Marriage by Mistake (4 page)

Reflex. Dean lifted his right hand. Before he
knew what was happening, his fingers closed mid-air around that
damned candle. Worse, he was completely out from behind the Bronco.
Everything suddenly went quiet.

"What?" Kelly asked, looking at her friends.
"What is it?"

No one answered. Dean felt as conspicuous as
the moon in a starless sky. Finally, Kelly turned. Her eyes were
wide. Horrified, Dean thought. His own face remained flushed. He
didn't know which was worse; that he'd just watched her complete a
ritual to get rid of him, or that he still held that cursed candle
in his hand.

"Miss Williams?" He flushed even more at the
mistake. "I mean, Mrs. Singleton." Stupidly, he held forth the
candle. "If it wouldn't be too anti-climactic    I came
to offer an apology."

CHAPTER THREE

The girls disappeared. They simply melted
into the landscape of parked cars. No one stayed to back Kelly up,
no one remained to lend support. And there was no one left to take
that blasted candle but herself.

Kelly stared in dismay at the pink wax held
out in Dean's long, tanned fingers. "Uh, thanks," she said, and
plucked it from his grip. She was sure her face had turned as red
as Dean's. But that was nothing compared to the rapid-fire beating
of her heart. He was here. Why was he here?

Worse, why was she so excited to see him?

"I have, you know," he said.

With no idea what he was talking about, Kelly
fumbled the candle into the front pocket of her sweat jacket.
"What?" she asked.

"Come to apologize," he repeated.

At that Kelly had to look at him again. His
gaze was dark, focused entirely on her.

God, Kelly thought, whatever his sins, he was
still the handsomest devil she'd ever seen. And he was also
   still    so different. For half a second
that bothered her, how different he was, not that she believed his
story of hypnosis for one second. Frantically, she reached for some
level of sanity. "You can't exactly apologize for walking out on
me."

A muscle twitched in his jaw. "No, I can't
make up for that."

Ha! Kelly thought.

"But I am sorry I didn't believe you when you
came to my office the other day." His gaze sharpened on her. "I
shouldn't have called you a phony. I shouldn't have assumed you
were anything but exactly what you claimed to be." He paused. A
different muscle twitched in his jaw. "My wife."

"Uh huh." Kelly shook her head, trying to
digest it all. He was here. He'd flown all the way across the
country to tell her...this? "So you're still saying you don't
remember me," she declared, just to make it clear to both of
them.

His lips thinned. "I'm not 'saying it.' It's
true."

Their eyes met, and locked. Never had Kelly
met a crumb who could look so sincere. Sincere? He looked
positively annoyed.

"Uh huh," she said, confused. Why was he
annoyed?

His next remark answered that. "Believe me or
not, Miss Williams, but we are legally wed. That gives us matters
to discuss." He looked at her, implacable.

Kelly stared back at him, uncomprehending.
Then it hit her.
The divorce
. "Oh," she said. He was
sincere, all right. Sincere in his desire to get rid of her. She
squelched a ridiculous little pang beneath her breastbone. This
fellow wasn't the man she'd once believed him to be, not the sweet
and tender love of her life. It was okay, it was
good
, to
put an end to this.

"Matters," she said. "Fine.
Wonderful
."

His gaze averted. "I have a place we can be
private."

###

Kelly had to admit herself impressed. He was
all prepared. In the hotel, he'd reserved a conference room for
their little meeting, with scattered sofas, end tables, and lamps.
Formal, impersonal, and the message clear: neutral territory.

She strode in ahead of him, reassured.
Neither emotions nor passion would get involved here. This was,
indeed, simply business. And simply business was all Kelly wanted
it to be. Handsome as he was, the man still wasn't admitting he
even knew her. A crumb to the end.

"Please," he said, indicating a pink-striped
sofa. "Have a seat."

Kelly glanced at him. His expression was
cool, calm, even pleasant. A crumb with impeccable manners. With
her fists clenched in her jacket pockets, she sat.

Dean moved with easy grace to a red floral
chair to one side. He picked up a briefcase and set it on the
coffee table between them.

So, Kelly thought, he already had the papers
drawn up. Quite...foresightful. And quite unlike the man she'd
known. That, apparently, had been one big, fat masquerade.

But whatever. All she had to do was sign. She
did not lean back against the sofa cushions. Why, she'd be out of
here, done with the whole humiliating episode in minutes.

Dean set one hand atop the leather briefcase.
"I understand you don't believe me about the hypnosis, or about
forgetting everything that happened during the ensuing two days.
But I wonder if you wouldn't mind...humoring me for a few
minutes."

"Um. What?"

He opened the clasps of the briefcase with a
simultaneous click. "I'd like to know what I did for two days. You
could help with the answers to a few simple questions."

Kelly chewed the inside of her cheek. She was
supposed to humor him? To what end? "Well, I don't   
What's that?" He'd drawn some sheets of double-folded paper from
his case.

"This is my credit card report, starting with
the plane tickets I bought Friday evening." He shook it open. "The
first item I don't understand is a place called 'Nat's.'" He looked
over at her.

Kelly looked back. Did he really think she
wanted to play this game? And why? She wasn't going to fight a
divorce.

His brows rose. "Bar?"

Kelly's breath rushed out. She didn't go out
to
bars
with men she met after the show!

He tilted his head. "You're just humoring me,
remember? Not admitting my story's true or anything."

"It's a diner," Kelly blurted, as if he
didn't know that perfectly well himself. They'd sat over the same
pair of free refill coffees for three hours. He'd smiled at her as
they'd talked and talked, a smile all slow and tender. She'd begun
to melt, thinking he really cared. Yeah, right. Just showed how
much
she
knew.

Dean's eyes went back down to his sheet. "A
diner. That sounds pedestrian enough. But what about this sailboat?
I rented a sailboat in Las Vegas?"

"No, that was Lake Mead." Kelly snapped her
mouth shut. What was she doing? He had to know they'd spent the day
on the lake, just lazing and looking up at the blue, blue sky. He
had to remember they'd shared their first kiss in the shadow of a
narrow river canyon. The boat had rocked beneath them. And so,
she'd thought, had her world.

"Pardon me. Lake Mead. That should have shown
up on the printout." He frowned down at the paper. "We got there
awfully early."

"We drove through the night."

He shot her a penetrating look.
"I...see."

Kelly felt her eyes widen. "We drove," she
said firmly. "Besides, we weren't married yet." But she supposed
he'd 'forgotten' that, too. Forgotten her stammered explanation of
her no-sex-without-marriage policy, forgotten his serene acceptance
of her restriction, followed by his own, incredible proposal.

Apparently so, for his gaze went back down to
his paper printout and his voice went dry. "Oh, yes. Our wedding,
held at the Little Chapel of the Dawn. My investigator confirms:
all perfectly legal. I even bought you a ring and    "
His implacable face suddenly reddened. "Party favors."

Kelly found herself blushing, too. On the way
out of the chapel, laughing, he'd bought a pair of handcuffs. "It
was no big deal," she now claimed. They'd been fur-lined and hadn't
even had real locks    nor had they ended up getting
used.

His face resumed its normal color as he set
his printout to the side. "You're right. Not much of a big deal,
compared to what is conspicuously missing. Miss Williams
   " Slowly, he clasped his hands and set them around one
knee. His dark lashes lowered. "Miss Williams, nowhere on this
credit report is there a record that I bought protection. Condoms.
Anything of that nature."

Kelly stared at him.

"I assume we had sexual relations and so I
need to ask." He lifted his lashes enough to give her an amazingly
direct look. "I have to ask: were such relations unprotected?"

Kelly continued to stare. His eyes were
steady, his mouth flat. "We didn't use protection," she heard
herself admit.

His stare went into laser-mode. "Then you
could be    "

"No."

"But    "

"I'm not pregnant." Her gaze averted and she
found herself blushing all over again. "I already know."

"Oh," he said a moment later, and released a
deep breath.

"God." Kelly jumped from the sofa, stalked to
the nearest wall, and crossed her arms tightly. She glared at a
painting of a beach. "What a thing to have to tell a rank
stranger."

They both stopped. A heavy silence descended
on the room. As she stared at the beach, Kelly felt a prickling all
over her skin. Slowly, she turned.

He was watching her, very alert. Waiting.

Kelly's heart started pounding. Was it
possible    ? Could he actually    ? That is,
she'd considered the scenario for half an instant here and there,
but could it actually be true?
Was
he a rank stranger,
someone who didn't remember meeting her...or anything?

Kelly swallowed. She didn't want to believe
it. It was too outrageous. It smelled like getting bamboozled
again. She cleared her throat, intending to tell him she wasn't
fooled when, even as she looked at him, he transformed.

Not physically. No, physically he was the
Dean she remembered; dark hair, wavy, left a little too long, blue
eyes like a midnight sea, body like a panther. But behind the eyes
  

Behind the eyes was someone she'd never met
before, herself.

Kelly had to think in order to breathe. Her
knees felt shaky. "Oh," she said. "Oh."

The new man, the stranger, got to his feet.
"There is one other document. Would you, please?" He indicated the
sofa with his hand.

Kelly shifted her gaze to the sofa but didn't
dare move. She tried to go back to skeptical mode, but it wouldn't
work. He wouldn't be the other man again, the one she knew. He
was...somebody else. Somebody who'd been hypnotized, who didn't
even remember meeting her, let alone remember falling in love.

Apparently giving up on the idea she would
sit, he plucked up something from his briefcase. It was a tiny
piece of paper, only about an inch square and soiled, as by kitchen
oil. He held it out to her.

The insistence in his gaze finally made Kelly
move. She took a step, close enough to see he was holding a
receipt. "Duncan's Donuts," she read aloud. The prickling sensation
returned, sweeping over her tenfold.

"Does that mean anything to you?"

Kelly could feel a bubble of hysteria inside.
"You got the donuts."

"I was holding a bag of them when I 'woke
up.' For you, I presume. I never eat such things, myself."

The bubble of hysteria inside Kelly expanded.
She started to laugh. "But you were the one who noticed the store,
who wanted them    " She stopped. Biting her lip, she
looked at him, looked at the man behind the eyes. "No," she
corrected. "That wasn't
you
." Kelly felt a chill replace her
hysteria. "Was it?"

He turned. Delicately, he returned the little
piece of paper to his briefcase. "Miss Williams, I can only repeat
my heartfelt apology that you got mixed up in this...little
accident of mine. The hypnosis    well, I never actually
expected to go under, and then my cousin Troy had to get in on the
act with his amusing 'suggestions.'"

"Suggestions." Kelly's chill grew. She'd seen
men, dignified, elderly men, bark like dogs under the suggestion of
a stage hypnotist. She could make the logical deduction. "In real
life you wouldn't have done any of it, what we did together. You
wouldn't have given me the time of day to begin with."

He didn't say a word. He just looked at her,
looked at her with cool, unfamiliar eyes.

Kelly whirled. A part of her wanted to laugh.
Here it was, the magical explanation she'd been hoping for. Dean
hadn't abandoned her, after all. He'd even bought the donuts.

Yes, he'd bought them, and then vanished into
thin air. Her easy-going, sweet and charming Dean Singleton didn't
even exist!

"Miss Williams."

Kelly clenched her fingers on her upper arms.
Inside she was reeling. This wasn't the man she'd met Friday night.
Of course, she'd already seen as much in Boston. Her Dean was blue
jeans and tee shirts. This man was English wool and silk. Her Dean
smiled. This man looked like he hadn't cracked a grin in the past
ten years.

She'd seen it, she just hadn't wanted to
believe it.

"Miss Williams," he asked. "Are you all
right?"

The question was both ludicrous, and valid.
She gave a soft laugh. "Sure, sure. I'm all right." She was just
peachy. It was no big deal to discover the man she'd fallen in love
with didn't even exist in real life.

Instead he was an illusion, a dream,
'suggested' into being by this no-good cousin Troy.

Her fingertips dug into her sweat jacket
sleeves. She was used to falling in love with an illusion, the
pretty picture of the guy she'd paint in her mind, but this was
ridiculous.

She sensed the other man, the real one, take
a step in her direction. Grimacing, Kelly turned. Their eyes met. A
funny quiver went through Kelly's stomach. He still had those
amazing blue eyes, the elegantly chiseled features, the whole aura
of vital, healthy male.