Borrowed Bride Read online

  She still didn’t completely grasp everything he had told her yesterday, only that he had drawn a line with him on one side and Adam on the other. Adam, who had always been there for her these past two years, who had sat with her and held her hand at the hospital when Toby was so sick, who had promised her a future when the one she’d counted on had been blasted out of existence. Adam offered her what she wanted most, she reminded herself, a safe, secure life for herself and for Toby. As opposed to Connor, who had never offered her anything but aggravation and heartache.

  In a contest between Adam and Connor, she didn’t even have to blink to know whose side she ought to be on.

  In fact, as she’d told him yesterday, she refused to even consider the allegations he’d made against Adam. After all, the only thing she had to support any of it was Connor’s word. She rolled her eyes. Hardly what she would consider irrefutable proof. For all she knew, it was a complete hoax and the state police hadn’t arrested anyone for the bombing at the Black Wolf, and the investigation into it was as stalled as ever. And Connor was simply...

  Simply what? she asked herself for at least the hundredth time since she’d shut herself in that room all alone. She pulled aside the white ruffled curtain to gaze without seeing at the lake as her fingertips drummed restlessly on the wooden sill. Any other time she would have enjoyed the peaceful tableau, with the sun glistening on the clear water, a light breeze ruffling the branches of the surrounding trees and dozens of birds providing soft background music. But not today. Today she was too upset to enjoy anything.

  What in the world could Connor hope to gain from stopping her wedding and hauling her up here to this cabin in the middle of nowhere? Amusement? Perhaps at Adam’s expense ? She bit her lip, wishing she could convince herself that was it. Lord knew she’d tried. But she couldn’t.

  In spite of his many faults, and the myriad well-deserved accusations she’d hurled at him yesterday, there was no denying that Connor had cared deeply about Joel and that he’d been shattered by his death. Even she couldn’t believe that he would treat the matter lightly or use the explosion that had killed his friend as part of some stupid joke.

  Last night she had woken again and again and lay there in the dark trying to figure out what other possible reason there could be for what he was doing to her. Ransom came to mind, but was quickly dismissed. The restaurant was earning more than any of them had ever dreamed it might, and Connor shared fully in those profits. Besides, unlike Adam, the man had never had expensive tastes. Far from it. Old jeans and boots and enough money in his pocket to have fun—that had always been the extent of his material needs. Nothing Gaby saw yesterday suggested he’d changed any in that respect.

  One after another she had examined each motive she could possibly conjure for his actions, and one after another they crumbled in the bright light of reason. It was her misfortune to be consummately logical, and logic told her that as farfetched and ridiculous as it seemed, the only explanation that made any sense at all was the one Connor had offered in the first place. The one she had refused to accept.

  Was it possible that he was right? That Adam had involved the Black Wolf in something illegal? If so, she reasoned, it followed that he might also be somehow involved in Joel’s death. Everything inside her rebelled at that thought. Why? Gaby asked herself, struggling to dissect her own response. Was her vehement gut reaction prompted by loyalty to the man she planned to marry? Or was the reason more selfish? Perhaps her feelings were due to the fact that if Connor’s suspicions proved true, it would be tantamount to another explosion in her life—and Toby’s—just when it seemed everything was going to work out for them at last.

  Only one thing was certain. If by some chance Connor was right, sticking her head in the sand wasn’t going to make it all go away. And there was still the possibility that he was wrong and that there was a very simple explanation for everything, she told herself reassuringly. An explanation she might even be able to provide now that some of her anxiety had subsided. She had been so tense and furious with him yesterday it had been hard to hear what he was saying, much less think rationally.

  She turned away from the window with a resigned sigh. There was no way around it, she decided. She was going to have to find Connor and listen again to what he had to say. This time with an open mind.

  Connor bent over the outboard motor he was working on and tried for at least the fifth time to position his screwdriver to grip the screw positioned just beneath the swivel bracket. He needed to loosen the screw to remove the bracket so he could get at the transom clamp. Once that was off, he would be able to lay the motor on its side, lift off the cowling and see what the hell was wrong with the clutch lever. He carefully twisted the screwdriver, and once again it slipped off the screw without moving it so much as a millimeter.

  “Damn,” he muttered as he used his free hand to wipe the sweat from his forehead. The red bandanna he’d tied around his head to keep the sweat from running into his eyes wasn’t doing squat.

  Straightening, he flexed his shoulder muscles and squinted first at the sun, which hung like a ball of fire in the cloudless sky overhead, and then at the oversize thermometer mounted on the side of the house. Eighty in the shade. No wonder he was sweating. It was too damn hot for June and too early in the day for a beer.

  Especially, he thought derisively, when his brain cells were still struggling to regroup after the six-pack he’d chugged down last night. It had been a long time since he’d felt compelled to drink so much he could still feel it the next day. His fuzzy head was a reminder—not that he needed one—that dealing with Gabrielle was going to complicate his life in ways he should have been smart enough to anticipate.

  He’d expected her to be furious with him for ruining her wedding, he’d expected her to fight him tooth and nail and he’d expected to feel like a louse for doing what he had to do. What he hadn’t expected was that two years wouldn’t have changed in the slightest the way Gabrielle made him feel.

  He gripped the screwdriver and grunted with the effort of making yet another unsuccessful attempt to loosen the screw, wishing he had never promised Charlie he’d take a look at the temperamental motor while he was here.

  Two long years. Two years of risking his life every way he knew how, of staying on the move, of trying to outrun a guilty conscience and the bloodred memory of the explosion that took the life of the best friend he ever had. Maybe the only friend he ever had. In all that time he’d rarely wanted a woman. Never had he wanted one badly enough to go out of his way to have her or to drink too much because he couldn’t. In less than twenty-four hours Gabrielle had him drinking and wanting and hating himself for it.

  He stood with the tool poised over the motor and simply stared into its grimy, rusted crevices, his thoughts trapped in a no win land between desire and guilt. The truth, something he was ashamed to admit even to himself and would never confess to anyone else, was that he had always wanted Gabrielle. He gritted his teeth and rode the wave of revulsion the acknowledgment always brought with it. From the first moment he saw her all those years ago, he had been hooked in a way he couldn’t understand, much less explain.

  Not that it was love at first sight. Far from it. They’d clashed right from the start, so much so that whenever they were together there always seemed to be sparks flying just beneath the surface of their mutual effort to be courteous. Besides, from day one Gabrielle had belonged to Joel, and that alone meant he was honor bound to keep his hands off her. It should also have meant that thoughts of her were off-limits, but for some reason he had never been able to quite manage that degree of nobility.

  It bothered him that he couldn’t. Then and now. He prided himself on his willpower. There was nothing he couldn’t do, no challenge he couldn’t face and conquer, if he set his mind to it. He was a man who disdained weakness in others, but most of all in himself. And Gaby’s hold on him—as private and unacknowledged as it was—represented a weakness. She was like a fever he couldn
’t shake, a craving that simmered in the darkest corners of his soul.

  His feelings for her confused and intimidated and irritated him in about equal parts. He wasn’t good with feelings in general, and the only person he would ever have even attempted to discuss these particular feelings with was Joel, and of course that had always been out of the question.

  The fact that Joel was dead only made the situation worse. Another man might feel that a friend’s widow was not quite as forbidden as a friend’s wife. Connor’s lips curled into a sardonic smile. Obviously good old Adam subscribed to that philosophy. But not him. Oh, he understood that she was a young woman and life went on and all that. But as far as he was concerned, she was still Joel’s and still off-limits and she always would be. Maybe if he hadn’t had these feelings before, while Joel was alive, it would be different. But he had.

  Of course, it had been easier to accept that she was off-limits when he was in Mexico with half a continent between them. It was clear that now that he was back home he was going to have to be vigilant and keep reminding himself of why he had come back in the first place. He had to remember that he was here because he owed it to Joel to protect Gaby and Toby from anyone who might hurt them. And that included him.

  Suddenly he was aware that he was clenching the screwdriver so tightly it was cutting into his palm. Loosening his grip, he stared at the motor. Maybe, he thought, trying to overhaul it this morning hadn’t been such a good idea after all. He was seriously contemplating abandoning the task in favor of the big hammock down by the water when he heard footsteps on the gravel driveway behind him. He groaned inwardly as every muscle in his body tightened in anticipation of round two with Gaby.

  She was moving at a snail’s pace, and not until she reached the front of the picnic table he was using as a workbench did Connor glance up. He was amazed to see her holding two glasses of what looked like iced coffee. Forcing a smile caused his head to throb, but he made the effort anyway.

  “Morning,” he said. “Which one has the arsenic?”

  She managed a small smile. “Neither. It’s meant as a peace offering.”

  “Really?” he asked, mock suspicion in the slight tilt of his head.

  She laughed outright. “Yes, really. Take your pick if you don’t believe me.”

  His gaze narrowed as he studied the two drinks she held out to him before reaching for the one in her right hand. The glass was cold and beaded with tiny drops of condensation, and suddenly his mouth was watering for the taste of iced coffee. He stopped with the glass only inches from his lips and eyed her over the rim. Arsenic seemed a little farfetched, but it occurred to him that there was no telling what she might have come across in Charlie’s medicine cabinet.

  “You first,” he ordered.

  “For heaven’s sake.” She rolled her eyes and took a big sip from the glass in her hand. “Happy?”

  “I wouldn’t go that far,” he muttered, and chugged half of his coffee in one gulp.

  Gaby regarded him with amusement. “I was going to ask if you wanted more sugar, but evidently it’s okay as it is.”

  “It’s perfect. Thank you.” He took another, more restrained sip, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. Lowering his glass, he glanced at her T-shirt and shorts and was instantly assailed by an image of her clad only in the bra and panties he knew she had to be wearing underneath. The day suddenly seemed even hotter. “I see the clothes fit,” he remarked, averting his gaze to the lake behind her, as if he found something out there absolutely fascinating.

  “More or less.” She took another sip. “Did you really think I’d try to poison you?”

  Connor shrugged. “Why not? I’m sure you think I deserve it. Or worse.”

  “True.”

  He met her gaze with a sardonic smile. “I thought you said this was supposed to be a peace offering.”

  “It is.”

  “Does that mean you’ve come to your senses, had a miraculous change of heart overnight and now realize that I’m right about everything, and that instead of the arrogant, hardheaded SOB you accused me of being, I’m actually a knight in shining armor?”

  “I wouldn’t go that far,” she said, her tone dry as she mimicked his earlier words. “It does, however, mean that I’m willing to listen again to what you have to say and see if somehow together we can’t come up with a reasonable explanation for whatever you think is going on.”

  “I know what’s going on, Gaby,” he said. “I’m just not sure of all the details or of exactly how Adam is involved.”

  “If Adam is involved,” she amended.

  His mouth tightened. “He is, trust me.”

  “I’m afraid I can’t do that. I can’t just take your word for the fact that a very dear friend of mine, a man who was only good to me and my son when I really needed someone, the man I intend to marry, is involved in some sordid money-laundering scheme and may even have been behind the death of my husband.”

  “Fine,” he said. He fumbled in the toolbox for a smaller screwdriver, telling himself that since he really hadn’t expected her to trust him, it shouldn’t bother him so much that she didn’t. “You don’t have to take my word for it. You don’t have to do anything. I only filled you in on what was going on as a courtesy and because you seemed so hell-bent on knowing. Your confidence and cooperation—or lack thereof—are really inconsequential.”

  “What is that supposed to mean?” she demanded. She stood with her weight on one hip, her arms crossed in front of her, her cool, haughty gaze getting to him like an itch in a place he couldn’t scratch.

  “Nothing diabolic, so you can stop looking at me as if I’m something you stepped in with one of your fancy iced apricot pumps.”

  “Speaking of which, there were no shoes in with the clothes you gave me.”

  He turned back to the motor. “That’s right.”

  “So I’d like my own shoes back if you don’t mind.”

  “I do mind.”

  “Why, for heaven’s sake? You can hardly expect me to walk around barefoot all the time,” she complained, her voice rising. “The stones killed my feet just getting out here.”

  He slanted her a distracted look as he moved to the other side of the table in hopes of finding a better angle for the screwdriver. “Then you won’t be straying too far, will you?”

  Understanding flared in her eyes, followed by a flash of anger.

  “Of all the... do you really think you can keep me here by keeping me barefoot?”

  “I think the odds are a lot better than they would be if I’d thrown in a pair of comfortable sneakers.” He felt the screwdriver begin to slip. “Ah, damn.”

  “You’re impossible,” she told him, her words clipped and angry. “To think I actually came out here hoping we could have a rational conversation and maybe come up with answers to some of the questions you’ve raised.”

  “The hell you did,” he retorted, not sure at that instant if he was more frustrated by her or the motor. “You came out here hoping you could chip away at what I told you yesterday.”

  Her silent shrug only served to spur him on.

  “I’m sure you’d love to twist it and slant it to make it look like we’re talking about a small bookkeeping error instead of a professional wash-and-dry operation for hundreds of thousands of dollars a year. And barring that, I’m sure you’d love to persuade me that your dear old friend Adam is just some kind of innocent bystander to whatever is going on instead of being at the center of it, involved in fraud and racketeering and maybe murder right up to his lying eyeballs.”

  “You have no proof of any of that.”

  “Yet,” he snapped, leaning over the motor to glare at her.

  “Yet?” she scoffed. “How do you expect to come up with any proof while you’re hanging around here baby-sitting me?”

  “I don’t have to. Half the state police crime and undercover units are working on it right this minute, and the proof will come. Count on it, Gaby. And when it do
es, it’s going down... and Adam Ressler is going with it.”

  Her head shook with bleak amazement. “You sound almost happy about it. I thought Adam was your friend.”

  “Yeah, I thought so, too.”

  “Don’t you think that you at least owe him the benefit of the doubt?” she pressed. “That you should try talking to him?”

  “The way Joel tried to? No, thanks.”

  Gaby went pale.

  Connor tossed aside the rag he’d been using to wipe grease from the motor. “Look, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said that.”

  “Why not, it’s what you believe, isn’t it?”

  He nodded slowly, his expression solemn. “Yeah. It’s what I believe.”

  The arms folded across her chest tightened, and it almost seemed to Connor that she shivered in spite of the heat that was sending a steady stream of sweat trickling down his back. He took a step forward, struck by a powerful and unsettling urge to reach out and offer comfort. He could almost feel what it would be like to take her in his arms, to feel the silkiness of her long hair brushing his bare skin and the delicate line of her backbone as he moved his hand consolingly along her back.

  He quickly reached for the screwdriver and bent over the engine once more. He was going to loosen that blasted screw if it took him all day. After a minute or so, he sensed her moving and cursed himself for feeling a stupid hope that she was coming closer instead of trying to get away from him. A quick glance up from what he was doing told him she wasn’t. That was all the time it took for Murphy’s Law to kick in. The screwdriver slipped off the screw, and the pressure he’d been exerting on it was enough to drive his hand forward toward the propeller. His fingers jammed between the metal blades and the casing, and one of the rusted blade edges ripped a four-inch gash across the back of his right hand.