Once Upon a Wedding / Accidental Princess. Nancy Robards Thompson

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СКАЧАТЬ why haven’t you come back before now?” Kelsey asked, curious despite sensible warnings to keep her distance.

      He shrugged. “Never had reason to, I guess.”

      “Until now,” she added flatly, “when you’ve come to crash Emily’s wedding.”

      Losing his relaxed pose, he braced his muscled forearms on the table and erased the separation between them. His smile disappeared, nostalgia burned away by determination. “First of all, there isn’t going to be a wedding. And second, even if there was a wedding, I wouldn’t be crashing. I’d be an invited guest.”

      “Invited!” Surprise and something she didn’t want to label had her pulling back, hoping to create some sanity-saving distance. “Who…” She groaned at the obvious answer, and the confident spark in Connor’s emerald eyes. “What on earth was Emily thinking?”

      “Actually, she summed up her thoughts pretty well.”

      Connor reached into his back pocket and pulled out an invitation. He offered it up like a challenge, holding a corner between his first and second fingers. She snatched it away, almost afraid to read what her cousin had written. Emily’s girlish script flowered across the cream-colored vellum.

       Please say you’ll come. I can’t imagine my wedding day without you.

      Good Lord, it was worse than she’d thought! The words practically sounded like a proposal. Was Emily hoping Connor would stop her wedding? That he’d speak now rather than hold his peace?

      “Okay,” she said with the hope of defusing the situation, “so Emily invited you.”

      “That’s not an invitation. It’s a cry for help.”

      “It’s—it’s closure,” she said, knowing she was grasping at straws. “Emily has moved on with her life, and she’s hoping you’ll do the same.”

      He frowned. “What makes you think I haven’t?”

      “Are you married? Engaged? In a serious relationship?” Kelsey pressed. Each shake of his head proved Kelsey’s point. He wasn’t over Emily.

      Kelsey couldn’t blame him. Her cousin was beautiful, inside and out. And experience had taught Kelsey how far a man would go to be a part of Emily’s life.

      Connor slid the invitation from her hand in what felt like a caress. “There’s no reason for me not to be here, Kelsey.”

      Here, in Arizona, to stop the wedding, she had to remind herself as she snatched her hand back and laced her fingers together beneath the table. Not here with her.

      The waitress’s arrival with their drinks spared Kelsey from having to come up with a response. Connor lifted his margarita. “To new friends.”

      Rising to the challenge this time, she tapped her glass against his. “And old lovers?”

      If she’d hoped to somehow put him in his place, she failed miserably. With a low chuckle, he amended, “Let’s make that old friends…and new lovers.”

      His vibrant gaze held her captive as he raised his glass. Ignoring the straw, he took a drink. A hum of pleasure escaped him. The sound seemed to vibrate straight from his body and into hers, a low-frequency awareness that shook her to the core.

      He lowered the glass and licked the tequila, salt and lime from his upper lip. “You don’t know what you’re missing.”

      Oh, she knew. The taste of a man’s kiss, the scent of his aftershave on her clothes, the feel of his hard body moving against her own. How long had it been since a man had stolen her breath, her sanity? How many weeks, months? She’d probably be better converting the time into years—fewer numbers to count.

      Odd how Kelsey hadn’t missed any of those things until the moment Connor McClane walked down the airport corridor. No, she had to admit, she’d suffered the first twinge of—loneliness? Lust? She didn’t know exactly what it was, but she’d first felt it the moment she’d looked at Connor’s picture.

      “Aren’t you having any?”

      Her gaze dropped to his mouth, and for one second, she imagined leaning over the table and tasting the tequila straight from Connor’s lips.

      “Kelsey, your drink?” he all but growled. The heat in his gaze made it clear he knew her sudden thirst had nothing to do with margaritas.

      Maybe if she downed the whole thing in one swallow, the brain freeze might be enough to cool her body. She sucked in a quick strawful of the tart, icy mixture with little effect. Frozen nonalcoholic drinks had nothing on Connor McClane.

      Still, she set the glass down with a decisive clunk. “You can’t come back here and decide what’s best for Emily. It doesn’t matter if you don’t like Todd. You’re not the one marrying him. Emily is, and her opinion is the only one that matters.”

      Connor let out a bark of laughter. “Right! How much weight do you think her opinion carried when we were dating?”

      “That was different.”

      “Yeah, because I was a nobody from the wrong side of the tracks instead of some old-money entrepreneur with the Wilson stamp of approval on my backside.”

      A nobody from the wrong side of the tracks. Kelsey schooled her expression not to reveal how closely those words struck home. What would Connor McClane think if he learned she had more in common with him than with her wealthy cousins?

      Kelsey shook off the feeling. It didn’t matter what they did or didn’t have in common; they were on opposite sides.

      “Did you ever consider that Emily’s parents thought she was too young? She was barely out of high school, and all she could talk about was running away with you.”

      “Exactly.”

      Expecting a vehement denial, Kelsey shook her head. “Huh?”

      One corner of his mouth tilted in a smile. “I might have been blind back then, but I’ve learned a thing or two. Emily was always a good girl, never caused her parents any trouble. She didn’t smoke, didn’t drink, didn’t do drugs. No tattoos or piercings for her.”

      “Of course not.”

      From the time Kelsey had moved in with her aunt and uncle, she’d lived in her cousin’s shadow. She knew all about how perfect Emily was—her fling with Connor the sole imperfection that proved she was actually human.

      “Emily didn’t have to do those things. She had me. I was her ultimate act of rebellion.”

      Kelsey listened for the arrogant ring in his words, but the cocky tone was absent. In its place, she heard a faint bitterness. “No one likes being used,” she murmured, thoughts of her ex-boyfriend coming to mind.

      Matt Moran had her completely fooled during the six months they dated. With his shy personality and awkward social skills, she couldn’t say he swept her off her feet. But he’d seemed sweet, caring, and truly interested in her.

      And СКАЧАТЬ