Brenda Harlen - A Wife for One Year

“No,” she said quickly, deliberately ignoring the leap of her pulse in response to his provocative statement.

He just grinned.

“I’m suggesting an amendment to the time frame,” she clarified. “Six months should be long enough to convince people we tried to make our marriage work but realized we were better off as friends.”

“Maybe most people,” he acknowledged.

She knew he was excluding his parents from that list, and she knew he was right. After refusing his request for access to his trust fund only a couple of months earlier, David and Jane Garrett would definitely have suspicions about their son’s sudden nuptials. And while she appreciated that Daniel didn’t like deceiving his parents, she didn’t understand how dragging the deception out over twelve months rather than six made it more palatable to him.

“Call about the chapel,” she decided. “Let’s make sure today is day one of my three hundred and sixty-five as Mrs. Daniel Garrett.”

* * *

Daniel made the call.

Fifteen minutes later they were picked up by a limo that took them to the marriage license bureau, then returned them to the hotel for the ceremony.

When Kenna stepped inside the chapel, her breath actually caught in her throat.

Her groom halted beside her. “Is something wrong?”

“It’s...beautiful.”

“Why do you sound so surprised?”

“I guess I just thought... I mean, this is an impromptu wedding in Vegas. I expected Elvis in a polyester suit and—”

“You nixed the Elvis idea,” he reminded her. “You wanted something more traditional.”

She nodded, because it was true. But she hadn’t expected something that would look and feel so much like a real church, with classic cathedral ceilings and antique stained glass, floral arrangements on marble columns and flickering candles everywhere.

The officiant started toward them. As he drew nearer, she noticed that he was wearing a clerical collar. Not an officiant, she realized, but a real minister, and his presence forced her to acknowledge the realness of the vows she was about to make.

He welcomed them, introduced himself as Gerald Laughton and inspected their marriage license. He’d just started to give them a brief rundown of the ceremony when a trim woman with neatly coiffed white hair and wearing an elegant rose-colored suit bustled in.

“Sorry, sorry, sorry,” she breathlessly apologized. “I should have been here to greet you, but I got tied up waiting for a delivery from the florist.”

“We weren’t going to start without you,” the minister assured her. Then to Daniel and Kenna he said, “This is Vera Laughton, the chapel administrator, your witness and my wife of thirty-four years.”

After the introductions were completed, Vera took Kenna’s arm and steered her away from the men, toward the back of the chapel.

“We’ve got a schedule to keep,” she reminded them. “So let’s get this started.”

Vera handed Kenna a bouquet of flowers and signaled to a younger man with a camera around his neck. He punched a few buttons on the front panel of an intricate sound system and music began to fill the room.

Not Mendelssohn’s “Wedding March” but Pachelbel’s Canon in D Major, Kenna realized. She’d always thought it was a much more elegant and beautiful song, as she’d remarked to Daniel when they’d attended his cousin Braden’s wedding several years earlier. Of course, Daniel wouldn’t have remembered that. And even if he had, she would guess that the music had been chosen by the hotel’s wedding coordinator or Vera—or maybe even the last bride who had walked down the aisle in this chapel.

But when Kenna drew in a deep breath and looked down at the hand-tied flowers in her hands, questions swirled in her mind. The website had indicated that the bride could choose between white or red roses, but she was holding a bouquet of soft pink gerberas—her favorite flowers.

In that moment, she knew that Daniel had done this. For her. He’d taken care of the little details to give her, if not the wedding of her dreams, at least one that she would remember fondly. And when she glanced up at the front of the chapel, where he was waiting more anxiously than patiently, she felt her heart swell.

When she’d first met him, back in high school, he’d been breathtakingly good-looking. At sixteen, he’d already been more than six feet tall and broad in the shoulders, but he’d added both muscle and maturity since then, and he was even more attractive now.

He rarely asked anything of her, and she knew he’d never wanted anything as much as he wanted Garrett/Slater Racing to become a reality. When she’d agreed to marry him, she’d thought she was doing it for Becca, but she realized now that she would have done it for him anyway. Because he wasn’t just her best friend, he was a good man, and even if she wasn’t in love with him, she did love him.

She started down the aisle toward him, and as her gaze met his, his lips curved. When she reached the front of the chapel, he took her hand and squeezed her icy fingers reassuringly. Or maybe he was holding on to her to make sure she didn’t bolt.

She didn’t look at him when he recited his vows, and she kept her gaze focused on his chin as she spoke her own. Because she wouldn’t—couldn’t—look him in the eye and say words that they both knew were a lie. Instead of “so long as we both shall live,” the minister should have asked them to promise “until the monies of the trust fund have been released.” It wouldn’t have sounded nearly as romantic, but at least it would have been honest.

Thankfully, the ceremony was concluded fairly quickly. Then came the words that made both of them freeze.

“You may kiss your bride.”

Her eyes lifted, and Kenna saw the knee-jerk panic she was feeling reflected in his. Obviously they’d both forgotten that after the exchange of promises and rings, there was supposed to be a ceremonial kiss.

He lifted one shoulder in a half shrug, then dipped his head and touched his mouth to hers.

The contact was so light and so quick, she might have doubted it had even happened except for the fact that her lips actually tingled.

The slight furrow between his brows made her wonder if he’d experienced the same unexpected reaction to the fleeting kiss. Then he touched his mouth to hers again, lingering just a little bit longer this time, just long enough to start her heart racing.

When he drew back, she slowly exhaled the breath she’d been holding and forced a smile as the photographer circled around them, snapping photos.

“All part of the package,” he reminded them.

Kenna’s lips remained curved, presenting the image of a blissful bride as she posed with her now-rich husband.

But nerves danced and tangled in her belly, warning that she wasn’t quite as immune to her groom as she wanted to be.

Chapter Two

Daniel had made reservations for dinner after the ceremony at Prime—a signature Courtland Hotel restaurant that specialized in steak and seafood. The decor was simple but elegant: leather armchair seating around square tables set with pristine white cloths, gleaming silver and crystal stemware all subtly illuminated by candlestick lamps.

Before they’d even opened their menus, the hostess returned to their table with a slim glass vase to keep Kenna’s bouquet fresh. She was followed by the sommelier bearing a half bottle of champagne “compliments of the management” for the happy couple.

“To day one,” Daniel toasted.

Kenna lifted her glass to tap against his. “Only three hundred and sixty-four more to go.”

Maybe he should have been insulted that she was already so eager to end their marriage, except that he understood the circumstances of their union weren’t what either of them would have chosen. All things considered, however, he knew he was a lucky man to have married the woman who wasn’t just his best friend but one of the most beautiful women he’d ever known.