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Five hundred guests rose dutifully to their feet, heads craned toward Roz for their first glimpse of the bride. An explosion of color greeted her, from the bouquets at the end of each pew to the multiple stands holding baskets of blooms across the front. Hendrix had chosen pinks to complement Lora’s dress, but hadn’t seemed too inclined to stick with a flower theme. There were stargazer lilies she’d picked out at the florist, but also roses, baby’s breath, tulips, daisies, and something that might be a larkspur, but her father started down the aisle before she could verify.
Wow, was it hot in here. Every eye in the house was trained on her. Her spine stiffened and she let her own vision blur so she didn’t have to see whether they were quietly judging her or had a measure of compassion reflected on their faces. No way was it the latter. No one in attendance had a clue how difficult today was for the motherless bride.
Then her gaze drifted past all the flowers and landed on the star of the show. Hendrix. She stared into his pale hazel eyes as her father handed her off in the most traditional of exchanges. Her husband-to-be clasped her fingers and the five hundred people behind her vanished as she let Hendrix soak through her to the marrow.
“You’re so beautiful it hurts inside when I look at you,” he murmured.
Her knees turned to marshmallow and she tightened her grip on his hand.
That was the proper thing to say to a bride on her wedding day and she didn’t even try to squelch the bloom of gratitude that had just unfurled in her chest. “I bet you say that to all your brides.”
He grinned and faced the minister, guiding her through the ceremony like a pro when nerves erased her memory of the rehearsal from the night before. The space-time continuum bent double on itself and the ceremony wound to a close before she’d barely blinked once.
“You may kiss the bride,” the minister intoned and that’s when she realized the complete tactical error she’d made.
She had to kiss Hendrix. For real. And the moratorium on that thus far had guaranteed this would become A Moment. The carnal spike through the gut at the thought did not bode well for how the actual experience would go down.
Neither did the answering heat in his expression. He cupped her jaw on both sides, giving her plenty of time to think about it. No need. Her whole body had just incinerated with the mere suggestion of the imminent follow-through.
And then he leaned in to capture her mouth with his. It was a full-on assault to the senses as their lips connected and she couldn’t do anything else but fling her arms around his waist, or she’d have ended up on the ground, a charred shell that was burned beyond recognition.
Oh God, yes. With that one hard press of his mouth, Hendrix consumed her. This kiss was but a shadow of the many, many others they’d shared, but it was enough to slide memories along her skin, through her core.
This was so very right, so perfect between them. Everything else faded—the weirdness, the nerves. This heat she understood, craved. If he was burning her alive from the inside out, she didn’t have to think about all the reasons this marriage might not work.
He teased the flame in her belly into a full raging fire with little licks of his tongue against hers. Hell, that blaze hadn’t ever really been extinguished from the moment he’d lit that match in Vegas. Masterfully, the man kissed her until she’d been scraped raw, panting for more, nearly weeping with want.
This was why she’d thrown down the no-kissing-no-sex rule. She could not resist him, even in a church full of people. Her body went into some kind of Hendrix-induced altered state where nothing but basic need existed. And he wasn’t even in full-on seduction mode. Thank God he’d played by her rules or there was no telling what new and more horrific scandals might have cropped up prior to the wedding.
That was enough to get her brain back in gear. She broke off the kiss to the sound of flutes and strings. The recessional music. They were supposed to walk and smile now. Somehow, that’s what happened and then she floated through a million photographs, a limo ride to the reception and about a million well-wishers.
All she really wanted was to dive back into Hendrix and never surface.
The crowd at the reception crushed that hope flat. No less than ten people vied for their attention at any given time and she’d lost count of the number of times Hendrix had introduced her to someone from his business world. The reverse wasn’t at all true, a sobering fact that brought home the reasons she was wearing a wedding band.
She’d spent the past few years having what she’d staunchly defend as a “good time” but in reality was a panacea for the pain of losing first her mother to cancer and then her father to indifference and grief. The scandals were just the cherry on top of her messy life and ironically, also the reason she couldn’t move forward with something respectable like running a charity.
Her new husband would change all of that. Had already started to.
The pièce de résistance of the event came with the first dance between husband and wife. Hendrix, whom she’d scarcely said two words to since that pantie-melting kiss, whisked her out onto the dance floor. He drew her close and when his arms came around her, the strangest sensation floated through her as they began to move to the classical piece that she’d have never picked out but fitted the occasion.
“Hey,” he murmured into her ear. “How is Mrs. Harris doing?”
“I don’t know. I haven’t spoken to your mother.” When he laughed, she realized he hadn’t meant Helene. “Ha, ha. I’m out of sorts. It’s been a long day.”
“I know. That’s why I asked. You seem distracted.”
She pulled back a touch to look at him. “Ask me again.”
The smile in his eyes warmed her, but then it slid away to be replaced by something else as their gazes held in a long moment that built on itself with heavy implications. “How are you, Mrs. Harris?”
A name shouldn’t have so much color to it. If anything, it should have sounded foreign to her, but it wasn’t strange. It felt...good. She took a deep breath and let that reality expand inside her. Mrs. Harris. That was her name. Rosalind Harris. Mrs. Roz Harris.
She liked it. Maybe she should have practiced writing it out a bajillion times on a piece of scratch paper. Then the concept wouldn’t have been such a shock. There was a huge difference between academically knowing that you were changing your name and actually hearing someone address you that way. Especially when the man doing the addressing had the same name and you were married to him.
“I’m better now,” she told him.
Understatement. Hendrix was solid and beautiful and he’d pulled off the wedding event of the season. Why hadn’t she participated more in the planning?
