The Prodigal Bride

Though she’d been tipsy, she’d let him vent about his father, offered him comfort and … one thing had led to another. Zoey had compounded the drunken mistake of sleeping with her best friend with her impulsive gut reaction the next morning. In a panic and without a word to Gage, she’d fled Lagniappe for Europe—a decision that had nearly ruined their friendship.

“No sex,” she repeated. “We can’t repeat that mistake. Our friendship is more important than a night of doing the mattress tango.” She pressed a hand to her swirling stomach. “Agreed?”

Gage held her gaze, his dark stare unnerving. He cracked his knuckles, a sure sign that he wasn’t as cool and collected inside as his relaxed manner suggested. Finally, he turned a hand up in concession. “Fine. No sex. But we still respect our wedding vows. No infidelity.”

She jerked a nod. “Naturellement.”

His scowl reminded her how much he hated her speaking French, a too-raw reminder of her years away “finding herself” in Europe.

“But to keep the divorce simple, I think we should—”

Gage growled and surged to his feet. “Can we not plan every detail of our divorce now? It’s bad enough you’ve talked about nothing but how this won’t be a ‘real’ marriage—” glowering, he made quotation marks in the air with his fingers “—since the minute you put on my engagement ring. If you don’t want to marry me, just say so. Otherwise, can we try to be at least a little optimistic before we walk down the aisle?”

“Easy, Sparky.” She stepped up to him and patted his chest. His broad, hard, well-developed chest. She let her hand linger longer than she should have, and he arched an eyebrow. Leapin’ lizards. “I just want to make sure we’re on the same page before we say ‘I do.’”

She savored the warmth of his skin that seeped through his shirt and felt the reassuring thump of his heart under her hand. Strong and steady, just like Gage. Reminded of all he’d sacrificed to help her, Zoey cupped his cheek with her hand. His unshaven jaw scratched her hand, and she marveled again at the changes in him since high school. Who was this calendar-worthy hottie she was about to marry? Sure, she’d seen him since graduation. Dozens of times. But in her mind, Gage would always be the quiet, skinny boy who didn’t shave until his junior year. The lanky track-team distance runner. The geeky guy no one noticed and whose name was misspelled “Gabe” in the senior yearbook.

But women noticed him now. At the restaurant alone, she’d counted five different women who’d looked ready to jump him if he’d shown even a hint of interest. Her best friend, the late bloomer, the fireman hunk. Who’da thunk it?

“Thanks again for coming to my rescue. Now I don’t have to go home to face my parents unwed, penniless, pregnant and deserted.” She quirked a wry grin. “Just penniless and pregnant.”

He shrugged. As if driving fifteen hundred miles without sleeping, as if putting his life on hold so her baby would have a name, as if saving her from being homeless were nothing.

He wrapped his fingers around hers and moved them from his cheek to brush a soft kiss across her knuckles. A sensation like tiny bubbles tickled down her spine.

“What are friends for? I wouldn’t have survived high school if not for you and your family. Consider this payback.”

The doors to the chapel opened, and a man wearing a sparkly suit that Liberace would envy called, “Powell-Bancroft?”

Gage and Zoey looked from Mr. Sparkles to each other. She saw the get-a-load-of-him grin Gage fought to hide and had to bite the inside of her own cheek so she wouldn’t laugh. “Are you sure this is the wedding chapel and not the Salute to Siegfried and Roy?” she whispered.

Gage’s cheek twitched, and his gaze lit with humor. “Just in case, keep an eye out for tigers in there, okay?” He offered her his arm. “Shall we?”

Her stomach swirled, and her burger-and-fries lunch rebelled. “Is this the right thing to do, Gage? I mean, the last thing I want is to do anything that will hurt our friendship.”

His dark eyebrows lowered, his expression cautious. “I’m sure. I thought about all the pros and cons driving out here. But if you’re not sure, if you need more time to think—”

“That would be so not me. Right?” She raked her hair back with her fingers and gave him a nervous laugh. “Impulsive is my middle name. Isn’t that what my mother says?” She hooked her arm in his and squared her shoulders. “Let’s do this.”

A tinny organ played the Wagner wedding march, and Zoey squeezed Gage’s hand as they strode down the aisle to the vaudevillesque minister. Her stomach seesawed, her lip sweated and her knees trembled. This was hardly how she pictured her wedding day as a little girl.

She swallowed hard, forcing down the bile that rose in her throat when the minister, a show-perfect smile in place, intoned, “We’re gathered here today to join Zoey and Gabe—”

“Gage,” her groom corrected.

The pearly-white smile faltered. “Oh, uh … Zoey and Gage in the legal bonds of marriage.”

Her heart thundered, and she thought she might throw up. Maybe the hot peppers on her burger had been a mistake … but she’d had a strange craving for them and—

“Zoey, do you take Gage to be your husband? To love and cherish in sickness and—” The minister’s voice faded to a drone as she faced her groom. Her groom. Leapin’ lizards! She’d spent her whole life making rash decisions, screwing up, hurting the people she loved. How could she live with herself if, in trying to dig herself out of the hole she’d created with Derek, she was making matters worse by marrying Gage?

She was ready to turn and run when she met Gage’s eyes. Warm, genuine, encouraging. He flashed her one of his crooked grins and, as if David Copperfield had waved his hands and snatched away a silky veil, her jitters vanished. Poof! Gage had been her rock, her refuge, her home base for more than eleven years. With him, she was safe, anchored.

“—until death do you part?” the showman minister finished grandly.

A niggle of guilt poked her. Their marriage would be temporary, not until death, but the confidence in Gage’s eyes filled her with a calm assurance she was doing the right thing. Warmth filled her chest. “Yeah, I do.”

Relief to have her vows over with buzzed through Zoey as the Liberace double repeated the vows for Gage. In response, Gage’s expression warmed. “Absolutely, positively.”

Zoey quirked an eyebrow. His answer seemed over-the-top, when a simple “I do” would have sufficed. But maybe Gage was getting caught up in the whole Las Vegas flash and dazzle. Or maybe he was trying to make her laugh at the absurdity of their tying the knot in Vegas like something from an episode of Friends. He surprised her again by producing from his pocket a plain band to slip on her finger at the appointed time. When she gave him a curious look, he only winked and turned to face the minister. They signed the marriage license to make it official, and the tinny organ tuned up again with “Going to the Chapel of Love.”

The minister gave Gage a sly grin. “You can kiss her now.”

Zoey sputtered, heat creeping to her cheeks. “Naw. See, we’re not really—”

Gage caught her wrist and reeled her close with a firm tug. “You heard the man, Zee. Shut up and kiss me.”

Her stomach swooped in anticipation. To cover, she pulled a face and buzzed her lips in dismissal. “Yeah, right. We’re not—”

Capturing her nape with one hand, Gage anchored her against his long, lean body with his other arm. He silenced her startled gasp with a kiss that was far from platonic. His warm mouth covered hers, drawing on it with gentle but insistent persuasion. Zoey clutched at his T-shirt to steady herself as his tongue traced the seam of her lips and her head spun dizzily. A sensation like hot maple syrup flowed through her veins, sweet and indulgent, while Gage’s skillful lips teased and tantalized hers. Around her, the chapel lost focus, and the organ was drowned out by the whoosh of blood in her ears.

When he angled his head to deepen the kiss, she surrendered to the heady pleasure that swamped her and answered the tug of his mouth with her own fervor. Gage massaged her neck with his fingers, his caress seductive and hypnotizing. Heat and need coiled low in her belly as she melted into him. His kiss was commanding yet tender, powerful, romantic—and unexpectedly erotic.

When he backed away, leaving her shaking and breathless, Gage’s grin was cocky, his dark eyes on fire. “And don’t you forget it.”

Weak-kneed, she blinked at him—stunned, confused … and aroused. Aroused by Gage? What was happening to her?

“Leapin’ lizards,” she rasped, touching her fingers to her lips, half expecting to find them ablaze. “What was that?”

“That, Mrs. Powell—” Gage took a step back, rolled his shoulders and twisted his mouth in regret “—is just a taste of what you’ll be missing.” He laced their fingers and nudged her down the aisle with her arm tucked under his. Giving her a side glance, he arched an eyebrow. “So … how do you feel about your no-sex rule now?”

Gage loaded the last of Zoey’s belongings into the back of his Ford Escape—or rather Elaine’s Escape. He was using the SUV while his sister was in rehab and he had Pet. He slammed the back end of the vehicle closed and glanced up to the door of the motel room where Zoey emerged with her purse and a backpack. Having never officially checked out, due to her lack of funds, Zoey was still technically renting the room. So they’d returned long enough for Gage to get a shower and a nap before hitting the road.

She’d been unusually quiet since the wedding ceremony, and Gage mentally kicked himself for kissing her so passionately. A chaste kiss to seal the union would have been enough. Or no kiss, as Zoey had wanted, would have been safest. But all her talk about how their marriage wouldn’t be real, how they couldn’t have sex, how sleeping together their only time had been a mistake had frustrated him.

And, yeah, he knew that harboring any hope that living as man and wife, sharing the same roof, renewing the bonds that had made them so close in high school would eventually change her feelings for him was a recipe for disaster and heartache. But maybe a little of Zoey’s recklessness had rubbed off on him because, damn it, he still clung to the shred of hope that someday Zoey would see what she meant to him and return his feelings. The kiss at the I Do, I Do Wedding Chapel just demonstrated that they had chemistry beyond friendship. His body temperature rose just remembering the heat in Zoey’s kiss. The way her raspberry lips had parted in surprise and a pink blush had crept over her cheeks. She’d made a beautiful bride.

For whatever reason, Zoey was scared to recognize that attraction and embrace it. He’d known that ever since he woke up alone the morning after graduation. Kissing her today had been stupid. He couldn’t push her, or he risked having her run from him again as she had six years ago. He couldn’t risk hurting her while she was vulnerable, couldn’t risk frightening her away when she was still reeling from Derek’s desertion. She needed him to be her friend while she dealt with the mess she was in and got her feet under her again.

Gage dragged a hand down his face and sighed. Patience, buddy. Just have patience.

Yet another small voice, an echo from the past, whispered to him, You’re a dope if you think she’ll ever want you. She’s going to run again. She’s going to hurt you. That’s who she is and what she does. You can’t change her.

“I think that’s everything.” Zoey opened a back door and tossed in her backpack. “Did you pay the motel manager?”

Gage shoved his hands in the back pockets of his jeans. “Yeah. We’re good to go.”

Zoey gnawed her bottom lip. “I’m going to pay you back. All of it. I hate that you got stuck settling my debts.”