Sweet Deception

The wedding party proceeded along the carpet to the reception. Zabrina didn’t notice Belinda, Griffin, Keith Ennis, Chandra or Denise Eaton. Her gaze was fixed on Myles as he came closer and closer, and then their eyes met and fused. His eyes grew wider as a wry smile parted his firm lips.

The smile, Myles and his powerful presence were there. Then they vanished as he moved past her. Emerging from her trance, she followed the crowd as the hotel staff ushered everyone down a wide tunnel that led outside where an enormous tent had been erected. Belinda and Griffin stood in a receiving line, greeting family members and friends who’d come to witness and celebrate their special day.

Belinda’s eyebrows shot up when she saw her friend. Zabrina had cut her hair in a style that drew one’s attention to her luminous eyes. Raven-black waves were brushed off her face. The style would’ve been too severe for some with less delicate features. She was stunning in a silk chiffon off-the-shoulder black dress that hugged her upper body, nipping her slender waist with a wide silk sash before flaring around her knees. Stilettos added several inches to her impressive five-foot-seven-inch height.

“You look incredible,” Belinda gushed.

“Thank you. And you’re an amazing bride, Lindy.”

Zabrina stole a glance at Griffin Rice as he leaned down to whisper something in the ear of an elderly woman who giggled like a teenage girl. She’d thought him breathtakingly handsome when she was a teenager, and her opinion hadn’t changed. His deep-set dark eyes and cleft chin had most women lusting after him. But Griffin had always seemed totally oblivious to their attention. It was apparent he’d been waiting for his brother’s sister-in-law.

Griffin turned his attention to Zabrina. She looked nothing like the young woman he remembered. “Thank you for coming.” Leaning forward, he pressed a light kiss to her cheek.

“Thank you for inviting me.” Zabrina knew she couldn’t hold up the receiving line. “I’ll be in touch with you guys after you come back from your honeymoon.” When she’d married Thomas Cooper he’d made certain to isolate her from everyone in her past.

“Your name, miss?” asked a hotel staffer as she stood in front of a table stacked with butler boxes.

“Zabrina Cooper.”

He handed her a box. “Your table number and menu are in the box, Ms. Cooper.”

In lieu of a guest card, each guest was given a personalized butler box with a leaf-colored letterpressed menu and table number. The pink-and-green color scheme was repeated in the pastel-toned chiffon on the ceiling of the tent, table linens and carpet. The lights from strategically placed chandeliers provided a soft glow as the afternoon sun cast shadows over the elegantly dressed guests as they found their way to their respective tables.

Waiters were positioned at each table to pull out chairs and assist everyone as they sat on pink-cushioned bamboo-gilded chairs. And because Zabrina had returned her response card for one, she was seated at a table with other single guests. She offered a smile to the two men flanking her. The one on her right extended his hand.

“Bailey Mercer.”

She stared at the young man with flaming red hair and blue-green eyes, then took his hand. It was soft and moist. As discreetly as she could without offending him, she withdrew her hand. “It’s nice meeting you, Bailey. I’m Zabrina.”

He draped an arm over the back of her chair. “Are you a guest of the bride or the groom?”

“The bride,” she said.

“Are you a teacher?”

“No. I’m a nurse.” Zabrina realized he just wanted to make polite conversation. “Are you a guest of the bride or groom?” she asked.

“Griffin and I were college roommates.”

“Are you also an attorney?”

Bailey leaned closer. “I’m a forensic criminologist.”

Suddenly her curiosity was piqued. “Who do you work for?”

“I’m stationed in Quantico.”

“You work for the Bureau?” she asked. The FBI was the only law-enforcement agency that she knew of in Quantico, Virginia.

Bailey nodded. “I’m going to the bar to get something to drink. Would you like me to bring you something?”

Zabrina smiled. He’d segued from one topic to another without pausing to take a breath. “Yes, please.”

“What would you like?”

“I’ll have a cosmopolitan.”

Music from speakers mounted overhead filled the tent as guests filed in and sat at their assigned tables. Bailey returned with Zabrina’s cocktail and a glass filled with an amber liquid. Smiling, they touched glasses.

Myles returned from posing for photographs with the wedding party to find Zabrina smiling and talking to a man with strawberry-blond hair. Sitting at the bridal table afforded him an unobscured view of everything and everyone in the large tent.

There was something in the way she angled her head while staring up at the man through her lashes that reminded him of how she’d look at him just before he’d make love to her. It was a come-hither look that he hadn’t been able to resist.

What Myles hadn’t been able to understand was how he and Zabrina were able to communicate without words. It could be a single glance, a slight lifting of an eyebrow, a shrug of a shoulder or a smile. It was as if they were able to communicate telepathically, reading each other’s thoughts. Right now he knew she would be shocked if she saw the lust in his eyes. The spell was broken when a waiter took his dinner and beverage request.

“I almost didn’t recognize Zabrina,” said Griffin Rice.

Myles gave his brother-in-law a sidelong glance. “She has changed.” And he wanted to tell Griffin the change was for the better. When he’d caught a glimpse of Zabrina the week before he’d thought her lovely, but tonight she was breathtakingly stunning.

Griffin’s gaze met and fused with Myles’s. “She’d dropped out of sight for years. Rumors were circulating that she and Cooper had divorced. But when reporters asked him about his wife he claimed she preferred keeping a low profile.”

Myles’s eyes narrowed slightly. “Who’s the guy with her?”

“Bailey Mercer. We were college roomies.”

The smile that softened Myles’s mouth crept up to his eyes. It was apparent Zabrina had come to the wedding unescorted. He’d planned to ask her to dance with him and nothing more, since he hadn’t wanted to act inappropriately if she had come with a date. Now that he knew she was alone things had changed. Myles had waited ten years for an explanation for Zabrina’s deception and he intended to get an answer before the night ended.

The waiter brought drinks for those at the bridal party table, followed by other waitstaff carrying trays laden with platters of curried scallop canapés, walnut and endive salad and mushroom rolls. Dozens of lighted votives in green glasses flickered like stars when the chandeliers were dimmed, creating a soft, soothingly romantic atmosphere.

Myles ate without actually tasting the food on his plate. He was too engrossed in the woman sitting close enough for him to see her expressions, but not close enough to hear her smoky voice. He wondered if Griffin’s former college roommate was as enthralled with her as he’d been. What he did do was drink more than he normally would at a social function. It didn’t matter, because he wasn’t driving back to Philadelphia. He’d reserved a suite at the hotel.

And, he refused to fantasize that his sister’s wedding was his and Zabrina’s. He and Zabrina had planned their wedding, honeymoon and life together, but all the plans had come to naught two weeks before the ceremony when his fiancée called to tell him she was in love with another man and she couldn’t marry him.

Myles still remembered her passion whenever they shared a bed, and wondered whether she’d screamed Thomas Cooper’s name in the throes of passion. Zabrina had always had an intense distaste for politicians. Yet she’d married one. And what about her claim that she’d wanted to wait two years before starting a family? She’d wasted no time in giving Cooper a child.

The music playing throughout the dinner ended when a live band took over, playing softly as toasts to the bride and groom were made.

Dwight Eaton wiped away tears as he smiled at his daughter. There was no doubt he was thinking of his eldest daughter whom he’d buried eight months earlier. Myles toasted the newlyweds, providing a lighter moment when he reminded everyone that Griffin Rice was so intent on joining the family that he’d become his brother-in-law for the second time.

A hush descended over the assembly as they watched Griffin ease Belinda to her feet, escort her to the dance floor and dance with her to the Berlin classic “Take My Breath Away.” It was their first dance as husband and wife.

Myles finally got to twirl his sister around the dance floor after she’d shared a dance with their father. “Does Griffin know he is a lucky man?” he asked, executing a fancy dance step.

Belinda lifted the skirt of her gown to avoid stepping on the hem. She gave Myles a demure smile. “I’d like to believe that I’m lucky that Griffin didn’t marry some other woman, leaving me pining for him for the rest of my life.”

Myles recalled the conversation he’d had with Stacey. She’d waited for him to come around and think of her as more than a friend, and when it hadn’t happened she’d opted to marry someone else. He was certain his sister would’ve done the same.

“You’re too much of a realist to spend your life dreaming of the impossible.”