Praise for USA TODAY bestselling author Kasey Michaels

“Lots of witty dialogue and humorous situations.”

—RT Book Reviews on Suddenly a Bride

“Funny, down-to-earth and likable characters, along with

snappy dialogue, make this story one that’s hard to put down.”

—RT Book Reviews on A Bride After All

“Kasey Michaels aims for the heart and never misses.”

—New York Times bestselling author Nora Roberts

“Michaels’ new Regency miniseries is a joy. This wonderful

storyteller combines passion, humor, emotional intensity

and depth of characterization with a devastating secret and

attempted murder. She makes it all work and shows how the

power of love can overcome. You will laugh and even shed a

tear over this touching romance.”

—RT Book Reviews on How to Tempt a Duke (4½ stars Top Pick)

“Michaels delivers a poignant and highly satisfying read.

The second Daughtry family book is filled with simmering

sensuality, subtle touches of repartee, a hero out for revenge and

a heroine ripe for adventure. You’ll enjoy the ride.”

—RT Book Reviews on How to Tame a Lady

“Known for developing likable characters and humorous

situations, Michaels adds an element of danger and suspense to

this sexy romp.”

—RT Book Reviews on Dial M for Mischief

“Michaels has done it again … Witty dialogue peppers a plot full

of delectable details exposing the foibles and follies of the age.”

—Publishers Weekly, starred review, on The Butler Did It

“[A] hilarious spoof of society wedding rituals wrapped around a

sensual romance filled with crackling dialogue reminiscent of

The Philadelphia Story.” —Publishers Weekly on Everything’s Coming Up Rosie

Dear Reader,

It has been such a pleasure writing about Second Chance Bridal, and I hope you’ve enjoyed reading the first two books in the trilogy, A Bride After All and Suddenly a Bride.

If so, you’ve already met Chessie Burton, owner of Second Chance Bridal, and her friend Marylou Smith-Bitters (one of my favorite characters ever!).

Well, now it’s time for left-at-the-altar Chessie to find her true love, her own second chance. And if Marylou has anything to do with it, we’re in for a fun ride!

Come along as Chessie discovers a passionate side of herself she didn’t think she had, and a handsome contractor looking for anything but love gets the surprise of his life!

Enjoy!

Kasey Michaels

About the Author

KASEY MICHAELS is a USA TODAY bestselling author of more than one hundred books. She has earned three starred reviews from Publishers Weekly, and has won a RITA® Award from Romance Writers of America, an RT Book Reviews Career Achievement Award, Waldenbooks and Bookrak awards and several other commendations for her writing excellence in both contemporary and historical novels. Kasey resides in Pennsylvania with her family, where she is always at work on her next book.

Readers may contact Kasey via her website, Kasey Michaels.com.

The Bride Plan

Kasey Michaels

www.millsandboon.co.uk

To my pal Joan Hohl—because it has been a while …

Prologue

Elizabeth Hollingswood sat on a blanket on the grassy hillside overlooking the baseball diamond, her friends Claire and Nick Barrington occupying the next blanket. The sun was bright, the freshly mowed grass smelled wonderful and the small white petals of the flowering crab trees that lined the street bordering the ball field, loosened by the breeze, made Elizabeth think of a soft, fragrant snow shower. It was a perfect afternoon. Well, at least for those not suffering from pollen allergies, she corrected mentally as Nick sneezed.

It was another spring, and another Grasshopper baseball season. Elizabeth smiled as she watched her husband, Will, going through the signals from the third-base coaching box, first touching a finger to his nose, then to his chin, and then tipping his cap before rubbing a hand across his chest and beginning again, the signals now to cap, chin, nose.

“Look at Mikey just standing there at the plate with that dazed expression on his face,” Elizabeth said, sighing as she reached for her bottle of water. “He doesn’t have a clue what Will is trying to tell him to do.”

Nick grinned at her. “I think I’ve got it about figured out. He’s either telling him to bunt … or blow his nose. Ah, here we go. The direct approach.”

Elizabeth watched as Will called for time, and then motioned for Mikey to meet him halfway along the baseline. A whispered conversation accompanied by more cryptic hand gestures followed; Mikey returned to the plate and promptly struck out, ending the game.

“Well,” Nick said, standing up, and then helping his pregnant wife to her feet, “that wasn’t so bad. Fourteen to two.”

“You can say that,” Elizabeth groused. “You don’t have to go home with the coach and the kid who made the last out. If Danny says one wrong word to his brother I’m going to have to murder him. For the second time this week,” she added as she folded the blanket.

The twins, Mikey and Danny, along with Sean, Nick’s son from his first marriage, ambled up the hill to gather the fruit and juice boxes it had been Claire’s duty to provide as team mom for the day.

“You okay, Mikey?” Elizabeth asked him quietly.

“Sure, Mom. Pops says it was his fault for telling me to swing. Gotta go, we have to collect the bases and hand out the treats.”

Claire looked over at Elizabeth. “Pops? That’s new, isn’t it?”

Elizabeth nodded, feeling her cheeks flush. Her first husband, Jamie, father of the twins, had died nearly six years ago, and her marriage to Will was not quite a year old. “They said they felt funny calling him Will, and all the other kids have dads. But they didn’t want to forget their own dad, so they came up with Pops. Will doesn’t say much about it, but I know he’s pleased. So am I. Kids need to be kids.”

“I think it’s terrific. Sean’s mother is still in the picture, although not as much as any of us would like, so I’m Claire to Sean. But sometimes he slips. I don’t say anything about it, either. But, yes, I’m pleased. Uh-oh, here comes Marylou. Look at her trying not to do a flip in those high heels. Do you think there’s something wrong at the shop? I hope nothing’s happened to Chessie.”

Marylou Smith-Bitters, thrice-married socialite and now not only Chessie Burton’s good friend but also part owner of Second Chance Bridal and Wedding Planners, did a quick two-step down the grassy slope before grabbing on to Elizabeth’s arm to stop herself from a headlong plunge down the remainder of the hill.

“I’m so glad I found you both together,” she said rather breathlessly. “We’ve got a problem. A b-i-i-g problem.”

Elizabeth, who had taken a part-time job at Second Chance a few months earlier, replacing Eve D’Allesandro, who had taken off for the south of France with Elizabeth’s employer, the novelist Richard Halstead, sighed and shook her head. “It’s Doreen Nesbit again, isn’t it? You’d think that by the time you got to your third groom, you’d learn to pick one who isn’t a control freak. He’s had her change the table favors three times already.”

Marylou waved her fire-engine-red-tipped fingers as if erasing Doreen Nesbit from the conversation. “This isn’t about the business—and, no, he didn’t change the favors again. I told him I’d tell Doreen about his little friend who works at the ice creamery on Broad Street if he tried.” She took a deep breath and let it out dramatically. “Here’s the deal, and it’s deadly serious. Chessie has to get married.”

Elizabeth and Claire exchanged puzzled glances, which left it up to Nick to put his foot in his mouth all by himself: “She’s pregnant? I didn’t even know she was dating anyone.”

The puzzled glances turned to twin expressions of female disgust.

“One, husband mine, pregnancy does not mean an automatic walk down the aisle. And two … well, you’re right. Chessie hasn’t had a date since the last time Will set her up and she made us all promise to kill her first if we ever got it into our heads to set her up again.”

“Are we done?” Marylou asked, adjusting the pearls at her throat. “Ready to get back to the problem? Which means, by the way, listening to me.”

By this time Will had joined them, and Elizabeth quickly put a finger to his lips before he could say anything. Clearly Marylou was on a mission, and when Marylou was on a mission people with an even cursory sense of self-preservation stayed out of her way.

“It’s Richard Peters,” Marylou said, and then sighed for dramatic effect. “He called the shop an hour ago. He called last week, but I thought I’d gotten rid of him by saying Chessie moved to Boston and I was the new owner of the shop. Anyway, Missy took the message and was about to deliver it to Chessie when I intercepted her. The child nearly swallowed her gum, which she knows full well she’s not supposed to chew within five miles of the wedding gowns.”

Will, who happened to also be Chessie’s cousin, slipped his arm around Elizabeth’s waist, which was rapidly disappearing as she was now six months pregnant. “Rick Peters, Marylou? It isn’t an uncommon name. Doesn’t mean it’s him.”

“What am I missing here? Who’s Rick Peters?”

“Nick, shhh,” Claire warned quietly. “We’re in the role of audience here.”

“Rick Peters is the guy who left Chessie at the altar so he could run off and elope with the maid of honor,” Elizabeth whispered.

“Damn.”

“Oh, please, Claire,” Marylou said, “you’re being too polite. I can think of much better words. And it is that Rick Peters, Will, because his message was that he wanted Chessie to know he’s moved back to Allentown and he’d like to take her to dinner. The man is scum. And you know what’s going to happen, don’t you?”

“Chessie might say yes,” Will said, nodding his head as if in agreement with what Marylou hadn’t said. “That’s always been her problem. She’s too damn nice. It’s been six years or so, and I’d still like to bust the guy one in the chops.”

“We could form a line, and all of us take a shot at him,” Marylou agreed, “but that isn’t going to solve anything.”

“And getting Chessie married would?” Elizabeth asked, feeling she’d at last gotten a firm grip on Marylou’s strategy. “Isn’t that just a little bit drastic?”

“Drastic times call for drastic measures,” Marylou pronounced. “Now, it only took me twenty minutes to drive over here, so maybe my plan doesn’t have all the bugs worked out of it yet, but here’s what I’m thinking.”

“This should be good,” Nick said, earning him a jab in the ribs from his loving wife.

“We’re all going to find Chessie a prospective groom. All of us,” she stressed, glaring at Nick. “Even you, Will, although you really need to cultivate a more acceptable circle of male friends to draw from, Counselor. Chessie says if she sees another lawyer she’s going to have to hurt you.

“Anyway, that’s the plan. We keep Chessie so busy with blind dates and discreet setups that she has no time to listen to Rick Peters tell her what a huge mistake he made and how now he wants her back. Because we all know how that works—they always want back what they once had and then tossed away. Men are so predictable it’s almost embarrassing.”

“He’s divorced?” Claire asked, but then shook her head. “Never mind, of course he is. I won’t even ask how you know that, Marylou. Sorry for the interruption. Go on, please.”

Marylou smiled, rubbing her palms together as she neatly stepped into the role of general of this campaign she’d concocted. “Peters isn’t just visiting. He’s back to stay. Which means we have to get Chessie settled, sooner rather than later. Agreed? We’ll call it TBP—The Bride Plan. Each one of us produces a prospective groom. We’ll make up a schedule so we don’t accidentally double book Chessie for the same date. If we find enough of them, one of them is bound to stick, right?”

“Like bubble gum to a wedding gown,” Elizabeth said quietly.

“She’ll thank us one day,” Marylou said, her smile now only slightly apprehensive. She looked at her friends for reassurance. “Won’t she?”

Chapter One

Chessie Burton turned the sign in the window from Open to Closed and wearily began making her way toward the stairs to her apartment, situated above Second Chance Bridal and Wedding Planners.

Eight months had all but flown past since Chessie and her friend Marylou had decided they’d expand Chessie’s business by also offering wedding-planning services to their clients.

The logic had been unassailable.

First-time brides often took a year or more to plan their weddings; they had family and lots of pals to help them make their big day perfect.

Second-chance brides? Not so much. Second-chance brides often had kids, car pools, soccer practice or ballet class, a full-time job and a much shorter time frame between “Okay, let’s do it” and “I do.” This was why Chessie always maintained such an extensive in-stock bridal-gown selection; ordering in a gown that might take six to twelve weeks to arrive often didn’t work well for second-chance brides.

So, in theory, branching out to wedding planning had seemed a great idea. Marylou could be very persuasive, and thanks to her husband Ted’s considerable wealth and eagerness to please his wife in all things, financing the project had been no problem.

In practice, however, the idea had turned into a case of too much of a good thing. Chessie and Marylou had found themselves pretty much on call 24/7, which didn’t make Marylou’s husband all that happy, and Chessie was spending entirely too many nights sitting cross-legged on the floor in front of her TV, dealing with trays of sugared almonds and net doilies and tiny little bows and a hot-glue gun.

It was great that Elizabeth had stepped in to replace Eve, and Missy, their teenage part-timer, had shown a remarkable talent for concocting spreadsheets that kept each wedding’s to-do list organized and up-to-date. Berthe, longtime Second Chance Bridal seamstress, had volunteered to help out on the sales floor as well, and Marylou often seemed to be everywhere at once, putting out small fires before they could become conflagrations.

But none of that got the boxes and boxes of supplies out of Chessie’s apartment, her beloved private sanctuary, and she had adamantly refused to relocate somewhere other than the huge Victorian home she had bought and furnished and simply adored.

Chessie waded through the crowded living room, eyeing the boxes holding three new albums of wedding-invitation samples that had arrived a week ago, promising herself she’d unbox them tonight after she’d eaten dinner … if she could find the kitchen. Thank God they were going to start that addition soon, to make a dedicated workspace and also to house all of this stuff.

She paused in the hallway and turned to look at her reflection in the full-length mirror that hung there because she’d hadn’t found any better place for it.

She looked tired. She was tired. Her coppery hair had pretty much outgrown its careful shaping, and looked more wild than artfully disheveled. She put her hands to her pale cheeks, wondering when last she’d seen the sun, and sighed as she looked at the huge blue eyes that were looking back at her, shiny with tears.

Rick was back in town. Chessie knew this because she’d found a note next to the telephone, scribbled by Missy. Rick was back in town and wanted to meet with her, have dinner. His phone number was scribbled beneath the message. She knew the number. He was back living with his parents. Was that pitiful, some sort of twisted poetic justice, or was it more pitiful that she still had the number committed to memory?

The last time she’d seen him had been six years, three months and twelve days ago—she’d worked that out in her head earlier. They’d just left the rehearsal dinner, her maid of honor and best friend walking with them into the parking lot. He’d apologized for not driving Chessie home, but he had something he had to do. He’d intimated that it was a surprise, and she’d been certain it had something to do with their honeymoon in Cape Cod, because he’d hinted as much.

She’d laughed, told him she loved him, wrapped her arms around his neck and kissed him soundly—a kiss he’d returned with considerable fervor and a bit of pleasant groping that suggested the last thing he wanted was to leave her alone for the rest of the evening. Then she watched him walk toward his car.

And out of her life.

“How do you do that, Rick?” she asked the empty apartment as she entered the kitchen, flipping on the overhead light. “How do you all but make love to one woman, while another woman is standing there watching, the same woman you’ll be taking to Mexico with you on a midnight flight? How does someone’s best friend watch something like that, and then drive her supposed best friend home and say she’ll be back in the morning to help her get dressed for the wedding? What kind of monsters were you, both of you? And what kind of blind victim was I, not to have seen it all coming?”

It had been years since Chessie had thought about either Rick or Diana. She wished she wasn’t thinking about either of them right now, but sometimes a mind wouldn’t turn off just because you wanted it to. So, as she spread peanut butter on two slices of fresh bread and then slapped the two pieces together, she attempted to concentrate on the positives.

She wouldn’t have Second Chance Bridal if it weren’t for Rick and Diana. She’s started the business with her own unused wedding gown as the first piece of stock, and it had turned out to be the very first gown she’d sold. She loved her business, loved the friends she’d made, the life she’d built.

She wouldn’t have any of that if she’d married Rick.

Chessie took a bite out of her sandwich and then quickly poured herself a glass of iced tea, hoping to get that bite unstuck from the roof of her mouth. Jelly helped to cut peanut butter so that it wasn’t so sticky, wasn’t a choking hazard. She knew that, but she’d forgotten. Granted, she didn’t want to see Rick again, but suicide by peanut butter wasn’t on her agenda, either.

Still munching on her dinner, Chessie threaded her way to the bedroom, stripped off her clothing and stepped under the shower, swallowing her last bite of the sandwich.

Once in the T-shirt and running shorts that served as both casual wear and pajamas, her hair still damp and forming itself into the natural burnished curls she’d have to straighten in the morning, she retraced her steps to the living room, glared at the three large boxes that seemed to be staring right back at her and searched the floor for the TV remote. Maybe she’d just lie down and watch a sitcom or something before she got to work, because it was going to be another long night.

Not that she was lonely. She was simply alone. Being alone hadn’t been her choice six years ago, but it was now.

Jace Edwards considered himself a self-made man. He’d begun working construction as a teenager, and over the ensuing years he’d learned how to do any job the members of his crew could do, often better. It hadn’t happened quickly or easily, had probably helped destroy his marriage, but the Edwards Construction Company was still his baby, and he was a very proud father.

It was just past 7:00 a.m. and he’d already had his third cup of coffee. He made it a rule to always be on-site for the first day of any new job, and today’s job hadn’t been an exception, even if the idea of running into Marylou Smith-Bitters’s business partner wasn’t something he was looking forward to, not by the way Marylou had described Ms. Chessie Burton.

It wasn’t any one thing Marylou had said, but more of an impression he’d got listening to her. Chessie Burton was driven, successful, particular, didn’t want her customers disturbed with a lot of noise and was extremely concerned with the amount of dust and mess that might accompany the construction.

As if construction could be kept noise- and dust-free. Get real, lady!

If he hadn’t needed the work, he might have turned down the job. Second Chance Bridal? Why didn’t they call it what it really was? Strike Two Bridal. The whole concept was pretty creepy when you got right down to it. Or maybe his own Strike One had made him leery of any place that catered to people like himself—marital losers.

In any case, in his mind, Jace had conjured up a middle-aged woman with her hair in a bun and a pair of reading glasses hanging from a strap around her neck. She’d be on his case for the month it would take to put the two-story addition on the house that, if Jace were the owner, would have remained exactly the way it was, which was perfect. He loved these old Queen Anne Victorians, even owned one himself.

“You want to tell me again how we’re going to build everything first, and only then break through the walls?”

Jace turned to look at his head framer, who was holding the unrolled plans in his hands and looking confused.

“I know it’s the hard way, Carl. The back of the house consists of the owner’s bedroom and bath upstairs and, downstairs, the room where they store the wedding gowns and all that stuff. We can’t just rip out those walls and have them open to the elements until we get the job done. Not to mention the noise.”

“Uh-huh,” Carl said, nodding. “But we are going to strip off the siding before the new walls go up, get rid of the shutters, the rain gutters, right? Tie in to the electricity and plumbing, since there’s going to be another bathroom? Then just cut in the two doors giving access to the building, right, cutting through those two existing windows? No way we can do any of that without some noise and dirt. We’re not knitting a sweater here, Jace. The owner knows that, right?”

Before Jace could answer there came the shrill beeping sound of a warning signal and the rumble from the engine of a piece of heavy equipment backing up into the yard along the cement driveway. This was followed hard by the squeal of massive air brakes, the grinding noise of gears meshing, lifting and then loudly depositing the large metal Dumpster that would hold the construction waste. The ground beneath them actually shook a little from the impact.

“I’d say she does now,” Jace said, grinning. “Okay, get the guys up on the ladders and start stripping off that siding. I’ll be back later to see how it’s going.”

He’d almost made it to the alley at the back of the yard, and to his car, when he saw her. Her appearance hit his brain in separate bursts of information. Coppery curls tumbling wildly around a pale oval face. Eyes as blue as the summer sky and big as quarters at the moment. A slim, trim, not-too-tall body, with pinup-calendar-worthy legs that went up to her ears. A chest that heaved up and down interestingly as she seemed to be trying to catch her breath. She wasn’t wearing a bra under that T-shirt, either. Nice. Bare feet. A TV remote clutched in her right hand.

A TV remote?

“Wh-what do you think you’re doing?”

Nice voice, he added mentally. Sort of husky. Sexy. Possibly slightly tinged with homicidal rage, but still sexy.

“Uh—Jace?” Carl said, backing up as the woman advanced on him. “You wanna come back here a minute?”

Jace tipped back his baseball cap as he approached, holding on to the bill as he said, “Ma’am. Your neighbor didn’t tell you we were beginning construction today?”

“Neighbor? What neighbor? I—” she gestured rather wildly toward the building “—I own this place.”

This was Chessie Burton? For the next four weeks or so, he could come to the job site and she’d be here? Every day? And who said the gods weren’t kind?

“So you’re Chessie Burton? Marylou’s business partner?”

“No. Marylou is my business partner. I’m the senior part—Oh, who cares? I live here. You should have checked with me before you started playing the “Anvil Chorus” on the back of my house.”

He could kiss her. Right here, right now, for no good reason he could think of, Jace really wanted to kiss her. She was so damned cute …

“What’s the matter? Why are you grinning like that? And another thing—who the hell are you? Do you know it’s only seven freaking o’clock in the morning? What do you do for an encore—march a brass band through here? Maybe some elephants bringing up the rear?”

“Name’s Jace. Jace Edwards. Elephants? Let me guess. Not a morning person, are you?” Jace asked, doing his best not to laugh. God, she was magnificent. A little on the wacko side of normal, maybe, but he hadn’t seen anything this good in the morning—or at any time, come to think of it—in a long, long time. Maybe never.

She rolled those big blue eyes. “Oh, he made a funny. Ha. Ha.”

The sound of industrious hammering and ripping of siding quickly followed. Clearly, Carl and the crew had heard enough.

She waved the TV remote in Jace’s face, then seemed to realize she was holding what might be construed as a weapon, and lowered her arm. “Make … them … stop.”

“You don’t want the addition?” He was being mean to a clearly upset woman, but he couldn’t help himself.

“No—yes! Yes, I want the addition. I just don’t want it at seven o’clock in the morning. I don’t want anything at seven o’clock in the morning, at least not until I’ve had my coffee, damn it! And stop grinning at me like that. What did you say your name was again?”

“Jace,” he told her, this time leaving off the Edwards as he held out his hand to her. “And you’re Chessie Burton. I think Marylou and I had some miscommunication when we met here two weeks ago to plan out the job. In a couple of ways.”

“Uh-huh,” Chessie said, holding out her own hand, and then quickly transferring the remote to her left palm before she shook hands with him. “I was working a wedding and couldn’t be here. Look, I don’t want to get off on the wrong foot here, and I’m sure you and Marylou will work together just fine, but one minute I was asleep, and the next I thought the world was about to end. I’m not usually so … so fierce.”

“Apology accepted, Ms. Burton.”

“That wasn’t an apology, it was an explanation,” she said, turning mulish again.

“Okay. And while you’re explaining—what’s with the TV remote?”

“I fell asleep on the couch last night,” she said quietly, her freckled cheeks blushing a pretty pink. “I don’t know why I’m holding the stupid thing. Are you going to start every morning at seven?”

“I’ll talk with the guys. Maybe they’ll want to go eight to six instead of seven to five. Of course, then Carl over there won’t be able to pick up his grandson from his day care, and Jimmy’s a newlywed, and you know how new brides are. Oh, and George has to get home because his wife works part-time at—”

“All right, all right, I get it. You start at seven. At least now I’ll be prepared.”

“But hopefully not armed,” Jace said, actually feeling a little sorry for her. Nobody liked to wake up thinking the world was about to end. But not sorry enough to keep him from beginning to unbutton his shirt, because he wasn’t blind, and he’d noticed how she’d been looking at him. Faintly mad … but at least marginally interested. Which was good, because he was feeling pretty interested himself. It was a good enough reason for making a jerk of himself, if he were still in high school. But what the hell. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, Ms. Burton, I’ve got to get to work.”

Chessie’s eyes widened slightly as she watched him strip out of his shirt and toss it over an azalea bush that was still blooming. Smiling, he grabbed a short pry-bar from Jimmy’s tool belt and headed for the rear of the house even as she was making a pretty fast retreat back down the path to the side door leading into the Victorian.

Safety glasses in place, he inserted the pry-bar and began stripping off a length of siding, the morning sun feeling good against his bare back.

“I thought Bob was going to be on-site. You working this job yourself, Jace?” Carl asked in confusion.

“I am now. Bob can take over for me at the Carter house. If that’s all right with you, of course.”

“She is cute, I’ll give you that,” Carl said, getting back to business. “I just didn’t think you’d noticed.”

“Oh, I noticed,” Jace said, giving the siding another rip.

“A four-man crew?” Carl persisted. “We’ll get done faster than we thought. The boys and I were hoping for a full month’s work on this one.”

“Do I look like a man in a hurry to you, Carl?”

The older man laughed and slapped Jace on the back. “Why, you dog, you. You really did notice.”

Chessie held the phone to her ear, listening to the rings. “Pick up. Pick up, pick up. Pick-up-pick-up-pick—Marylou! Why didn’t you tell me?”

“Chessie? Is that you?” Marylou asked, her voice gravelly with sleep.

“Yes, it’s me. Why didn’t you tell me construction started today? At the crack of dawn! And that man, that Jace something-or-other? Why didn’t you tell me about him?”

“Jace Edwards? What about him? Wait. Hold on a sec while I get up, go in the other room. No, Ted, nothing’s wrong. It’s just Chessie. Go back to sleep, darling. Okay, now I’m in the hall and he’s already snoring again. That man sleeps with the easy innocence of a baby, I swear it. Only louder. Now, what about Jace Edwards?”

“Oh, come on, Marylou. I wasn’t born yesterday. That wavy black hair you’d love to run your fingers through, those light gray eyes that have those sexy smile crinkles around them. That tan. That tall Greek-god body—he stripped to his waist, Marylou. Right in front of me! Shoulders that go from here to there, a waist without a single inch-to-pinch of fat hanging over his belt. Washboard abs, isn’t that what they’re called?”

“I guess so. He didn’t strip for me, darn it, but your mental picture is almost as good. The man is a hunk. So where’s the problem?”

“The problem, Marylou-the-matchmaker, depends on whether or not you checked out his real credentials. The ones that matter. You know, the ones where we find out if he’s any good at his job. This is my house he’s tearing into. I want to know if he knows how to hammer a nail into a stud, not that he is a stud. Oh, God, that’s sounds bad, even for me. But you know what I mean.”

“Jace comes very highly recommended, Chessie. And I am not matchmaking. I gave up on that long ago. I had some success with Claire and Nick, but you’re a hard case. I’ve taken the pledge, no more trying to set up Chessie, okay? I want to keep my success ratio high.”

Chessie finally subsided onto one of the stools at the breakfast bar that made up one side of her kitchen. “I overreacted,” she said, lowering her head into her hand. “Made an idiot of myself. I’m sorry.”

She wasn’t sure, wouldn’t be able to swear to it in any court, but she got the feeling she could actually hear Marylou’s smile, and she hung up as soon as she could.

What was the matter with her? Oh, okay, so her house was being ripped apart, and her routine along with it. But that was to be expected. She’d just been surprised, the noise had startled her out of a deep sleep. She could be forgiven for that, or at least she could rationalize her actions to herself.

But who could rationalize her reaction to Jace Edwards.

“That was bad,” she told herself as she headed for the shower. “That was very, very bad. Another minute and you would have looked like a construction-worker groupie, if there is such a thing. From now on, Chessie Burton, you are going to avoid the man.”

If you have to tie yourself to the mast and have your eyes covered and your ears blocked up, just like that mythological Greek guy did when he faced the Sirens, she added mentally, right before opting for a cold shower.

Chapter Two

“I said,” Chessie repeated, this time half screaming the words, “you look beautiful in that gown! The mermaid style is perfect for you!”

Oh, brother. How was she supposed to sell gowns, make her brides feel special, when she had to shout over the sounds of hammering and electric saws and—she nearly jumped out of her skin as somebody dropped what sounded like a half ton of boards all at one time.

Helen Metcalf looked into the three-sided mirror and shook her head. “The style is good, but there’s not enough bling. At my age, I need some bling, to take the attention away from my crepey neck.”

“You don’t have a creepy neck,” Chessie assured her, once more speaking over the noise of an electric saw.

“I hope not! I said crepe, not creep. Anyway, I don’t think this is the one. Then again, it’s so difficult to concentrate with all that noise. What’s going on out there?”

As she helped Helen out of the gown, Chessie explained about the construction that had already been going on for an endless three days, and would continue for at least another month, or so Marylou kept telling her.

“Ooh, construction workers. With tool belts and tight jeans and bare chests. Lead me to them,” Helen said, heading for the window in her strapless bra, French-cut silk panties and little else. She pulled back the drapery and leaned her head to one side, looking toward the rear of the building. “Oh. My. God.”

Chessie twisted her hands together in front of her, longing to punch something. Or someone. He was out there without his shirt again, the great big show-off. Jace Edwards. Owner of Edwards Construction, owner of his own built-in six-pack, and all round pain in her rump. Helen wasn’t the only person to have had that oh-my-god reaction, one way or another, to Jace Edwards.

“He’s just a man without a shirt, Helen.”

“No, my Joe is just a man without a shirt. That out there is a whole ‘nother story, that’s what that is. Can you just imagine him with butter on top?”

Chessie had to laugh. “Helen, you’re getting married.”

Slowly, reluctantly, Helen backed away from the window. “Right, married, which isn’t the same as dead, even if it felt like it with my ex. I’m still allowed to look, I just can’t touch. Have you? You know—touched?”

No, but not for lack of thinking about it, Chessie said inside her head. Outside her head, she said, “Not interested.”

“Really? Are you ill?”

Chessie blinked. “No—why?”

“Because if you’re not at least a little bit interested in that, maybe you want to consider vitamins or something.”

“I can’t believe you teach kindergarten,” Chessie said, motioning for Helen to raise her arms so another mermaid-style gown could be dropped over her head. “What a potty mouth you have.”

“It’s a part of my girlish charm. Ah,” she said, smoothing her hands down over her hips as Chessie did up the concealed zipper. “Now, this is more like it. I love the neckline, and the way it seems to give me a shape, which I’d pretty much thought I’d lost after the third kid.” She turned about to see the sweep of the demi-train, and then turned back to stand foursquare in front of the mirror.

And didn’t say another word for a full minute.

Chessie recognized the signs. She quickly grabbed the elbow-length veil and secured it to Helen’s blond curls and then handed her a bouquet of deep-purple-silk calla lilies.

Then she handed her a tissue.

“This is the one, isn’t it?” she said after Helen wiped her cheeks and blew her nose.

Helen nodded, clearly not trusting her voice. For all the woman’s bravado, her insistence that it was only a second wedding, a formality really, and she didn’t expect to feel “special,” Helen Metcalf was suddenly feeling special. Every bride deserved to feel that way.

Chessie handed her over to Berthe to discuss built-in bras and how to bustle the small train for the reception, and headed for her office, deliberately averting her eyes from the door leading to the side yard and, if she simply made a left, to the back of the house and the construction.

She inspected the progress each night, after Jace and his crew departed, but she had made it a point not to go outside while they were on-site. Not to offer them a pitcher of iced tea, not to ask any questions, not to complain about the noise … and definitely not to peek at Jace Edwards sans shirt.

Okay, once. Yesterday afternoon. Just that once she’d sneaked upstairs and looked out the third-floor attic window, just in time to see him holding up the garden hose over his head, rinsing himself off to stay cool she supposed, and then shaking his head like a dog to rid himself of the excess water. She’d thought, I could lick it off, and then mentally slapped herself upside the head, because she didn’t think that way. Who thought that way?

Helen Metcalf, probably. That woman had more fun in her mind than Chessie had awake and upright.

One hand on the doorknob to her office, a thought struck Chessie. By staying away, wasn’t she making it pretty obvious that there was a reason she was staying away? After all, any normal person wanted to see what’s going on when the thing that was having something going on with it was her very own house, her very own business.

Why, he was probably out there right now, laughing at her, thinking he’d scared her away.

The nerve of the man!

She took the stairs two at a time and headed for her kitchen and the full pitcher of iced tea she had just happened to make that morning because … Well, it didn’t matter why she’d made it. She dumped the ice out of a tray and into the pitcher. She tucked a stack of tall plastic cups under her arm, grabbed the pitcher and headed back down the steps before she could change her mind.

Over to the door. Out onto the three concrete steps leading down to the concrete path that led to the rear of the house. Down the concrete path, the cups beginning to slip out from under her arm. Around the corner to the picnic table they’d pushed over to the fence and out of the way.

All done without thinking, because thinking was dangerous. Almost more dangerous than counting up the muscles on Jace Edwards’s rib cage and getting to, yup, solid six-pack.

“Anyone thirsty?” she called out, smiling at the crew in general, her gaze sliding over the four men, landing on none of them. “I’ve got some iced tea.”

All four men put down their tools and approached the picnic table, three of them murmuring thanks as they took turns pouring iced tea, and then heading for the shade of the red maple at the back of the yard.

Jace Edwards poured himself a cup as well, but then stayed where he was. Which was much too close to Chessie. He smelled like sun and some spicy cologne and a little good old manly sweat, and she had to clear her throat before she could talk to his chest … she winced, lifted her head to readjust her gaze … before she could talk to him.

“How—how’s it going?”

“Not as well as we could have hoped,” he told her, and then drained the glass in a few manly gulps as she watched his throat work and felt suddenly quite thirsty herself. “You’ve got some dry rot we have to take care of before we go much further. Some wet rot, too. Both kinds. I told Marylou yesterday when she was here. She told you?”

“No,” Chessie said, looking worriedly at her house. “She didn’t tell me. How bad?”

“We won’t know that until we check a little more, but I don’t think it could be too extensive.”

“As in not too extensive to be too expensive?”

He smiled at her. Those light gray eyes—she hadn’t known she could like light gray eyes—sort of twinkled as the laugh lines around them crinkled. “That, too. You’ve had some water, rain most likely, get in between the original siding and the add-on. And the original siding, being wood, started to grow some mold. The rain gutter was pulled away a bit along the lower back roof, probably from all that ice we had last winter. The slate on the roof is good, nearly indestructible, so at least you’ve got that in your favor.”

“There’s mold under my siding? Isn’t that dangerous?” Chessie plunked herself down on the picnic-table bench, figurative dollar signs circling just above her head. “Does all the siding have to come down?”

“That’s the good news. The siding is already down. That’s how we saw the mold damage and got rid of it, replaced all the damaged boards. What it means, mostly, is you were hearing a lot more ripping and hammering the past two days than you probably counted on.”

“I didn’t count on any ripping and hammering,” she admitted quietly. “I was sort of hoping it would all happen magically. You know, like little elves showing up in the night, and the next thing I’d know I’d have an addition.”

“Little elves? With little tool belts? Tiny little velvet-covered hammers?”

“Magic wands, actually,” Chessie said, trying not to smile. “And wings. Don’t forget the wings.”

“I’m trying to picture Carl with wings.” He shook his head. “Nope, not happening.”

“I don’t think the look would be too good on you, either. Although the pointed shoes might be interesting. Look. I … I, um, I’m sorry about the other morning. We sort of got off on the wrong foot, didn’t we?”

He smiled that I-know-what-you’re-thinking-and-I might-be-thinking-it-too smile again. Damn, his teeth were white! She tried to picture him standing in front of his bathroom mirror, struggling to apply whitening strips like in the commercials, but that image wouldn’t form, either. He was just one of those naturally drop-dead-gorgeous human beings. She shouldn’t blame him, he probably couldn’t help it.

“I don’t know. I thought it was … interesting. I’ve never before been attacked by a TV remote.”

“I usually make a better first impression. Although you probably should be glad I didn’t fall asleep holding the glue gun.”

“I can think of better things to take to bed with you than a glue gun.”

Chessie felt her cheeks going hot. She wasn’t going to touch that statement with a ten-foot pole. “I didn’t fall asleep watching TV in bed. I fell asleep on the couch because I was supposed to be making little bows and sticking them on—Never mind. Let’s just say my life is going to get easier once this addition is done and I have an actual workroom.”

“About that. I was only inside the building the day Marylou and I took the tour. Since then, I’ve been working from the measurements and drawings I made that day, and I think I might have a better suggestion now for the egress from your bedroom to the upstairs workroom. You’d have more wall space for shelving, which I think you’ll probably want to have in there.”

“Really? I, um, I guess we could go inside and you could … check that out?” My bedroom? He wants me to lead him to my bedroom? Hoo-doggies, I couldn’t have just stayed inside and let them find their own iced tea?

“That would be the plan. If you don’t mind? Marylou explained that you didn’t want anyone inside during business hours until it was totally necessary. We’re halfway through the framing, and as soon as we’re under roof, it’s going to be necessary. Let me get my plans, and I’ll meet you inside.”

He was reaching for his shirt as she nodded and headed back down the cement path, her mind retracing her steps this morning as she got dressed and raced downstairs for an early delivery. She knew she hadn’t made up her bed, but she didn’t really care about that. It was what she’d done with the clothes she’d stripped out of last night before she’d gotten into that bed that she couldn’t remember.

All she’d need would be for Jace Edwards to ask to see her room for some reason, and then let him walk in there to see her leopard-skin-patterned underwire bra dangling from the doorknob to her bathroom. That was a visual to make her carefully straightened hair curl.

Once inside, she broke into a run, climbing the stairs in record time to do a quick grab-and-stash of anything she didn’t want him to see. She’d just grabbed the bra from exactly where she’d left it—hanging on that doorknob—when she heard a knock against the door frame in the living room.

“The lady downstairs said I could come up. Chessie?”

“Yes, I’m here. Come on back.”

She lifted her pillow and shoved the bra beneath it, and then quickly sat down on the side of the bed.

Then just as quickly sprang back up again, as if the mattress was on fire. Was she out of her mind? Who sat on a bed when a man was on his way into the room? Women with ideas in their heads that didn’t belong there, that’s who!

Jace stuck his head and shoulders around the doorway, and then smiled. He was wearing his shirt, she’d give him that much. But he couldn’t have buttoned it? “Hi, again. I brought the plans and a measuring tape. Are you sure I’m not disturbing you too much?”

Oh, the many ways she could take that statement!

“No, no, it’s fine.” She turned in a small circle, her hands sort of aimlessly fluttering until she stopped them by entwining her fingers until her knuckles probably showed white. “Mi casa es su casa for the duration, or whatever. You were, uh, talking shelves?”

“Yes, a sort of combination hallway and storage area. Instead of the door opening directly into the workroom. Too boxy, you know? I was taking the easy way out, I guess. Here, let me show you.” He unrolled the plans, blueprints, whatever they were, and laid them on the bed. When the large, crinkly papers tried to roll into a cylinder once more, he picked up a sneaker that had found its home on the floor last night, and placed it on the left edge of the papers.

Then he moved to grab the pillow and use it to hold down the other edge He’d half lifted it before she could react.

“No!” Chessie grabbed his hand, then quickly let it go, as if it was also too hot to handle. “That probably won’t work. Feather pillow, you know. Too, er, too light. I … I’ll just sit here and hold them down.”

“Okay,” Jace said, looking at her in some confusion. “You’re a funny girl.”

“That’s what I’m told. A real laugh a minute,” she said through clenched teeth and a smile that hurt her cheeks. “So, uh—these are the plans?”

Commanding herself to calm down and—for God’s sake—shut up, Chessie did her best to listen, nod in the right places and pretend she didn’t notice that he was only two feet away from her. Not exactly invading her personal space, but since this particular personal space happened to be her bedroom … well, yeah, maybe he was. Him and his cologne and his open shirt and his laugh lines and his … no, she wouldn’t think about his bare chest. She’d never had a thing for bare chests, not ever. On her list of what attracted her to men, bare chests wasn’t even in the top five. So why was she so suddenly fixated on his?

“And then I figure we can paint it all purple and put a cherry on top.”

“Uh-huh—What?”

“Then you are listening. I wasn’t sure.”

She got to her feet, the crinkling sound of the plans rolling back into their cylinder shape closely following. “Oh, cripes, I’m sorry. I wasn’t listening. Could … could you maybe just … back up a little?”

“I could,” he said, not moving. “But we probably ought to get this over with.”

“The …” She cleared her throat. Honestly, she was never at a loss for words. If anything, she talked too much. Just ask her cousin Will, he’d tell him. “You mean … talking about the plans?”

Jace took a small step closer, which definitely put him within her personal space. And her into his personal space, come to think of it, although he maybe didn’t mind so much as she minded … not that she minded. Not that she had much left of her mind at this point.

“No,” he said, tipping up her chin with his hand. “I mean this.”

Chessie’s eyelids fluttered closed as he touched his mouth to hers. Which was probably a good thing, because then she didn’t miss any of the colorful fireworks that immediately began bursting against them.

She hadn’t been kissed in a long time. And she hadn’t liked the kiss when it had happened. It had been one of those I took you to dinner and a movie and now I expect payment kind of kisses, courtesy of the last blind date Will had set her up with nearly eight months ago.

So of course this kiss was better. It didn’t have to be much of a kiss at all to be better than her last.

Except this one was not only better than her last kiss, it won hands down over any she’d had in her entire life. Maybe three lifetimes.

His mouth tasted of sugared iced tea, and his tongue had probably gotten its Ph.D. in Persuasion, with a special commendation for Artful Insinuation.

She wanted to gulp him down, tear off his clothes, lick the sweat and salt from his muscled belly, dig her fingers into his shoulders so she could use them for leverage as she half vaulted him, scissored her legs around his back, pumped her eager lower body against him until he was so rock hard that she could feel him through his jeans.

And then she’d get really serious about seducing him ….

As if he knew what she wanted, or maybe he wanted it, too, Jace cupped her backside in both of his strong hands and ground his lower body against hers. No words required. None were needed. They both knew what they wanted from each other.

This was desire. Lust. Raw need. Animal magnetism.

Good stuff. That’s what it was.

Good stuff. Heady stuff. Can’t-stop-it-now stuff. Who-cares-if-it’s-right-or-wrong stuff. I-don’t-need-to-know-your-name stuff. I don’t even have to like you. You don’t have to like me. I’m hungry; you’re hungry. Let’s eat.

Sex. It’s what’s for dinner ….

Jace pulled his mouth away from hers, pressed his lips to her ear. “You’re vibrating.”

“Tell me something I don’t know,” Chessie all but gasped, trying to catch her breath, as she apparently hadn’t been breathing there for a while. Was surprised she hadn’t forgotten how. He didn’t have to talk. She didn’t need him to talk, preferred he didn’t talk. She just needed. If he didn’t watch out, she might just get there on her own, just from thinking about what she wanted him to do next. She’d never felt like this before in her life. She liked it!

His low chuckle helped bring her back to earth. “No, I mean something in your pocket. I think it’s your cell phone.”

Sanity knocked on the door to Chessie’s libido, and her libido, so entirely unused to company, idiotically let it in.

“Oh. My cell phone. Right. It could be important. I should answer it, huh?”

Jace stepped away from her just as her knees threatened to buckle. “To be continued later?”

“Is … is that a question, or are you just being smug?”

“Do you care?”

Things like this didn’t happen to people like her. Sexual innuendo. Raw, primitive lust. Openly acknowledging that, yes, she wanted to have sex with somebody. There was no dance, no courtship, no promises. No flattery or flowers. No agenda or destination other than getting him inside of her as deep as he could go and then watching his face as he drove into her again and again until they both exploded in a physical release that was the entire object of the game.

A sudden visual image stole her breath. Her caller could leave her a voice mail.

“I have a date tonight,” she heard herself say. “A blind date. I can’t get out of it. It … it’s for a dinner party at my cousin’s house. If I didn’t show up, it would make the numbers uneven. And I think the only reason for the dinner party is to …”

Jace picked up the plans and his measuring tape and began backing toward the door to the hallway. Was he angry? Did he look angry? Did he have any right to be angry?

Chessie decided he wasn’t angry. And then got a little angry that he wasn’t angry.

Talk about your mixed-up heads—she ought to have hers examined the first chance she got!

“Set you up? Been there, done that.”

“Got the T-shirt?”

“Didn’t want one. I’m not into relationships.”

“I didn’t ask.”

“I know.”

“I’m divorced. I found my wife in bed with another man.”

“I was left at the altar. He ran off with my maid of honor, and I doubt they’d only been sharing longing glances before they hopped that plane to Mexico. Which do you think is worse?”

He stepped back another pace, his eyes still very much locked with hers. “Are we keeping score?”

“I’m just saying. I’m not into relationships, either.”

“Good. Because I don’t want one.”

“No. I know what you want. You made that pretty obvious.”

“I didn’t hear you telling me to stop.”

Chessie pressed her crossed hands against her chest. “Oh, darling, are we having our first fight?”

Jace laughed, shook his head. “You’re something else, Chessie Burton. Don’t make me like you.”

“I wouldn’t think of it. Whatever was going on here had nothing to do with liking. We know nothing about each other. We should probably keep it that way.”

“What was ‘going on here’? Say it, Chessie. We were about to have sex, and if that phone hadn’t vibrated we’d probably be done by now, because there wasn’t going to be anything slow or easy about where we were heading.”

Chessie felt another blush starting and turned her face away from his gaze. “Yes, I know. But you started it,” she said, feeling like a child in a childish argument.

“Let’s at least be honest here, Chessie. We both started it, the first time we saw each other. And it’s not going to go away unless we finish it.”

She turned to answer him, saying what, she didn’t know. But the doorway was empty.

She dropped onto the bed, her chest rising and falling rapidly, as if she’d just run a marathon in some alternate universe, where she was a sex-starved nymph in transparent flowing draperies and he was the flesh-and-bone mating invention of some mad scientist out to re-populate the world with six-pack abs.

A vacation. That’s what she needed. A long vacation far, far away from here. Long enough so that the addition would be done and he’d be gone by the time she got back. Because she could never face him again after this, and she was sure he wouldn’t have the same problem. No, he’d just be there every day for the next three weeks or so; no shirt, big smile, crinkly creases around his eyes, and oozing sex from every pore. Just there, waiting for her to give him the signal.

Chessie sat up all at once. Signal? What was the signal? She didn’t know any signals. She didn’t even know who she was anymore, because she certainly wasn’t the woman who had almost … almost—Good Lord!

“I’m not going to think about this anymore,” she told herself as she stood in front of the mirror over the bathroom sink, reapplying her lipstick. “Everyone is entitled to one aberration in a lifetime. He was mine, but I was saved by the bell, and now I’m over it. It’s out of my system. He’s out of my system. He was never in my system. I don’t even like him. He’s arrogant, and assuming, and clearly just out for what he can get, and I—

“Good Lord. Now I’m trying to set myself up as either a victim or a Goody Two-shoes who didn’t know what I was doing even as I was doing it. The man is sex on a stick. He can’t help it. The only question is, do I take what he’s offering, or do I do the sensible thing and walk away?”

Her reflection had no answer for her. Neither did her formerly rational brain nor her once-bruised and now wary heart.

But her body? Oh, her body had cast its vote before she’d even finished the question.

“Where’ya goin’, Jace? Is something on fire somewhere?”

Jace had already picked up his lunch bucket and was heading toward the alley and his pickup when Carl asked his question. He turned back to look at the man, his mind racing to come up with a reason he was walking off the job. Okay, running off the job.

“I need to go downtown, check on some permits. I think we’re going to enlarge Ms. Burton’s existing bathroom, make it a Jack-and-Jill open to the workroom, which is going to change the entryway from the bedroom to the workroom, and I’m going to have to amend the plumbing permit to do that.” As lies went, this was a pretty good one, and he decided he would do just that. He’d tell Marylou about it when he saw her. She’d approve it. She’d pretty much tossed the job at him and told him to do anything he wanted with it.

But she’d never told him much about Chessie Burton. Jace wished she had. Maybe then he wouldn’t act like a complete ass every time he saw her.

“Okay, sounds good. But there’s a problem. I just got a call from Bob. He says that flatbed with the siding we were expecting today broke down on the turnpike. They’re sending a new cab, but it will probably be six o’clock before it gets here. I called the wife, but she can’t pick up Aiden, so I can’t stay, and George—”

“It’s okay, Carl. I’ll be back in plenty of time, and I’ll wait for the delivery. No problem. Gotta go.”

Jace escaped the scene of the crime—okay, now that was being a little dramatic—and then drove to the nearby park and carried his lunch pail down to the stream and the waiting ducks.

A slice of bologna for him, a few hunks of bread for the ducks. A pickle for him, a slice of bologna for the ducks. His entire second sandwich, his small bag of potato chips and the container of green grapes for the ducks. The slice of bologna he had eaten, lying in his stomach like a chunk of cement.

What the hell had he done? What the hell had he been thinking?

Had he been thinking?

Hell, no. His hormones had been doing the thinking.

Never a good idea. Never.

Damn, she’d tasted good. Tasted good, felt good, looked good.

He hadn’t been able to get her out of his mind since that first morning. Three days. Three days he’d waited, wondering when he’d see her again. And nothing.

Then suddenly there she was, all smiles and iced tea and flushed cheeks and that way she had of sort of tipping her chin down and looking up at him through those incredible long black lashes. Those huge blue eyes. Those see-into-her-soul blue eyes. Trying not to look, unable to look away. And that was both of them. She knew he couldn’t stop looking at her, devouring her with his own eyes.

God, she was funny. Odd funny, silly funny, nervous funny.

Every moment they were in each other’s company, you could cut the tension with the proverbial knife.

He’d honestly thought the kiss would do it. Cut the growing tension. Satisfy his curiosity. And hers.

Next time he had a bright idea he should go soak his head in something wet and cold until the feeling passed.

At least she’d come to her senses, even regained her sense of humor with that darling crack. And she’d turned down his arrogant suggestion that they meet again later, finish what they’d started. Nice to know he was attracted to a woman with a brain. Not nice to know he’d already decided he hated her blind date and hoped he got food poisoning at lunch and would have to call and cancel.

He wadded up the sandwich wrappings and shoved them back in his lunchbox before heading back up the hill toward the pickup, a couple of the ducks, hoping for dessert, he guessed, following him.

Tossing the lunchbox onto the front seat, Jace turned and leaned back against the driver’s side door, trying to remember the last time he’d been so consumed by a woman, and finally decided the answer to that was never. Not even with Marci.

He wondered if Marci had known that, sensed it, acted as she had because of it. Because he hadn’t been a good husband. He’d had his job during the day, college courses at night and then his fledgling business that took all of his energy and concentration … and devotion. He’d been 110 percent devoted to building his business. His marriage had been a casualty of his ambition.

So that was it; he wasn’t marriage material. And he wasn’t in a hurry to take another swing that would probably end up as strike two. Even being around Second Chance Bridal made him sort of knot up inside. How did Chessie stand it, having been left at the altar as she’d said she’d been? You’d think she would stay as far away from anything to do with weddings as possible.

Funny girl. Odd girl.

He couldn’t get her out of his head. That, and the last thing he’d said to her. That asinine near challenge: It’s not going to go away unless we finish it.

What a stupid macho thing to say.

“Who the hell does saying something like that make me?” he muttered to the world at large.

There was a strange, fairly strangled quack coming from ground level. Jace looked down to see that one of the larger ducks—a female, naturally—had just christened his right work boot with a suggested answer.

“I was thinking of it more as a rhetorical question,” he said, smiling in spite of himself. “But thanks anyway ….”

Chapter Three

“So tell me again how this happened, Chess,” Marylou said as she dropped into a chair in the reception area of Second Chance Bridal just as Chessie entered from the hallway leading to the dressing rooms. “I thought you’d made it clear to Will that you weren’t going on any more blind dates he set up for you.”

“And hello to you, too. I didn’t hear you come in.” Chessie slipped the rhinestone tiara back into the glass case and locked it for the night. Katie Harwell had been right, the tiara had been too much, but selling her the cathedral-length train had sweetened the bottom line of the sale, so that was all right. “It wasn’t Will this time. It was Elizabeth. I felt sort of stuck, you know?” She looked across the room at her friend and business partner and frowned. “Tell me you didn’t get more collagen injected into your lips.”

“All right,” Marylou said, holding the cool aluminum of the soda can she’d just taken from the mini-fridge against her mouth. “I did not get more collagen injected into my lips.”

Chessie opened the armoire that hid the minifridge and pulled out a diet cola for herself. “Liar, liar, French-cut pants on fire.”

“Only as a matter of degree. You were being specific. You said collagen. I didn’t have collagen injected into my lips. I had some of my very own fanny fat injected into the area just around my lips. So, not a liar. And the swelling will go down in a couple of days. Ted’s in Vegas with some golfing buddies, and I’ll be all happily pouty but not too swollen by the time he gets back.”

Chessie subsided into the facing chair, sighing. “Marylou, you’re a beautiful woman—”

“I’m a passably attractive fifty-five-year-old woman married to a forty-eight-year-old man who thinks I’m fifty-two. There, how’s that for BFF-to-BFF honesty.”

“Pretty good,” Chessie said, nodding. “Except you’re fifty-six. And,” she said as Marylou tried to make a face—the fanny fat and some sort of injections to her forehead pretty much defeating that effort—”Ted loves you.”

“Yes, third time’s the charm. He knows I’m fifty-six. He still calls me his child bride. I think we’re going to renew our vows next year, in Tahiti. Or maybe Rome. We haven’t decided. I never get tired of wearing wedding gowns. I’m thinking a lace sheath. Ecru, maybe with a colored sash. Now tell me again about this date. Is he someone local?”

Chessie realized she hadn’t asked. In fact, all she knew about Toby Nieth was that he wasn’t the country singer, Toby Keith, and she’d have to remember that or else she’d probably screw up at some point and ask him how his last tour went. “Elizabeth tells me he’s a doctor.”

“Really? Doctors are good. What kind?”

“I don’t know. He’s a doctor-doctor. It doesn’t make a difference what kind of doctor he is.”

“It would if he was a witch doctor,” Marylou said quietly. “Anyway, I’m proud of you for doing this. I know how much you hate blind dates. That’s why I’ve given up. No more matchmaking for me with you, Chess, I took the pledge. You’re just not ever going to get married. It’s very possible you’re still carrying a torch for old what’s-his-name.”

“Rick?” Chessie was shocked. Nobody mentioned Rick to her. Not ever. She could joke about her aborted trip down the aisle, but that was her. For everyone else, the subject had been tacitly agreed to be out-of-bounds. “Why would you mention him? Why would you think that?”

Marylou’s expression being cosmetically rendered unreadable, darn it, Chessie could only listen to the words, not watch for telltale signs of fibbing. Or conniving. “Because he’s back in town and you haven’t said anything about that to me or to anyone, which might mean you’re afraid of old feelings rising to the top and bubbling where everyone can see them. At least that’s the general consensus.”

Was there a Chessie’s World website floating around the internet that she didn’t know about? How did everyone know so much about her private life? Not that she had a private life. One private almost-tryst—did people still say tryst?—earlier this same day, but certainly not a private life. “How do you know Rick’s back in town?”

Marylou got up and deposited the empty soda can in the recycle bin beneath the kidney-shaped registration desk. “I haf my vays,” she said, doing an impression of Mata Hari, or some other spy with a bad German accent. “Not that I know much.” She turned and sort of smiled at Chessie. “He’s living at home with his mother—pitiful—his divorce from the bimbo maid of honor was final six months ago, he drives a three-year-old Mercedes—leased, and the cheaper model—and he’s working as a junior broker at Gibbons, Fiorello and Schultz on Hamilton Boulevard. Oh, and he’s got just the teensiest little bit of a sparse spot starting right at the crown of his head, for which he uses that liquid stuff you buy at the drugstore and rub on your head twice a day.” She rolled her eyes. “Other than that, I know nothing.”

“You never cease to amaze me, Marylou,” Chessie said sincerely. “How do you know he’s rubbing hair restorer on his head? Or don’t I want to know?”

“You probably don’t, although I will say the drugstore at that new shopping center on Cedar Crest Boulevard has a very nice selection of eye shadows.”

Chessie tried not to laugh, but it was difficult. “You’ve been stalking the man? How did you do it? Did you wear a trench coat with the collar pulled up? Or just dark sunglasses and a blond wig?”

Marylou rolled her eyes. “Don’t be ridiculous. Let’s just say I happened to be in the same place he was a few times in the past week or so. But I’m done with that. Just be glad he doesn’t use that spray-on hair stuff some men use and think we don’t notice. Run your hand through a guy’s hair and come out with sticky gunk all over your fingertips and, believe me, you know.”

“Well, you and the rest of the world can relax. I’m not going to be running my fingers through Rick’s hair, Marylou. He called here once, nearly two weeks ago, and I did not call him back. Clearly he took the hint. And I am not still carrying some torch for him. Rick Peters is filed away under Lucky Escape, and that’s that. I just don’t like being set up. There’s something creepy about it. So thank you for not doing it anymore, and if you could convince everyone else, I’d be eternally grateful.”

Marylou gave her a hug. “Honey, I’ve told them and told them. She doesn’t want your help, I told them. She’s happy as she is. Alone. But you know how happily marrieds can be. They want everyone else to be happily married, too.”

Chessie disengaged herself from her friend’s expensively scented embrace and held her at arm’s length. “So you really did hire Jace Edwards because he came highly recommended? And not in some typical whacked-out Marylou Smith-Bitters idea of throwing him in front of me and vice versa?”

Marylou almost succeeded in making a face this time, she seemed that appalled. “Jace? Don’t be ridiculous. He’s not at all your type. You need a doctor, a dentist—heaven forbid, a stockbroker. Someone more … refined. He’s a hunk, certainly, and seems nice enough. I’m sure I can find somebody for him if I just flashed his photo a few times, and since I’ve given up on you, he might make an interesting project. But not you, Chess, he’s not at all right for you. He’s much too male. Rough and tumble, self-made, a little too earthy around the edges.”

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