Mother of the Bride (27 page)

“C'mon, Cydney.” Gus hobbled after her. “Gimme a chance.”

“I gave you a chance yesterday.” She turned around in her bedroom doorway. “And today you're lying to me again.”

“I'm telling the truth and I'm trying to explain,” Gus said, taking a step toward her. “If you'd just listen—”

She back-stepped into the room and slammed the door. He plowed into it, saw stars and staggered backwards, stumbled and fell flat on his ass in his own hallway, his hands cupped over his throbbing nose.

Cydney opened the door and looked at him. “Are you all right?”

Gus lowered his hands and gingerly worked his nose up and down and from side to side. “I think so.”

“You're bleeding,” she said, nonplussed. “Go get an ice bag.”

Then she shut the door and locked it.

chapter

twenty

So far, Cydney thought dismally, her acquaintance with Angus Munroe read like an episode of
ER.
He'd suffered a concussion, a cracked nose, a sprained ankle and a broken toe all more or less at her hands, and still he wanted to sleep with her.

Well, he'd wanted to until she slammed the door in his face. He might not now, but she hadn't hung around to find out. She'd dashed a note, grabbed her purse and her keys and ran for the Jeep while he was in the kitchen with Aldo and Bebe, letting them pack his nose in ice.

It wasn't in Cydney's nature to run, but she didn't know what else to do but disappear before her mother came back and strung her up in the great room by the orange icicle lights for giving the shopping list to Bebe. The only good thing about that scenario was they wouldn't have to cut her down— they could just leave her swinging from the ceiling beams as part of the decorations.

She remembered most of Gus' directions and found her way to Branson with only a half-dozen or so wrong turns. She filled the Jeep with gas and ran it through an automatic car wash to scrub the bug splats off the headlights. Then she went shopping. In all the hubbub of designing and mailing the invitations, she'd forgotten to pack something to wear to the wedding.

She found a mall built around a brick courtyard and spent the morning looking for a dress that would go with the paper bag she planned to wear over her head if Georgette couldn't talk Bebe out of a Halloween wedding. She wasn't hungry,
but bought a cheeseburger and hot chocolate for lunch and took them outside to the courtyard where red-gold Bradford pear trees grew inside protective wrought-iron collars.

It was chilly enough to raise gooseflesh, even with the black wool blazer she'd grabbed out of her suitcase and tugged over her sweater, but she plunked down anyway at a black mesh table. The cheeseburger tasted funny, but Cydney ate it. She'd blown her chance to make love with Gus, so who cared if she caught pneumonia or ptomaine?

The stiff breeze chasing dead leaves around her feet reminded her of the maple tree in her backyard and the wicket. That damned croquet wicket, the doomed beginning to this whole debacle.

She shouldn't have run out of Gus' house. She should've followed her instincts and never set foot in it. Why had she slammed the door in his face? Wasn't dropping a rock on his foot and smacking him upside the head when he'd tried to kiss her enough? How was she going to face him? What was she going to say to him when she got back to Tall Pines?

Maybe you won't have to say anything,
her little voice suggested.
If your mother finds out he dared Aldo and Bebe to plan the wedding, she might string him up by the orange icicle lights.

Cydney made a face and gave up on the cheeseburger. More than likely, Gus had given up on her. She'd gone way beyond overreacting to what he'd said to Aldo. She realized that now and she wasn't angry anymore—well, not much—but she was mightily confused.

Thursday night Gus thought she was the nicest person he'd ever met. Yesterday morning he'd suggested they be lovers. What step had she missed in that evolution? And why did it seem so suspicious?

Was it her insecurities that made her think he
must
be up to something because he couldn't
possibly
just want her? Boy, that didn't paint a happy picture of her inner landscape.

“It's too good to be true,” Cydney said out loud. “That's what's wrong with it. That's what makes it suspect.”

She simply wasn't used to too good to be true. She was
used to Wendell Pickering being the best offer she'd had since the last time Gwen held a press conference to tell the world she was getting married.

Cydney sighed and finished her hot chocolate, stuffed the half-eaten cheeseburger in her empty cup, threw it away and headed for the Jeep. The map she'd picked up at the gas station said there were two factory outlet malls five miles off Highway 76, the main drag parking lot through town. Five miles and twenty minutes in gridlock, but she got there, found a sale on sweaters and shoes and a lovely peach-colored satin suit with a tea-length skirt that would go nicely with her paper bag.

It was pushing four when Cydney left the mall. The sky had turned gray with low-slung clouds. The wind was so strong it blew her across the parking lot and so cold it made her nose run. She turned the Jeep's heater on, blew her nose and headed back to Highway 76.

As she inched along in traffic, past the motels, music halls and strip malls crowding both sides of the road, she bent her arm on the door, spread her fingers on her temple and yawned. She felt achy from being up half the night and a headache from lack of sleep pulsed behind her eyes. Snapshots of Gus flickered through her mind, the lush hair on his chest, the long, gorgeous length of him in those purple silk boxers.

In her dreams he was kind, thoughtful and considerate. In person he was rude, arrogant and selfish. That was the problem—her stupid fantasies. She'd expected perfection and Gus wasn't perfect. He was human. Of course he seemed rude and arrogant and selfish. Of course he kept disappointing her. He'd keep on disappointing her until she snapped out of her dream world and accepted him as is, like a used car with no warranty. If it has tires or testicles, Gwen had told her once, it's going to give you trouble.

Cydney was tired of dreams. She wanted reality, wanted to feel Gus in her arms again, the sheer male weight of him on top of her. It wasn't all of her dream. He didn't want to marry anyone, so there'd be no “I love you,” and no Rhett Butler
sweep up the stairs, but part of a dream was better than none, wasn't it?

You sure about that?
her little voice asked.

“No,” Cydney admitted mournfully. “I'm not sure about anything.”

She thought she remembered where Gus told her to turn to take the shortcut, but an hour later she was lost. Well, wasn't this the perfect end to the perfect day? She'd found her way out of Tall Pines but couldn't find her way out of Branson. Cydney pulled into a scenic overlook cut into the side of a tree-covered, autumn-flamed mountain and spread the map over the steering wheel.

Tall Pines lay west of Branson. That much she knew. What she didn't know was how she'd ended up here, on the east side of town with the sun slicing through the overcast to set in a tangerine blaze across the windshield. The wind buffeted the Jeep on its springs and seeped past the doors, cold enough to make her shiver. Three times she'd tried to get out of town going west and ended up making a giant loop. She didn't see much point trying again and reached for her cell phone.

Cydney dialed her mother and got the out of area recording. Bebe's cell phone dumped her into voice mail. She left a message—noting the time, 5:20—and sat huddled in the Jeep, running the engine every few minutes to keep warm. At six o'clock it started to snow, a swirl of tiny flakes skittering across the windshield. At 6:10 Cydney's nose started to run again. She gave up and dialed the number at Tall Pines Gus had faxed to her mother and Georgette had insisted she program into her phone before they'd left Kansas City.

He answered on the second ring with a curt, “Hello?”

Cydney opened her mouth, ready to admit defeat and ask for directions. Then Gus snapped, “Hel-
lo
?” and the memory of him sitting on the side of her bed in his purple silk boxers, wagging his eyebrows and saying, “Lust will find a way,” seared through her heart. She punched end and tossed the phone into the passenger seat.

“If lust can find a way,” she said grimly, “so can I.”

As she started the engine and reached for the gearshift, her
cell phone rang. At last, she thought, Bebe, and snatched it up. “Hello?”

“Why did you call and hang up?” It was Gus. “Where are you?”

Damn Caller I.D. “I have absolutely no idea where I am. Someplace east of Branson, parked in a scenic overlook.”

“Stay put. I'll come and find you.”

“No, don't. Just tell me—”

The connection went dead. Cydney redialed but the line just rang and rang. Terrific. She sighed, turned on the heater and folded her arms to wait. The longer she waited the bigger the snowflakes got—dime-size, quarter-size—and the more she worried about Gus. The Jeep had four-wheel drive. His Jaguar looked like a skateboard.

By the time the British racing green coupe skidded sideways into the overlook, there were three inches of snow on the ground and the flakes were the size of saucers. The Jag's wheels spun as Gus pulled up beside the Jeep, lowered his window and turned on the dome light. Cydney lowered hers and winced at his puffy red nose.

“You okay?” He called over the howl in the wind.

“Yes. Just cold.”

“The roads are absolute shit. Aldo and Bebe took off in my pickup before the snow started, to catch a movie. I'm going to leave the Jag in Branson and ride back to Tall Pines with you. That okay?”

“Absolutely.”

“Follow me.”

Cydney did, the Jeep's transmission in four-wheel drive and her heart in her mouth watching the Jag slide down the mountain ahead of her. It was pitch-black and snowing like crazy, the flakes the size of dinner plates and piling up fast. She kept the wipers on high and the defroster blasting to keep the windshield clear.

Highway 76 was deserted. So were all the parking lots they passed, except those surrounding motels. Red neon
NO VACANCY
signs flickered through the snow. When Gus turned into a Chinese All-U-Can-Eat buffet, the Jag spun in a circle.
He straightened it out, parked it, hopped out and waved and ducked into the restaurant.

He's going to yell at me, Cydney thought. All the way to Tall Pines, like I did to him yesterday. She deserved it, but she couldn't face it trapped in her truck with no place to slink off to and cry. If she let him drive, maybe the snow would distract him until they reached Tall Pines. She could hide in her bedroom and make him yell at her through the locked door. It was the chicken way out, but Cydney took it, shoved the gearshift into park and climbed over the console into the passenger seat.

When Gus came out of the restaurant carrying two white bags, she lowered her window and waved him toward the driver's side. He squinted at her through the wind-driven snow, slipped and slid around the Jeep, opened the door and hiked himself in behind the wheel.

“Whew, it's cold.” He slammed the door, shivered and passed her the two white bags. “Hope you like beef and broccoli.”

Cydney tasted snow on her tongue, hot steamed rice and wok-fried meat. Her mouth watered and her heart ached looking at Gus, his cold-flushed face and his broad, snow-peppered, navy suede-clad shoulders.

“I love beef and broccoli,” Cydney said. And I love you, heaven help me, she thought, as she bent over to tuck the bags between her feet.

This close up, his nose looked more red than it was swollen— maybe from the cold—and there was a scrape across the bridge.

“I'm sorry I slammed the door on your nose. Does it hurt?”

“Only when I laugh.” He reached between his knees to release the seat, pushed it back to make room for his legs and gave her a rueful smile. “I'm sorry I didn't lock your bedroom door.”

The defroster was blowing full tilt, melting the snow on the thatch of hair that was always falling over his forehead. Cydney raised her hand to brush it away, half expecting him
to cross his index fingers and shout, “Back!” But he bent his head so she could reach him.

“Me, too,” she sighed wistfully, just as the dome light winked off.

The red and yellow restaurant marquee glowed through the windshield, its neon glare softened by the snow piling up on the glass. Gus caught her wrist, raised just his eyes and looked at her.

“Does that mean you won't slug me if I kiss you?”

“It means I might slug you if you don't.”

He made a noise in his throat, clamped his mouth over hers and lifted her over the console into his lap. All in one swift, strong scoop, spreading her legs over his without breaking the kiss, his lips cold but his mouth hot.

Hot enough to send her Angus Munroe fantasies up in flames. It didn't get any realer than the hard curve of his jaw and the deep, dizzying throb she felt behind the zipper of his jeans. Cydney clutched his shoulders, broke the kiss and gasped a breath.