Marriage by Mistake (3 page)

But the woman wasn't done. With one hand, she
pointed to a finger on the other. "How do you intend to forget
this
?" she wanted to know.

Dean forced his gaze from her chest. "Excuse
me?"

She began pulling on the indicated finger,
then held up an object that was too small for Dean to see. She
shook it at him. "Our wedding ring, Dean. So please tell me, did
you intend to 'forget' we were married, too?"

Dean felt his heart stop right in its place.
Married
? Right before he passed out from lack of oxygen, he
dragged in a breath and reminded himself this was just Troy. Really
playing hardball, even for a joke. He wasn't
married
. Not to
her
.

And yet    and yet    he
couldn't remember those two days. Amnesia hadn't been part of
Troy's suggestion. Why the hell couldn't he remember?

Slowly, Dean shifted his gaze to meet
hers.

Her eyes glittered with anger and insult. It
was hard to believe even an actress could pull it off.

"Here," she said, and threw the ring hard. It
made a small thud as it hit the carpet behind Dean's desk. "So much
for your promises," she whispered hoarsely.

Dean watched, immobilized, as she whirled and
threw open the door. He saw a flash image of Mrs. Barnes and a lot
of swinging fake leather fringe before the automatic spring
returned his abused office door to its frame.

It should have become quiet then, but Dean's
ears were ringing. For a long time he could only stand there,
eardrums vibrating. Then he turned. His gaze went down to the
floor.

The gold band lay behind the back wheel of
his chair. Like a snake, waiting to strike.

Married, to a dancer on the Strip.
Impetuously, foolishly tied to a woman with whom he had not a thing
in common, who could only be charmed by his money, who made a
living controlling the passions of others, and who could have no
real feelings for him at all.

Married to the very kind of woman his father
always married.

Dean stared at the ring and frowned. No. The
ring was just a prop. Easily obtained. Interchangeable. Hardly
proof of anything.

He bent and picked it up. The metal was still
warm from her finger.

Dean felt a large area hollow out in his
stomach. His fingers tightened on the ring. Prop?

Or evidence of what he'd actually done those
two missing days?

The hollow in his stomach grew.
No
,
Dean told himself. He was
not
his father.

But his eyes squeezed closed as he set the
ring against his forehead. If only it all didn't make a horrible
kind of sense.

CHAPTER TWO

Kelly was still burning as she braced for
liftoff in the crowded jet out of Logan. Hypnotized! How
   how outrageous could a man get? Claimed he didn't even
remember her! Glaring out the plane window, Kelly thought of the
hours they'd spent together, the outpourings of their souls, so
fast, so deep.

She'd told him everything; from her strict,
but loving, upbringing as a preacher's kid in a small town outside
of St. Louis, to how she'd nearly flunked out of school but had won
every dance contest around. He knew how lucky she'd felt to get the
Las Vegas gig, but how frustrated she was in finding a man who was
serious about a relationship, and not one who simply wanted an
affair with a dancer.

He was going to
forget
all that? Her
soul stripped bare?

And what about the other parts of her she'd
stripped bare? What about the hours they'd spent in her bed, hot,
entwined, pleasured? Was he going to 'forget' that!

Throughout the plane flight Kelly nursed her
anger, although every so often a stray thought crept in. Why
had
Dean looked so strange? With that grim slash of a mouth
and corporate demeanor, he'd seemed like a completely different
person. And a whole building was named after him?

That was when, for one tiny, wing beat of an
instant, Kelly would wonder if he'd been telling the truth in that
big fat office of his, if he'd really been hypnotized and had done
everything while in a trance.

But the instant of such credulity would pass
quickly. Her anger would burn through again. She wasn't
that
stupid. Oh, she'd let men feed her some pretty incredible lines,
but she wasn't about to eat this one. Hypnotized.

And to think she was married to him!

In her cramped airplane seat, Kelly grimaced.
Unfortunately, she had to recall that
she'd
been the one to
bring up marriage. After her last disastrous relationship, with a
musician who'd strung her on for months without committing, she'd
decided to go back to basics, back to the values with which she'd
been raised. She'd decided she could no longer go to bed with a man
unless he was her husband.

Last Saturday night in the back seat of her
car and locked in a hot, wet kiss with Dean, the temptation had
been strong to abandon this quaint little policy. He'd felt so good
around her; his arms so strong, his hands so clever.

But Kelly had forced herself out of her
sensual haze. Panting, she'd pushed back from Dean. The look in his
eyes then    Oh, not disappointed, not angry, but
stricken
. Yes, he'd looked as if her pulling away hurt as
much as a blow.

So Kelly had explained the problem. She'd
been terrified he would laugh. She was a Las Vegas dancer, after
all. She wasn't loose, but hardly a virgin. So    holding
out for marriage? She'd expected an argument, persuasions.

Instead Dean had given her one long, intense
look    and then asked her to marry him.

At the time, oh!    Kelly had
thought it so romantic. Sure, she hadn't believed him at first. But
Dean had talked fast. He'd talked hard. And he'd truly seemed to be
absolutely, positively serious. He'd been so serious he'd made
Kelly feel that way, too. As if they were meant to be together, not
just for that night but for forever.

Serious! All he'd been serious about was
getting her into bed.

Kelly's anger kept her going through the
plane flight, the landing, and a cab ride home. By the time she got
to her apartment, however, it all began to catch up to her. She
hadn't slept the night before, or the night before that. She was
worn to the bone.

At the front door, her key wobbled in the
lock. "Come on, come on," Kelly muttered. "Don't get picky on me
now." The tumblers caught and she pushed the door open.

She nearly tripped on the pale green
sweatshirt trailed across the threshold.

"Oh, no," she whispered. She could feel the
muscles of her face contort as she kicked the sweatshirt to one
side. She remembered, too well, how it had gotten there. After the
wedding, they'd both been laughing, giddy with the gamble they'd
taken. Married, after a courtship of only two days. Dean had
pressed her against the door. "Now," he'd crowed, nuzzling her. His
hands had lifted the hem of Kelly's sweatshirt. "Now I'm allowed to
take this off."

Kelly fell back against the same door. Her
purse dropped and she threw her hands over her eyes. She'd promised
herself she wasn't going to cry over him, not over some rock-bottom
worm like that, but she could feel the hot moisture building
anyway, could feel the spasms starting in her chest.

What had she been thinking to fly out to
Boston? Had she expected to get the better of such a super-class
bum?

Well, yes, she had imagined that. And
something even worse.

She'd imagined    oh, she hated to
admit it, even to herself    but she'd imagined, deep
down in the most naïve part of herself, that he was going to be
happy
to see her. Yes! She'd dreamed he was going to have
some magical explanation to take away the hurt of what he'd done.
His betrayal was going to vanish into thin air.

In one, secret, wishful part of herself,
she'd envisioned him flying home with her on the plane.

Stupid. Utterly delusional and stupid.

All Dean had wanted in Boston was to see the
back of her    forever. And he hadn't cared how much more
he had to hurt her to achieve that result.

Kelly hiccupped painfully. Lord, she'd been
brought up better than this, better than to accept less than
complete commitment and respect. Her minister father and his
devoted wife, her mother, had given Kelly a glorious example of a
truly loving relationship. It certainly wasn't their fault Kelly
was failing completely in the romance department.

She was almost   
almost
   glad they were no longer alive to see what a mess
she'd made of her own 'marriage.'

Kelly allowed herself one last sob, then gave
her head a brisk shake. All right. Enough. She'd made her mistake
in insisting on a ring, and then compounded it by flying out to
Boston. It didn't accomplish anything now to feel sorry for
herself. All she could do was...move on. Put Dean Singleton and her
bad judgment behind her.

Next time she'd be smarter. Next time she'd
find out for sure whether or not the guy really loved her.

Kelly sniffled, rubbed her nose, and bent to
snag the green sweatshirt off the floor. The simple act made her
feel better. A crumb cake, Kelly decided. She almost smiled as she
mashed the sweatshirt into a ball.

Tomorrow she'd ask the girls for the crumb
cake. With her boots pinching, Kelly limped toward her bedroom. A
good crumb cake ought to clean Dean Singleton right out of her
system.

###

Seated in a rental car parked in a lot behind
one of the biggest hotels in Las Vegas, Dean lifted his wrist and
checked his watch. According to the private detective's report,
Kelly    yes, that was her name, Kelly    would
be getting out of her required workout just about now.

Dean lowered his wrist. He'd been surprised
to learn the number of hours Kelly put in at her job. It was clear
she was in a show that demanded real dancing and not a simple
display of physical attributes. In fact, according the detective's
report it was family oriented, no nudity. That made Dean feel
marginally better.

Not completely better, of course. He still
couldn't believe the cold facts of the matter, all he'd done his
two lost days. The whole affair was so pathetically tawdry. But at
least he was facing it now, dealing with the consequences. Part of
that involved sitting here, waiting to speak to the woman who had
not, after all, been hired by cousin Troy to interrupt his vice
presidents meeting.

Dean looked out the car window and chewed the
inside of his cheek. This was duty. The sooner he got to it, the
better.

Suiting action to words, he clicked his car
door open. Desert air hit him as he unfolded from the car. Cool for
Vegas in May, but warm for a New Englander. He took a moment to
adjust to the temperature, then shut the car door and straightened
his tie. With a deep breath, he started through the parked cars
toward the gym door.

His palms sweated and his neck felt stiff.
Everything depended on his doing this right; his sense of honor,
his self-respect    everything.

He slowed when he saw the crowd. About a
dozen women, hair bands and sweat suits, gathered in the parking
lot around the back of a car. They were laughing and excited. Among
them Dean saw Kelly. That's when his feet stopped. Partially hidden
behind a red Bronco, Dean stared his fill.

Kelly's hair was loosely bound in a ponytail
high on top of her head and she was dressed just as sloppily as
everybody else, in a sweat jacket with the sleeves pushed up, but
Dean felt the wind knocked out of him all the same. There was
something about her, the way she stood, an angle of head
   it simply cried out:
sex
.

He hadn't expected that. For some reason, he
hadn't thought the same reaction would assail him now that had hit
him in his office on Monday. Dean drew in a deep, slow breath. He
could handle this, get past it. He could still prove that he was
not
just like his father.

Meanwhile Kelly took control of the crowd.
"Now, now," she called, raising her hands. "Calm yourselves,
girls."

"But you said you were ready," complained a
woman in a purple jogging suit.

"So blow him out," a redhead in shorts
recommended.

Dean frowned, peering to see what they were
talking about. A sheet cake was laid on the back of a car. Thanks
to the angle of the car's trunk he could see the orange-frosted
concoction was cut in the shape of a human figure. A single candle
was stuck in just the right place to create an anatomically correct
male figure.

The women in the parking lot laughed. A few
jumped up and down. "Blow!" came the cry. That's when understanding
finally hit Dean. His face went red.

Kelly, her attention on her comrades, was
shaking her head, smirking, and clearly milking the situation for
all it was worth.

"Blow! Blow! Blow!"

Kelly patted the air with her hands, then
drew in a deep breath and blew the candle out.

There were cheers and a few whistles.

"Now slice him up!" someone shouted.

"Bloodthirsty," Kelly scolded, but she had no
trouble accepting a huge kitchen knife that was handed her way.
Indeed, she lifted it high.

Dean couldn't help flinching when her blade
hit the cake man.

"And this one's yours." One of the women
picked up the piece with the candle still stuck in it.

Kelly bit the tip of her finger. "Oh no, I
couldn't."

"You already did," somebody called out.

There was ribald laughter and Dean felt a
pull down in his loins as Kelly accepted the proffered cake. She
eyed the half-melted candle. "It's true," she sighed. "The only
part of the fellow worth remembering."

Heat suffused Dean then; embarrassment, he
told himself. He moved, needing to make his presence known, even as
Kelly plucked the candle from the cake and tossed it, laughing,
over her shoulder.