Special Order Groom

“So tell me what you’re looking for in a man,” Mitch said.

“You must be picky to have remained unmarried in Lover’s Valley, where marriage is practically in the air everyone breathes and sung to babies in their cradles.”

Crystal’s hands went to her hips. “I know what you’re hinting at—that I never got over you—and it’s simply not true.”

“Do you want to know why I never married?” Mitch asked, his grin teasing.

“No.” She turned her back as if to leave. Her curiosity was burning, but she’d have stuck a pin in her eye before admitting it.

“I’ve thought about you a lot,” he said softly.

Her heart froze. “You have not,” she said weakly.

“I have. How could I forget you?”

She couldn’t stand it any longer. “Why didn’t you show up that night?” she asked in an anguished whisper. “What was it?”

“I can’t tell you,” he said. “The story isn’t mine to reveal….”

Special Order Groom

Tina Leonard

www.millsandboon.co.uk

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Tina Leonard loves to laugh, which is one of the many reasons she loves writing Harlequin American Romance books. In another lifetime, Tina thought she would be single and an east coast fashion buyer forever. The unexpected happened when Tina met Tim again after many years—she hadn’t seen him since they’d attended school together from first through eighth grade. They married, and now Tina keeps a close eye on her school-age children’s friends! Lisa and Dean keep their mother busy with soccer, gymnastics and horseback riding. They are proud of their mom’s “kissy books” and eagerly help her any way they can. Tina hopes that readers will enjoy the love of family she writes about in her books. A reviewer once wrote, “Leonard has a wonderful sense of the ridiculous,” which Tina loved so much she wants it for her epitaph. Right now, however, she’s focusing on her wonderful life and writing a lot more romance!

You are cordially invited to a surprise wedding!

Bess, Martin and Elle Jennings are pleased to finally announce the marriage of Crystal Star Jennings to Mitch McStern Saturday at noon in the school gymnasium.

Please keep the secret from the bride and groom.

Fireworks to follow.

Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter One

“All I’m saying is that you’d rather have people think you’re a lesbian than go out with a man in Lover’s Valley, Texas,” Bess Taylor declared to her daughter.

“Probably,” Crystal sighed as she stuck another pin into the skirt of a bridal gown. “Mother, can you come up with some new lines, please? Just because I haven’t dated in a while is no reason anyone would wonder if I’ve changed my sexual preference.”

“It’s not normal,” Aunt Elle mentioned in her soft voice. “It’s not normal that you don’t have someone in your life, Crystal.”

“Why? Why is it not normal? I have a busy life. I run a bridal salon. I’m busy dressing brides every day of the week. Why is that not normal?” She glared at the contingent of two women and one uncle who were grouped around the dressmaker’s dummy, pleading with her to change her bachelorette ways.

Every day in her salon, she saw how tense, how stressed brides were. If anything, she had less interest than ever in jumping into one of her own beautiful gowns. In fact, she’d pretty much lost interest in men as a subspecies when her high school sweetheart, Mitch McStern, dumped her the night of the prom to go with Kathryn “the Prom Queen” Vincent. If the right man came along, she would regain interest, she was positive. He just hadn’t arrived.

She shook her head, perplexed. “Why?” she asked them again. “Why am I not normal?”

“Because you’re dressing brides but you don’t get married yourself,” Uncle Martin stated.

“Oh, and if I were a mortuary owner, I wouldn’t be normal unless I died. Then I would be experienced, right?”

Aunt Elle touched her shoulder. “We want you to be happy. You can’t go on living other people’s dreams forever. We think you should go away for a while, Crystal. Let us run the business for you.”

“Go find a man, honey,” her mother joined in. “He’s out there somewhere.”

“I doubt it. And even if he was, I’m sure I wouldn’t run into him.” She hadn’t enjoyed the pain of being left for another woman. Or left at all. She’d learned fast from that one experience. “I’m happy. Why can’t you three see that?”

She stared up at her family. They loved her, they really did. Why couldn’t they see that she didn’t need a man to feel complete?

“I’m getting old, Crystal,” her mother began.

“Please don’t start playing that harp. You’ve been playing it since I was twenty-five.”

“And I’ve been more than patient! You’re going to be thirty tomorrow! What next? Forty?”

Crystal tried not to smile at her mother’s horrified tone. “Look, Mom, if it was that easy, I’d get married just to make you happy. But it’s not. Great guys just don’t grow on trees, okay?”

“They’re all happy.” Uncle Martin pointed out the window. “See all those couples walking along, enjoying a June summer day in Lover’s Valley, the closest thing to God’s country?”

Crystal was slowly losing command of her serene posture. “I do. But they’re not me! If it was that simple, if I could just reach out the door and grab an eligible male, don’t you think I would?” She wouldn’t, but she wanted to win the argument and send her relatives home so she could finish the last-minute alterations on a dress for a bride who’d enjoyed marital relations a little too soon and now couldn’t be shoehorned into her gown.

“You might not do it, but I would!” Aunt Elle cried, her normally soft voice growing loud with daring. “I’d reach out the door and grab the first man I could if you’d just agree to go out on a date with him, Crystal Star Jennings! I can’t bear the thought of you being a wallflower all your life.”

“Well, then go ahead,” Crystal said through gritted teeth. “But don’t blame me if the guy you grab is connected to a furious wife. I’ll swear I had nothing to do with it. I have a weapon, and I’ll protect myself.” She brandished the pin cushion, which cuffed her wrist.

“Go ahead,” Bess urged. “She said she’d go out with any single male you pulled in. It’s just like fishing, sister. Catch us a big one!”

“All right! I will!” Aunt Elle got to her feet. Uncle Martin held the door open and Bess held Elle by the back of her summer dress so she could lean far out into the path of pedestrians—and latched onto the first male sleeve in reach of her fingertips, pulling it with all her might into the bridal salon.

Crystal’s jaw dropped when Elle reeled in her catch, a six-foot-two, ebony-haired, bedroom-blue-eyed hunk…of Mitch McStern. “Not you again!” she exclaimed, wishing with all her might Aunt Elle’s delicate fingers hadn’t been so dastardly.

“Hi, Crystal,” Mitch said.

“Turn him loose, Aunt Elle,” Crystal snapped.

“You said you’d go—” Bess began.

“I know what I said. I don’t have to fall in with a silly prank. A setup.” She turned her back, stuffed the closed sign up in the window and refused to look at any of them. “You can all leave now.” She heard feet shuffling, but didn’t turn around.

Mitch cleared his throat. “They’ve gone. It’s just me, Crystal.”

She told her heart not to beat so fast. She begged her blood not to rush through her veins. With all her will, she pleaded with her ears not to hear the wonderful, heartbreaking baritone of the voice she hadn’t heard in thirteen years.

It was no use.

He was probably married. Heaven only knew, he probably had crowns in every tooth, maybe even six children and no less than two extra inches on his waistline, but she’d never gotten over him.

Never.

Chapter Two

“At the risk of appearing obvious,” Crystal said to Mitch, “the store is closed.”

He knew as well as she did that it was only closed to him. “Please don’t throw me out on my ear, Crystal.”

The years had left little trace of the girl he’d wanted to dance the night away with at the high school prom. This Crystal was taller, probably five-nine in her stockings if she removed the navy pumps she wore. Her hair was pulled into a serviceable bun-thing, with two red Chinese sticks impaled in the back of the thick honey-blond hair. She might have been trying to give an impression of competence, with her summer dress of navy and white print covering her knees, but wisps of hair had defied the torture of the sticks and escaped, framing her sweet heart-shaped face.

She couldn’t fool him. Soft, delicate Crystal was hidden beneath that practical, no-nonsense veneer.

“I have nothing to say to you,” she said.

Her brittle voice could match ice for hardness. “Can I ever make it up to you for not showing up that night?”

“No. You cannot.” She drew a deep breath. “Mitch, it might have just been a silly dance to you, but I looked forward to it from the moment you asked me. The crush I had on you was immature, possibly, but it was innocent and deep. Never in my wildest dreams did I imagine you would leave me waiting at home, first sitting upstairs waiting eagerly for the doorbell to ring, then peeking surreptitiously out the window, straining to see if you were walking out your front door.” She shuddered, her hand tracing over the wedding gown she’d been pinning. “Silly me, I thought you’d had an accident. A flat tire, or worse, a wreck, on the way home from school. But I believed you were coming.” She met his gaze now, her hazel eyes full of remembered pain, before she drew herself upright. “Of course, life does goes on. No need to rehash the past. But I’m certain you can see why I’d prefer not to spend an afternoon of auld lang syne.”

“There was a reason,” he said softly.

“Which I have no interest in hearing, years after you left me high and dry for Kathryn. I heard you looked very handsome when you were crowned king that night, and that she was a very beautiful queen. One can only assume you realized you had a better chance of racking up that win with someone other than me.” Opening the door of the salon, she gestured for Mitch to exit. “I wish Aunt Elle hadn’t pulled you in the door, because I’d forgotten about you. It’s up to me to send you back out.”

There was little he could do. She didn’t want him around, and he couldn’t blame her. His heart tugged, a cruel, painful sensation. He had actually come here hoping to talk to her. Aunt Elle’s magical fingers wresting him inside had seemed like too kind a fate.

He moved outside onto the sidewalk. She stared at him, her cheeks pink spots in her pale face. Her eyes were huge and her full lips trembled. He remembered quite clearly how those lips felt against his, though he’d been so unskilled at kissing he probably hadn’t tapped the vein of pleasure kissing Crystal could offer. They’d been young, and those kisses had been earnest and affectionate and sweetly loving.

“Crystal,” he said haltingly, “the night before the prom, when we—”

“Don’t say it!” Her voice came out in an agonized gasp. “Don’t you dare mention that night! If I never see you again, my fondest wish will come true!”

And then she closed the door of the bridal shop.

TRAITOR! HE’D BEEN ABOUT to mention the one thing she’d never told anyone, never would tell anyone. Crystal’s heart beat wildly, despite the hand she’d thrown against her chest to calm herself. She could only pray he’d never told anyone about the wistful night of discovery they’d spent in a field, far from prying eyes.

She had loved him so much. Maybe it had been the flush and fury of first love, but all her soul had been behind her giving him the gift of her innocence. She’d thought Mitch would be hers forever.

Nothing was forever. That lesson had been learned the hard way, and it was one she wouldn’t forget, no matter how handsome the man Mitch had become. He’d branded her, in some mysterious way she’d never understood—and her heart was still his.

The last thing she wanted was for him to discover that unfortunate fact. It was simply too humiliating to have given herself to a man who’d never thought about her again after he’d—

The mortifying words echoed in her mind before she could stop them. Gotten what he’d wanted.

She stiffened. That night of secret loving had happened years ago. She wasn’t prisoner to such mortifying memories now. Her life was full. She’d moved past what had followed, her utter despair and the quiet sorrow of her family as they’d tried everything they could to heal her broken heart.

She’d gone off to college and received a business degree. Then she’d opened her own store and dedicated herself to making sure that other women’s dreams came true, just the way they had always imagined them. She understood the notions of the foolish, lovestruck heart better than anyone.

And if she closed herself up in her tiny red brick cottage at night and sometimes thought about her youthful lover as she sat with her five cats, three dogs, pair of lovebirds and a teacup, well, that was no one’s business but hers.

She was happy with her life, and she was going to stay that way.

“EGADS, ELLE, YOU COULDN’T have done that any worse if you’d rigged it,” Martin said. The three dejected family members sat in the dining room of the family home.

Elle’s dainty shoulders crumpled with apology. “My goodness,” she murmured faintly. “Who would have thought he’d be standing outside?”

Bess’s lips folded. “We are in hot water with Crystal, you can be sure of that. Why, she looked stunned, rooted to the floor, the same way she looked the night he didn’t—”

“Sh!” Elle commanded on a moan. “I simply can’t bear thinking about that horrible night. Why, my princess in her pretty gown, and that cad not having the decency to…well, I guess it’s murky water under the bridge. The brigand.”

“It was, until today,” Martin said woefully. “Wonder what they said to each other?”

“I doubt Crystal let him say very much at all. As is perfectly appropriate, I suppose.” She sounded uncertain. “If I weren’t so shocked to see that scamp, I’d have…I’d…”

“You’d what?” Martin said, sitting up to tap his pipe.

“It’s curious that he’s back in Lover’s Valley,” Elle interrupted, her voice thin and high with hope. “Do you suppose he was outside the store for a reason?”

“Like buying a dress? I shouldn’t think he was the shopping type,” Bess stated flatly.

“But what if he knew Crystal owned the Lover’s Valley Bridal Boutique? How could he not know? His parents would have told him. Any of his high school jock friends would have told him,” Elle said excitedly. “Anybody might have mentioned it.”

“Even if he’d decided to try to explain for the prom night that didn’t happen,” Martin cut in, “his words would fall on deaf ears, so we need not speculate on that. Far better for us to concentrate on how we’re going to get ourselves out of the doghouse with Crystal.”

“You’re right.” Bess nodded, though a glimmer of hope had been doused in her soul. “As unmotherly as this may sound, on the eve of my daughter’s thirtieth birthday, I would almost be willing to forgive Mitch if he…”

Elle’s blue eyes were huge behind her silver-rimmed spectacles perching on her delicate face. “If he what?”

Possibly she was abnormal. Certainly she didn’t wish her daughter any further pain. Quite the opposite! She wanted her to experience the joy of happily-ever-after.

Unfortunately, she and everybody else in this room knew that Mitch wasn’t the man to unlock her daughter from her self-imposed ivory tower. “Never mind,” she said sadly. “At least we’ve planned something special for Crystal.”

“We’ve never given her a surprise party before. It should be a lively occasion,” Elle said. “I expect to see Crystal smiling then. And maybe she’ll forgive us for the shock our meddling gave her today!”

Their hopeful smiles faded as they remembered the undisguised panic on Crystal’s face when Mitch had landed among them.

“Or maybe not,” Bess said.

Chapter Three

Mitch hadn’t known what to expect yesterday upon seeing Crystal. As he’d stood on the pavement, trying to gather his wits to go in and offer a long-overdue apology, he’d tried to imagine what she looked like. If she’d changed at all. How she’d come to open a wedding boutique when she’d dreamed of medical school.

He’d attended med school, and become a surgeon in Dallas. Anything that needed removing or suturing, he could fix with skill. Not broken hearts or shattered souls, his or anyone else’s. His work was the physical.

Crystal’s appeared to be the stuff of dreams.

Yet, she seemed to studiously avoid any pretense of the romantic herself. No one who had a hot date after work dressed like she did. Gone was the giggly girl who’d loved faded blue jeans and glittery fingernail polish.

The Crystal he’d just met was professional. Not about to let her hair down. Refined. He’d once thought her name suited her, because she glowed with an inner warmth that sent prisms of color dancing over the otherwise plain surfaces around her. In her mother’s house, there was a crystal chandelier that sunlight had touched in the afternoons as they sat in the parlor talking about nothing more than rainbow prisms and future dreams. Crystal had been warm and colorful, like those prisms.

Now she was beautiful and icy and without color. Crystal without light.

He fully remembered how much fire she’d once possessed. He wanted a chance to warm her again.

But he was not in a position right now to even dream of warming Crystal. He had troubles of his own right now—which was why he was taking a breather here in Lover’s Valley.

Mitch swallowed, grabbing at the invitation that sat before him on the table at his parents’ home, where he was staying a few nights as he tried to sort out a family dilemma. His parents lived across the street from the home where Crystal had grown up. She no longer lived there, of course, but Martin, Bess and Elle would never give up the family seat. It was a stately two-story white building, with columns out front that spoke of Southern gentility. People in Lover’s Valley wondered why two sisters and a brother still held on to a house that was too big for them to keep up and that would bring them a pile of money should they decide to sell. Real estate in this neighborhood had skyrocketed, due to the wonderful architecture and enormous lots.

When his family moved into town his senior year, he’d fallen immediately head over heels for the girl across the street. She was always in motion, having girlfriends over and boys pick her up in their cars.

He’d decided right then and there that location was everything, and he was in a prime position to win Crystal’s heart. He had, the same way he helped the football team or the debate team win, using his determination and his charm to win, convince and score.

She’d been so much more than a score. His lips pressed together tightly as he remembered the way moving into her tight body had felt. Heaven and hell all at once. Pain and pleasure in agonizing extremes. The most beautiful thing he’d ever experienced in his life.

To this day he treasured their fumbling, tender joining.

This invitation to Crystal’s party tonight, which had his parents’ names on it, would not include him. Mitch knew that too well. Bess would think it rude to hold a party in her house without inviting his parents. All the parked cars and noise in front of their houses would strain a relationship everyone was eager to keep as neighborly as possible. Their families had remained cautious friends, mostly because no one knew of the night of passion Crystal and Mitch had shared.

His name was not on the invitation, because no one had expected him to be in Lover’s Valley. Even if they had, he would have only been invited because of Bess’s good manners. It was a surprise party, and the worst possible surprise he could give Crystal was to show up on her birthday.

Still, he could send a small token of the esteem in which he’d always held her.

BESS, ELLE AND MARTIN could hardly sit still as they waited for Crystal to arrive. After she was safely in their care, Martin would spirit her off on a convenient “errand,” which would take up thirty minutes. This would give the guests time to be greeted and then hidden in the decorated great room. When Crystal and Martin returned, wouldn’t she have a nice surprise waiting for her?

Tonight, everything was going to go smooth as velvet. “I’m edgy,” Bess announced, as if her brother and sister couldn’t tell by her pacing.

“I just hope Crystal shows up.” Elle fretted, patting her hair as she stared into a sideboard mirror. “I worry about her deciding to work late or some other foolishness.”

“Since she may be slightly put out with us from yesterday, perhaps I should call down to the shop,” Martin suggested.

“Maybe so.” Bess peered out the upstairs window at the street. “Call her, Martin. Make sure she hasn’t forgotten that we invited her over for a ‘family birthday dinner.”’

They shared a nervous glance.

“I believe I will. No reason to leave anything to chance, or to Crystal’s work ethics.” Martin went to the rotary phone that sat atop an old rolltop desk in the hallway. He dialed the number swiftly, then listened for a few moments. “She’s not picking up. Maybe she’s gone home to feed her pet menagerie before coming over.”

“You don’t think they’ll bring him, do you?” Elle murmured from her place at the window. Without realizing it, she’d been staring at the McStern place ever since they’d gone upstairs to keep their vision trained on the street for Crystal’s appearance.

“I should think not!” Bess stated. “It would be impolite to do that to Crystal on her birthday. Besides, I doubt he would want to come. I’m sure they had very little to say to each other yesterday. And why should he invite himself tonight when he didn’t bother to show up for the big night?”

“I don’t know.” Elle sighed, shaking her head. “It worries me that Crystal may believe we knew Mitch was staying at his folks and told him to pay her a call at the shop.”

Bess straightened, as if a two-by-four had gone up the back of her dress. “I may be a nosy neighbor, I may be a bit of a well-meaning busybody, but I would never hurt my daughter. Surely she knows that.”

“We were pretty overbearing in her shop,” Elle reminded her, “as we primed the pump for tonight so she’d give extra consideration to all the handsome, eligible men we invited.”

“Yes, but we never suspected…you’re right,” Bess said suddenly. “Maybe that’s why she’s not here. She’s angry with us because she thinks we set her up by sending Mitch down there.”

“Well, she has every right to be.” Martin put the phone down and took a seat on a cushioned chair in the hallway. “Crystal most probably suspects we were matchmaking. Which we were, just not with our neighbor in mind. We had no way of knowing he’d be in town, and even if we had known…”

He trailed off. Bess thought that was a minor dilemma they’d been spared. “Oh, dear, what a quandary!” She paced for a moment before snapping her fingers. “If Mitch shows up tonight, which would be the height of ill manners, we will endeavor to keep them apart. There are enough rooms in this house to achieve that.”