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He chuckled. "Every woman is my type, but I'm strictly a window-shopper these days. I've waited fourteen bloody years to marry Catriona MacTaggart, and I won't bollocks it up. Not that I have eyes for anyone but her. She is my soul mate, which is something I used to think was rubbish."
"But now you're into it. I get that. Never believed in soul mates either until I fell for Heidi."
My fiancée glanced at me, her eyes widening briefly right before she smiled. "Yeah, I believe in that sappy stuff now too. Love changes your perspective on everything."
Alex sighed, his lips forming a soft smile. "Yes, it does. And to think I never would've found Cat again after all these years if her meddling family hadn't gotten involved."
"Is that the mob of Scots you mentioned earlier?" Ollie asked. "Can't wait to meet them. They sound like a crazy bunch."
"Oh yes, that they are," Alex said with what I could only describe as a devious smile. "Most of them want to murder me, but marrying Cat ought to keep their homicidal impulses at bay. She will beat to death anyone who lays a finger on me."
Were all Brits as weird as this guy? I kind of liked him, but damn, he had the most bizarre sense of humor. At least I thought he was kidding about Scots wanting to murder him.
Ollie seemed confused too. "You're joking, right? There won't seriously be Scottish people trying to off you while you're all here for the wedding."
"Yes, of course I'm joking," Alex said. "My parents did kidnap us recently, but Cat and I outwitted them. Now they're both locked up."
No one spoke. We all stared at Alex Thorne. Had that been another joke?
"I can see I've stunned the lot of you," Alex said. "It's true, though. My mother is in prison, and my father resides in a psychiatric facility."
Eve regained her ability to speak before the rest of us. "Do you tell everyone you meet about your, um, parents being…"
"Incarcerated? No, I don't spread that around." Alex clasped his hands behind his head. "But it was in the papers and on the telly a few months ago, at least in Scotland. So it's hardly a state secret these days."
"Telly?" I asked.
Val explained, "He means television. Brits call it the telly. I spent some time in England when I was on the Brazilian national football team."
"You're a footballer?" Alex said. "Have you ever tried shinty?"
"I have never heard of it."
"Not surprising. It's a Scottish game that I like to call the bastard child of lacrosse and field hockey."
The conversation continued from there, with Alex making strange jokes while he discussed the wedding preparations and the differences between the UK and America. We all got used to Alex's sense of humor and wound up laughing a lot. The wedding would take place in eight weeks, but when Eve told Alex we already had guests booked for that week, he offered to pay those people to take a vacation anywhere in the world they wanted to go, no matter the cost.
He wasn't kidding. He seriously would do that.
After the group confab, Eve and Val went into the caretaker's house to call those guests and tell them the plan. I had a feeling nobody would balk. I mean, Alex had vowed to spend "any amount of money" to send those people on "their dream holiday." Ollie and Mara went to the office to study the list of wedding guests Alex had given them.
Heidi and I took Alex out to the horse pasture. When I'd mentioned my pilot project, he had wanted to see it "purely for the sake of curiosity but potentially for more." I had no idea what he meant by "more," but hey, if the guy wanted to see the horse pasture, I'd show it to him. He was paying an obscene amount of money for a week-long "wedding extravaganza," as he called it.
We stood at the fence, petting the horses while we talked. He told us a bit about his life, and we shared funny stories from the resort.
"I saw a gypsy wagon out there," Alex said. "Is that owned by a guest or the resort?"
"The resort paid for it, but it's my thing."
"You would be the Ludar prince referenced on the sign."
"That's right."
Alex scratched under Georgie's chin. "Are you a genuine Ludar, or is that strictly an act for the tourists?"
My Ludar lidar was pinging, but in a good way. I had a feeling Alex knew about this stuff. "I'm descended from a long line of proud Ludar, that's what my mom likes to say. I've got Rom genes on both sides of the family tree."
"Your ancestors must've fled Eastern Europe in the late eighteen hundreds during the great migration."
