manner.

Feelings had become more important than thoughts. The feel of Craig Branson’s lips against hers. The feel of his hands as they stroked up and down her back, then cupped her bottom, pulling her more tightly against the erection straining at the front of his jeans.

He was ready to make love with her. And she was just as ready, yet she knew in some part of her mind that this was going too fast. They had to stop, and she was the one who had to do it.

She wrenched her mouth away from his and pushed at his shoulders.

The move caught him by surprise, because in his mind he was already taking the heated contact to its logical conclusion.

She slipped out of his grasp and put several feet of space between them as she stood panting.

When he reached for her, she shook her head. “Not now.”

He was breathing hard, and his face looked as if he’d just touched a live electric wire, but he said only, “Why not?”

Now she couldn’t meet his heated gaze. “Is this usually the way you act with a woman you don’t know?”

“You know it isn’t.”

“What happened between us just now?”

“I felt the connection to you. Like the connection to Sam.” He laughed. “Well, I never felt the sexual part with my brother.”

She nodded slowly.

“But you’ve never felt anything like that?” he asked.

“No. What does it mean?”

“You weren’t a twin?”

“No.”

“Then what in the hell just happened?” he asked, revealing he was as perplexed as she was.

“I don’t know,” she answered.

It seemed he was still trying to come to a logical conclusion when she was sure there was no logic to what had happened. Or, at least, no logic that she had ever encountered.

“I...”

Before she could explain that to him, the bell over the shop door jingled, and her head jerked up. Claire stepped into the shop and gave the two of them an appraising look.

“What’s going on?” she asked, her voice going high and sharp.

“Two men came in here. I don’t know what they wanted, except that they were going to hurt me. Then Mr....”

“Brady,” he supplied, and she knew when he said it that it wasn’t his real name. But for some reason he had decided to use it.

“Mr. Brady came in and fought with them. Then they ran away.”

Claire’s gaze swung to him, her eyes assessing. “That was lucky—your being here. But how did you know what was happening?”

“I was on my way to the po’boy shop down the block,” the man who had rescued her said. “I noticed them on the street, and they looked out of place. When I saw them come in here, I didn’t think they were planning to buy dresses.”

Claire was still staring at Stephanie and Craig as though she didn’t believe a word of what they were saying. And Stephanie silently acknowledged that they were lying—by implication, at least, about what had happened after the men had left.

Craig turned away and came down on his knees under the rack of dresses. When he stood again, he was holding a gun. “They left this,” he said to Claire.

She sucked in a sharp breath as she saw the weapon. If Claire hadn’t believed them in the first place, she would now.

“What should I do with it?” Stephanie asked.

“I’ll take it,” Craig said.

“Shouldn’t we call the police?”

“Do you want to?”

She thought about it before shaking her head, then wondered if he would accept the decision.

As she looked at him, her gaze zeroed in on the bruise that was discoloring his forehead.

“You got hurt in the fight,” she said.

“Did I?”

“Yes. Your forehead is bruised. You need ice on that.”

Glad to escape, she slipped into the back room, where she paused to run a shaky hand through her hair, thanking her lucky stars that she and Craig hadn’t been in each other’s arms when Claire had come in. That was all she needed, for someone to report back to John that she was kissing another man. Would Claire have ratted on her? She didn’t know, but she still understood that she had to be careful.

She got several ice cubes from the refrigerator, wrapped them in a paper towel, then put them into a plastic bag. She wished she didn’t have to go out there and face Craig again, but she was pretty sure he was still waiting for her in the front of the shop.

He and Claire were talking when she returned and handed him the ice pack, being careful not to touch his hand.

Something had happened between them when they touched, and she didn’t want it to happen again. At least not now.

He took the ice and pressed the package against his forehead.

“Thanks.”

“No problem.”

“Mr. Brady and I were talking. He’s in the city to get some investment advice,” Claire said.

Stephanie nodded. She hadn’t picked that up from him, but she supposed it could be true. She canceled the last silent observation. He wasn’t in town for investment advice. He was here to investigate John Reynard.

That realization made her suck in a sharp breath.

“Are you all right?” Claire asked, her gaze anxious.

“I’m...I’m just reliving the moments before Mr. Brady came in,” she answered. “It was pretty scary with those men coming after me.”

“What happened, exactly?” Claire asked.

“Not too much. They came in, and I could tell they—” she gulped “—wanted to harm me.”