One Winter Wedding

“No need. Sara’s catering our workday. Her word, not mine,” Lisa laughed as she grabbed Trey’s arm and led him toward the door.

“Man, I wanted pizza and beer. Sara’ll probably bring mini quiches and crudités.” As the two of them walked outside, the laughter and casual camaraderie went with them, leaving behind a tension that for Kelsey buzzed as loudly as the fluorescent light overhead.

Ready to take the offensive, she turned to Connor. What apology did he want to give? What explanation? Her lips parted on those questions, but he beat her to the punch.

“How many of your friends are working Emily’s wedding?”

Just like that, momentum changed, and Connor had her backpedaling and on the defensive. “Lisa and I went to high school together, and I’ve made friends with some of the other people I’ve worked with. But I never would have hired them if I didn’t think they’d do an awesome job.”

She lifted her chin, ready to battle for her friends the same way she had when she hired them for Emily’s wedding. But if this was a fight, Connor didn’t play fair.

Reaching up, he tucked a loose curl behind one ear. His eyes glowing with a warmth that stole the fight from her spirit and the breath from her lungs, he murmured, “It wasn’t a criticism. Only an observation. Your friends obviously care a lot about you. Just like you care about them.”

Intensity lit his emerald eyes, and Kelsey could almost believe he wanted her to look out for him, to care about him—but that had to be a delusion due to lack of oxygen from the breath he’d stolen with his nearness. “I do,” she managed to murmur.

“So why was it so hard for you to accept their help?”

She started to deny it, but when Connor’s eyebrows rose in challenge, she knew he wouldn’t believe anything but the truth. And maybe if she told him, he would understand why Emily’s wedding was so important. “Fixing things is what I do. It’s what I’m good at. I wasn’t brought up as one of the wealthy Wilsons. I was raised by my mother. We didn’t have much, but growing up I didn’t know that. All I knew was that I had an amazing mother who taught me how to cook delicious meals without spending more than a few dollars and how to clip coupons to make the most of what little money we had.”

A memory came to mind, and Kelsey smiled. “Our favorite day was Black Friday, but we didn’t just shop for Christmas. We bargain-hunted for the whole year. My mom taught me how to look at secondhand furniture and see beyond the layers of flaking paint or rust. She showed me how to strip away the exterior to the natural beauty beneath.”

Her smile faded away. “But then she died, and I came to live with my aunt and uncle. None of the things I knew how to do mattered anymore. Coupons and discount stores and secondhand furniture were as foreign to them as paying hundreds of dollars for a pair of shoes was to me. They had people to shop and clean and fix things.” Kelsey gave a short, sad laugh. “The only thing broken in their house was me. I know they cared about me, but…I just didn’t fit, no matter how hard I tried.”

“Kelsey.” The low murmur of Connor’s voice mirrored the tenderness in his gaze. This time it was Kelsey’s turn to pull away, to try to escape.

“That’s why the wedding is so important. It’s my chance—” her only chance, because if she screwed this up, why would the Wilsons or anyone trust her again? “—to prove that I can do this, that I’m good at something. So I really hope your gut’s wrong, Connor, and that Todd is everything my family thinks he is. Or all this hard work is going to be for nothing.”

“It won’t be for nothing because you’re going to be a success with or without Emily’s wedding. Maybe if you were more like Emily or Aileen, more used to everything going your way, you’d be more likely to give up. But a single setback won’t stop you. You’re stronger than that.” Catching her hands and smiling at the streaks of spackle marring her skin, he said, “You aren’t afraid of hard work.”

Strong…unafraid… Kelsey liked the sound of that, but she wasn’t feeling the least bit of either as Connor stroked his thumbs across the palm of her hands. She felt downright weak and terrified by the desire coursing through her at such a simple touch.

Her fingertips tingled, tempted to chart the planes and angles of his face, the strong column of his throat. The broad shoulders and wide chest covered by cotton as soft as Connor’s body was strong. But she curled her hands into fists. She wouldn’t—couldn’t—reach out to him again. The embarrassment of Connor pulling away was too painfully fresh in her mind, and her heart was too vulnerable to risk rejection a second time.

In the end, she didn’t have to reach out; she didn’t even have to move. It was Connor who pulled her closer, Connor who lowered his head, Connor who brushed his mouth against hers. Any thought of him pulling away disappeared as he deepened the kiss. He buried one hand in her hair and wrapped the other around her waist, holding her body tight to his, as if she were the one who might back away.

But escape was the last thing Kelsey wanted.

Instead she wanted to capture this moment, bottle it up, save it for a time when memories were all she would have left of Connor. But even that proved impossible, as he slanted his mouth over hers, his lips and tongue stealing her breath, robbing her of her ability to think, and leaving her with no choice but to feel…

Her breasts against the hard wall of his chest, her heart pounding desperately enough to match the rapid beat of his, the firm press of his fingers against her hip. She splayed her fingers across his back, searching out as much contact as possible, the material thin enough, soft enough, heated enough, that she could imagine his naked skin and the play of muscles beneath her hands.

“Connor.” His name escaped her on a breathless sigh as he trailed a kiss across her cheek to her jaw, his warm breath setting off a chain reaction of shivers down her spine. She swayed closer, her hips brushing against his solid thigh. The heated contact weakened her knees, and all she wanted was to sink to the floor, pull Connor down with her and feel the weight of his body on top of hers.

She might have done just that if not for the ring of the bell and an embarrassed “Oops. Pretend I was never here.”

Kelsey tore away from Connor in time to see her friend Sara backing out of the door with a platter of food in her hands. She wanted to call Sara back, but it was too late, leaving Kelsey with little choice but to face Connor. With his eyes dark with passion, his chest rising and falling, it was all she could do not to dive back into his arms.

Two seconds ago an interruption was the last thing she wanted. But now with passion clearing, she realized it was exactly what she needed. Already Connor was going to her head; it wouldn’t take much for him to go straight to her heart. “That, um, was Sara. I should ask her to come back inside.”

Her friends were waiting, her dreams were waiting and she didn’t dare push them aside. Not even for Connor. No matter how much she wanted to.

Hours later, Connor looked around Kelsey’s shop, amazed by the transformation. The scent of paint filled the shop, and the soft pink and green colors highlighted the walls. The carpets had been shampooed, and the new rug and drapes stored in the back would soon complete the new look. Kelsey’s self-proclaimed talent for stripping away the layers and revealing the beauty beneath was on magnificent display in all the work she’d done.

How could she possibly doubt her own worth, her own ability? Connor wondered…until he tried to imagine Emily—or heaven forbid, Charlene—dressed in a T-shirt and cutoffs, with their hair covered by a bandana, a streak of pale pink war paint on one cheek and spackle on the other. None of the other Wilson women would be caught dead looking the way Kelsey did right then. Yet seeing her eyes sparkle as she laughed with her friends, celebrated every small success and worked her ass off, Connor didn’t think he’d ever seen a woman look as vibrant, as alive, as sexy, as Kelsey.

As if feeling the heat of his gaze, Kelsey glanced his way. Heat flared in her cheeks, and she ducked her head, taking a sudden interest in flipping through the phone directory, cell phone in hand as she searched for a plumber.

A phone call to her uncle, and her plumbing problems would have been solved. Hell, a single call to Gordon Wilson and all her problems would have been solved. Gordon could have easily set up Kelsey in a furnished, upscale Scottsdale or Paradise Valley suite instead of a work-in-progress strip mall in downtown Glendale.

He’d meant every word when he called Kelsey strong and fearless. She’d been only sixteen when she went to live with her aunt and uncle, an age when most kids would have lost themselves in a world filled with wealth and privilege. But not Kelsey. She’d stayed true to herself, to the lessons her mother had taught her. Even now, when her family’s money could make her dream an instant success, Kelsey refused to take the easy way out…not like he had.

He’d had his reasons for taking the money Gordon Wilson had offered him to leave town all those years ago, reasons he believed justified his actions, but he couldn’t help thinking that had Kelsey faced the same choice, she would have found another way.

She flat-out amazed him. He would have liked to ignore the emotion spilling through him, but Connor had learned his lesson when it came to ignoring feelings…even if this one wasn’t hitting his gut as much as it was pulling at his heart.

“Place looks great, doesn’t it?”

The sudden question jerked Connor from his thoughts, and he turned to face Lisa. Judging by the woman’s sharp gaze, he doubted Kelsey’s shop was on the woman’s mind. “It does. You, Trey and Sara were a huge help,” he added.

Kelsey’s friends had thrown themselves into helping, Trey especially. But despite the close eye Connor kept on the other man, he hadn’t seen any proof Trey and Kelsey were anything other than friends. And yet Trey’s touchy-feely familiarity had set Connor’s teeth on edge. A reaction as unfamiliar as it was uncomfortable.

He rarely felt possessive over a woman, and certainly not after a kiss or two. But then again, what a kiss! He could still taste her, could smell the cinnamon and spice he’d come to associate with Kelsey. No too-sweet floral scents for her. Nothing expensive, nothing fancy, just…Kelsey.

“You weren’t too bad yourself,” Lisa said with enough tongue-in-cheek attitude to make Connor wonder if she’d noticed how he strove to outlift, outwork, outdo Trey. Turning serious, she said, “We’re all glad to help Kelsey. She’s the kind of friend who always takes care of everyone else. This is the first chance we’ve had to pay her back.”

“I doubt she expects payment.”

“She doesn’t. It’s in her nature to help.” The brunette paused, and Connor sensed her debating over her next words. “I think a lot of it comes from taking care of her mom.”

“Kelsey told me her mother died when she was sixteen.” But despite what she’d told him, Connor knew he had only part of the story. Why had Kelsey’s mother—Gordon Wilson’s sister—raised Kelsey on her own? Single mom or not, she should have had the family fortune at her disposal, and yet that clearly hadn’t been the case.

What had caused the rift between Kelsey’s mother and her family? And what about the father Kelsey never mentioned? Connor didn’t ask Lisa those questions. It was up to Kelsey to offer answers…if he asked her.

With a glance at her watch, Lisa told him she had to go, but she left with a few final words he translated into a warning. “Kelsey’s a great girl. She deserves the best.”

Connor waited for the woman to add that Kelsey deserved better than him, but when she merely gazed at him in expectation, he realized Lisa wasn’t telling him Kelsey deserved better than him; she was telling him Kelsey deserved the best from him.

“Well, I finally found a plumber who can come this week…” Kelsey’s voice trailed off as she walked from the back room, cell phone in hand.

Connor stood alone in the middle of the shop. Even with the progress they’d made, bringing her dream closer to reality, he overwhelmed the place. If anything, the shop’s increasingly feminine decor only served as a larger reminder of Connor’s masculinity. And after that kiss, Kelsey didn’t have any doubt whatsoever about his undeniable and—she was beginning to fear—irresistible masculinity.

“Lisa had to take off,” he explained.

“Oh. She was probably afraid I’d put her to work again if she didn’t sneak away.”

“I don’t think so. Your friends will obviously do anything for you.”

Uncomfortable with the praise, Kelsey countered, “Like Javy would for you.”

Connor frowned. “Yeah. He thinks he owes me, but the truth is, his family bailed me out when I was a kid. Nothing I’ve done would be enough to repay them.”

Despite the explanation he’d promised earlier, Connor’s voluntary statement caught Kelsey off guard, surprising her almost as much as his kiss. She shook her head and protested, “Just because I spilled my guts doesn’t mean you have to—”

“I want to,” he interrupted. “I should have told you about my past last night, but I haven’t told anyone since Señora Delgado pried it out of me as a kid.”

“You—you didn’t tell anyone?” Kelsey prodded.

You didn’t tell Emily?

His penetrating gaze read into the heart of her question, hearing what she hadn’t asked, and he vowed, “I didn’t tell anyone.”

And suddenly Kelsey wasn’t sure she wanted to know. Listening to what he had to say seemed to take on a greater significance because Connor wanted to tell her, to confide in her, something he’d never told Emily.

Without saying another word, Connor stepped forward, his long strides erasing the distance between them. He caught her hand and led her over to the love seat her friends had surprised her with. She’d been overwhelmed by their generosity. The sofa would be the perfect place for her soon-to-be-married couples to sit side by side and decide floral arrangements, wedding invitations, dinner menus.

But as soon as Connor sank down onto the love seat, she decided it would be the perfect place for her to curl up in his arms, the perfect place to kiss him and never stop. The masculine-feminine contrast sent a slow roll of awareness through her stomach as he settled back against the rose-covered cushions. In faded cotton and rough worn denim, he should have looked out of place; instead, his broad shoulders and wide chest looked far more comfortable and inviting than the floral chintz ever could.

Swallowing, she folded onto the couch beside him, one leg bent and angled toward Connor. He stared straight ahead, keeping his silence, and Kelsey sensed his thoughts drifting back to a past he’d purposely chosen not to face…until now.

Taking a deep breath, he said, “My father was a truck driver. Eighteen-wheeler. He worked hard, drank hard. He was…strict.”

The tension in Connor’s shoulders and the way his hands tightened into fists gave a clear definition of the word. Her heart ached for the boy he’d been, a boy she could picture so easily. Dark hair that was too long, a body that was too skinny, and a gaze that was too old. She could see him in her mind as if, somehow, he’d been there all along.

Crazy, she thought, but she felt she knew him so well. And now that Connor was willing to give out answers, did she dare ask more questions? Could she risk getting to know him even better?

In the end, no matter the potential danger to her heart, Kelsey had to ask. Not because she needed to hear the story…but because Connor needed to tell it. “And your mother?” she asked softly.

One by one his fingers unclenched then slowly laced together as if cradling something precious. “She was a dreamer. She was always…looking for something. Always hoping for a better life, only she never found it. I was eight when she died. She’d been taking art lessons, or maybe it was a dance class. I can’t remember.”

Connor cleared his throat. “Anyway, this place wasn’t in the best part of town. I begged her not to go. I knew something bad was going to happen. But she went anyway. No one knows exactly what happened,” he added, the tension pulling at his shoulders revealing how much not knowing still troubled him, “but the police figured a mugging went wrong. Either my mom fought back or the guy panicked, and the gun went off.”

“Oh, Connor, I’m so sorry.” Just as she feared, her heart ached a little more at the telling, and she longed to reach out to him, to comfort him. But she didn’t. This time it was her turn to twist her fingers together, strangling the desire to touch him.

Because—despite his kiss—she still feared her touch wasn’t the one Connor wanted.

But he never told Emily about his family. He’s telling you! Aching or not, her heart had the strength to argue, and Kelsey felt her resistance crumbling.

“The guy stole her purse and wallet,” Connor went on as if she hadn’t spoken. “It took three days before the police figured out who she was.”

“Didn’t your dad report her missing?”

“He was on a long-distance drive. He didn’t know anything was wrong.”

“But when your mother didn’t come home, someone must have tried to get hold of him. The people you were staying with—” As soon as she said the words, realization flooded Kelsey and her breath caught. “You were alone, weren’t you?”

“My mom thought I was old enough to take care of myself, and it should have only been for a few hours.”

Hours that had stretched into days.

“Wasn’t there anyone you could call? A friend of the family?”

“Probably, but hell, I was eight. My mom had told me she was going to be right back. Calling someone would have been like admitting something was wrong, admitting she wasn’t coming back. Ever.”

Kelsey felt heartsick at the thought of the frightened, abandoned boy Connor had been. “You were so young. How did you get on without her?”

“My dad and I stumbled along, but he always blamed my mom for dying. If she’d been happy with her life, if she hadn’t always been out looking for more and expecting something better, she’d still be alive. If she’d just listened to me. I could have—”

Saved her. Connor didn’t say the words, but they rang in the silence and underscored everything he did. “It’s not your fault, Connor,” she insisted, and this time she couldn’t keep from reaching out and grasping his hands as if she could somehow heal the pain and guilt with her touch. “People make their own decisions, and you aren’t responsible for their choices.”

“No, only for my own,” he agreed darkly, but tension tightened his hands into rock-hard fists.

Her family was so wrong about Connor. He wasn’t out to ruin Emily’s wedding—he was trying to save her from a past he couldn’t possibly change. But Kelsey still wasn’t convinced Todd was the threat Connor thought him to be. After all, Connor’s gut reaction had pinned Matt to the restaurant, mistakenly seeing her ex-boyfriend as a physical threat. Wasn’t it possible Todd was as harmless as Matt, and Connor was looking through the eyes of the past and seeing a danger that wasn’t there?

“I can’t imagine what that must have been like to lose your mother so suddenly.” So violently. “But don’t you think maybe that’s colored the way you see people?”

“People like Dunworthy?” he asked with a wry twist to his lips. He pulled his hands out from beneath hers in the pretense of shifting to face her on the love seat. “I know you think I’m wrong about him, but it’s because of my past that I’m sure I’m right.” As if sensing her doubt, he asked, “Haven’t you ever met someone and instantly known the kind of person they are?”

Thoughts of her first impression of Connor assailed Kelsey. The bad boy. The troublemaker. The man out to ruin Emily’s wedding and destroy Kelsey’s chance to prove herself to her family, to make her mother proud…But he was so much more than that.

“Maybe once or twice.”

“Like when you met me?”

One corner of his mouth kicked up with the teasing comment, but the smile lacked full-force charm, his heart not in it. The emotional waters had gotten too deep, and Connor was clearly pulling back to shallower depths. And Kelsey almost wished she had stayed on the surface, wished she could still see Connor the way he wanted to be seen—cocky, self-confident, unbreakable. But she felt herself going under, caught by the pull of this man who was so much more than the rebel he played.

Struggling to break free, she focused on the easy out Connor had taken and followed him to more solid ground. “I knew you were going to be trouble the moment I met you. Does that count?”

“Talk about biased,” he murmured. “How many Connor McClane stories have you heard over the years?”

“More than a few.”

“More than a few hundred, if your aunt and uncle had anything to say about it.” The teasing tone stayed in his voice, but Kelsey could tell her family’s poor opinion of him still rankled. He was clearly out to prove the Wilsons wrong, but Kelsey suspected he had as much to prove to himself. “And here I’ve been a perfect gentleman.”

“Well, not perfect,” she argued. But who wanted perfect? Perfect was for women like her cousins; Kelsey much preferred the real thing to Ken-like perfection.

“I’m crushed. Señora Delgado will be so disappointed.”

“Señora Delgado?”

“Javy’s mother.”

“How did you and Javy meet?”

“We went to school together. Mrs. Brown’s sixth-grade glass.”

“And you two became fast friends?”

“Nah, we hated each other. I can’t even remember why. Oh, wait, it had something to do with a girl. We thought we were pretty hot stuff on the playground. Both trying to impressAlicia Martin. Unfortunately for us, she had a thing for older men.”

“Eighth grader?” Kelsey guessed, playing along to maintain the teasing mood.

“Worse. P.E. teacher. And man, the guy was old. Like twenty-five. Anyway, we bonded over a couple of cafeteria juice boxes, and I started hanging out with him at his mother’s restaurant. Before long, I was washing dishes and bussing tables. If the Delgados hadn’t fed me through most of junior high and high school, I don’t know what I would have done. Probably would have dropped out to work full-time if Maria hadn’t stopped me.”

Kelsey knew the drop-out rate was horrible, especially in Arizona, but as much as she’d hated school, she never once considered not finishing. “How did she stop you?”

“By telling me I should,” Connor said wryly. “She said anyone foolish enough to give up a free education didn’t deserve one.”

Smiling at the woman’s use of reverse psychology, Kelsey said, “I think I’d like to meet her. Not every woman has enough influence to keep a boy in school and teach him to clear dishes off a table.”

“You’re on. Let’s go to the Delgados’ restaurant. Maybe Maria will be there.”

Kelsey swallowed. Was Connor asking her out? On a date? She waited for the little voice in her head to tell her this was a bad idea, but she didn’t hear it. Possibly because it was drowned out by the big voice screaming, “Go for it!”

She knew the voice of reason would be back, loud and clear, and ready to say “I told you so” if she let herself fall for Connor. But that worry, like the voice, seemed far off, and she couldn’t resist the chance to spend more time with Connor.

“I’m a mess,” she said in weak protest. “I can’t go anywhere looking like this.”

As Connor’s gaze swept over her, Kelsey felt her face heat. She could only imagine what he saw. She had spackle under her nails, drywall dust in her hair, and more splotches of paint than freckles covering her arms. She was sweaty and disheveled, and even though Connor had worked as hard as anyone, he looked—

Gorgeous, she thought with a sigh, taking in the lock of dark hair he’d constantly pushed back from his paint-streaked forehead, the hint of five o’clock shadow shading his jaw, the damp T-shirt that molded to his shoulders and chest.