The Wedding Bargain

Raif swallowed against the dryness that suddenly hit his throat. Undress her? Hell, he’d dreamed about this moment on and off since he was fifteen years old. He slammed the door on his wayward thoughts. This was neither the time nor the place to indulge in his fantasies, he informed himself firmly. She needed a friend right now, and that was what he’d be. Nothing more. Now and always, she didn’t want anything more from him—and he wasn’t going to set himself up for yet another rejection from her.

Shanal turned her back to him and lifted the swathe of her hair to one side. A waft of her fragrance, an intoxicating blend of spice and flowers, enticed him. Urged him to dip his head and inhale more deeply. He fought the impulse and breathed through his mouth. She wasn’t his to touch, or taste, or anything, he reminded himself.

She’d just run from her fiancé, and while every cell in his body was thrilled to bits about that—some cells more than others—he wasn’t the kind of guy to take advantage of it. Not out of any respect for Burton, because the man deserved nothing but his contempt. But for Shanal’s sake. Whatever had driven her to leave her wedding in the middle of the ceremony—and in the back of his mind he ached to know what it was that had triggered her last-minute change of heart—she was clearly shaken and upset. Unwanted attentions from a guy she’d rejected a dozen times over were the last thing she needed.

Raif took in a deep breath, then applied himself to his task. Shanal’s skin was a delicate bronze above the edge of her strapless dress. A color that signaled the mixed heritage of her Indian mother and Australian dad.

“I’m surprised you didn’t wear a sari,” Raif commented, determined to distract her from the fact that his fingers, usually dexterous and quite capable of the job at hand, had become uncharacteristically clumsy in the face of her proximity and the way that the tiny buttons, undone one by one, revealed more of her beautiful skin.

His fingers slipped on a button, brushing against her. Her skin peppered with goose bumps and he heard her gasp.

“Sorry,” he said, forcing himself to take more care.

“It’s okay,” she said, her voice a little husky. “And as to your question about the sari? Burton said he preferred me to dress more traditionally.”

Raif frowned and was unable to keep the irritation from his voice when he spoke. “Traditionally? For whom?”

Shanal didn’t answer his question. “I think I can manage the rest myself,” she said, stepping just slightly out of his reach and pressing her hands against the crystal-encrusted bodice of her gown to stop it from sliding farther down. “Thank you.”

“No problem. I’ll be down the hall getting changed myself. Just holler if you need me.”

Her pale eyes met his and he felt her trust in him as if it was a tangible thing. It was a surprisingly heady feeling. Shanal had always been so cool, so untouchable and in control. He’d never seen her this vulnerable, and the fact that she chose to put her trust in Raif when her guard was down... It meant a lot.

She gave him a small nod, then collected Cathleen’s clothes off the bed and turned to the bathroom. “I won’t be too long.”

“Take as long as you need,” he said, and left the room. In fact, take longer, he added silently. Because it sure as hell was going to take him a while to get his raging hormones under control.

Two

Shanal closed the bathroom door behind her and stripped away her wedding dress. Without caring about any possible damage to the delicate and expensive fabric, she let it drop to the floor. She shuddered. Right now she felt so cold, deep down into her bones.

She quickly tugged on the jeans and sucked her tummy in a little to do up the zipper. Cathleen’s curves were just a bit more subtle than her own and it showed in the cut of jeans that she favored. Too bad, Shanal thought as she slid her arms into the sleeves of the T-shirt and pulled it over her head. Beggars couldn’t be choosers. That final thought held a painful irony she didn’t want to think about right now. She had enough on her plate.

There was still an air of unreality about what she’d just done. In fact, she could barely believe she’d done it. Run away from everything—everyone.

Burton would be angry, she knew. Justifiably so? Very likely. They’d had an agreement, and if she’d learned anything about Burton Rogers it was that he couldn’t bear to be thwarted, not to mention being humiliated in front of a cathedral packed with his peers. She certainly wasn’t in any headspace to face that right now.

It wasn’t that she was worried he’d get physical with his rage—no, that would be beneath his dignity—but how did you explain to a man, especially one who on the surface was every woman’s dream, that you no longer wanted to be his bride? All she knew was that she couldn’t go through with it. She needed space—time to think, to form a strategy to overcome this situation she’d put herself into.

Another shudder ran through her and she felt her chest constrict anew. Her breathing became difficult again and she closed her eyes and focused on one breath in, one long breath out. When the tightness began to ease, she reached for the logical side of her brain. The one that had weighed the options of Burton’s offer of marriage so carefully and had accepted it, knowing she didn’t love him. The tension returned twofold. No, she couldn’t even think about it. She felt so close to the breaking point. The two people who now depended upon her most, her mum and her dad, would be beside themselves with worry. For her. For themselves. Her father’s medical expenses aside, in a few months they would be struggling to meet paying their utilities, let alone affording the basics like food.

Her decision to run away from Burton would affect them all.

She’d find a way around it. She had to. The alternative simply wasn’t an option. And maybe it wouldn’t be so bad, after all—maybe it was just her panicked mind that was making it seem worse than she thought. Right now, though, she needed distance. Distance and a healthy dose of perspective. Raif had offered her both unquestioningly.

But what was his angle? Was he doing this because he wanted to help her—or just because he wanted to hurt Burton? He’d come to see her at her parents’ home three months ago after her engagement had been announced. He hadn’t wasted time on niceties such as saying congratulations. He’d come straight to the point and said he was there to talk her out of marrying Burton. She’d told him the wedding would go ahead no matter what he had to say, and had very firmly asked him to leave, without hearing him out. She knew there was bad blood between him and Burton; she’d gotten the sense from what Burton had said that it had been some idiotic male rivalry over a woman. Whatever had happened, Raif had clearly carried a grudge, and she’d assumed that was what had motivated him to see her.

A deep and painful throbbing started behind her eyes. It was all too much to think about. Right now she felt as if she could simply crawl under the covers of the bed in the room next door and go to sleep for a week. Instead, she forced herself to move and put on a pair of socks and the shoes Cathleen had left behind.

When Shanal looked up into the mirror, her reflection was that of a stranger. She never usually wore this much makeup—hadn’t really wanted to, even today—but Burton had insisted she allow him to send along a makeup artist during her preparations on the morning of their special day. She’d acquiesced, thinking it didn’t matter, but as each layer of cosmetics had been applied she’d felt as if her true self was being hidden. As if pieces of her were being pushed further and further into obscurity.

Was that what it would be like being married to Burton? His decisions overriding hers and suffocating everything that defined her until her very identity was buried beneath what he wanted? She bent over the bathroom basin and scrubbed her face clean, desperate to grab that part of herself back again.

A knock at the door turned her mind willingly away from questions she couldn’t face and didn’t want to answer.

“You okay?” she heard Raif ask through the door.

No, she was not okay. Not right now. But she had to hope she would be. “You can come in,” she answered.

He did, and she noticed he’d changed into a pair of well-worn jeans that hugged his hips, and a navy sweater. The fisherman’s rib knit clung to his broad shoulders, making him look impossibly strong and masculine. As if he could take on the weight of the world and barely notice the strain. She certainly hoped that was the case, because at this moment she felt even closer to fracturing apart than she had half an hour ago.

“We should hit the road. I’ve loaded up a bag in the Jeep with some things for you. Clothes of mine you can borrow—y’know, track pants, sweaters and a thicker jacket than that one of Cathleen’s. They’ll be far too big for you, but at least you’ll be warm. We can stop somewhere and get you some underwear, toiletries and anything else you think of, on the way through.”

She nodded. It was such a relief to simply hand over her care to him. To have someone else do all the thinking for a change. Shanal followed him out of the room, not even sparing a glance for the mound of tulle that still lay on the bathroom floor.

“I need to call my parents,” she said as they reached the door to the garage. “To let them know I’m okay.”

“Already done,” Raif answered smoothly. “They send their love.”

Did they? Or did they send their recriminations, their fears for the future now that she’d dashed their only hope for a secure retirement? The financial settlement Burton had agreed to pay her on their marriage would never happen now—in fact, she probably wouldn’t even have a job after this.

“Are...are they all right?”

“They’re worried about you, but I assured them you’re being cared for.”

She swallowed a sob and murmured a response, but something in her tone made Raif whip his head around and study her carefully.

“It’ll be okay, Shanal. You did the right thing.”

But had she? Or had she simply destroyed not only her parents’ future, but her own, as well? Raif opened the passenger door of the Jeep for her to climb up before he walked around to the other side.

“Mac is stocking the houseboat with everything you’ll need for a week, at least,” Raif said as he settled in the driver’s seat and hit the remote for the garage door.

“I’ll pay you back, Raif. I promise,” she said brokenly.

“Don’t worry about that right now,” he replied. “Why don’t you put your seat back a bit and close your eyes. You look done in. Try and get a little sleep, huh?”

She did as he suggested, but found her mind was too active to sleep. Instead she listened as he called his younger brother, Cade, and arranged for him to collect the car that Raif had left parked near the church. Guilt sliced deep as she considered everything he had done for her so far today. And now he was going out of his way to drive her all the way to Mannum so she could take time out.

For someone she’d never exactly treated well, he seemed to be prepared to go to great lengths for her. Maybe it was just a measure of the man he was, she thought, as she heard him laughingly warn his sibling not to drive the Maserati too fast through the Adelaide hills on the way to his property. A man who, she had to admit to herself, she didn’t know very well at all. When he ended the call he turned on the radio, tuned to a classical-music station. She was surprised, thinking him more likely to be into popular music or rock than anything resembling culture.

But then again, what did she really know about him aside from the fact that he was her best friend’s cousin? Sure, he’d always been there when Ethan had invited her to attend family functions at The Masters. But Raif was three years younger than her and back when she’d met him, that three-year age gap between him at fifteen and her at eighteen going on nineteen had seemed huge. She’d mentally filed him away as a child, and had barely given him a second thought.

She’d recognized he had a crush on her early on, but had ignored it—and him, too, for the most part. He had been easy enough to ignore at first, especially since their paths didn’t cross all that often. When she thought of him even now, she tended to think of the child he had been. Shanal hadn’t really noticed when he’d left childhood behind for good.

Until now.

Until she’d realized the boy had most definitely grown into a man. A man she could depend upon when it seemed she had no other options available to her.

She opened her eyes and watched him as he drove, his concentration on the road ahead, his hands capable and sure on the wheel. He was a bit more leanly built than Ethan, but aside from that the family resemblance was strong. Just over six feet tall, with dark hair brushed back off his forehead and blue eyes that always seemed to notice far too much, Raif, like the rest of the Masters family had more than his fair share of good-looking DNA. Added to that was the perpetual tan he wore, a byproduct of his work outdoors on the vines that grew in the various vineyards run by The Masters. But even so, the differences were there if you looked hard enough. There was a suppressed energy about Raif, whereas his cousin was calm and measured in everything he did. Raif projected a more physical and active air.

There was no doubt he was a man who thrived on action and on thinking on his feet. His spontaneity was one of the reasons it had been so easy to continue thinking of him as the child he’d once been—impulsive and thoughtless, never considering the consequences. Today had been a perfect example of that. What was it that Ethan often said about Raif? Ah, yes, he was the kind of guy to always leap before he looked. Well, today she was truly thankful for that. Not at any stage had he asked her why she’d run from her wedding. He’d simply taken her away when she’d begged to be taken.

If it weren’t for him, she had no idea where she’d be or what she’d be doing. She was not the impulsive type, and never had been. Every choice was always meticulously planned and carefully considered. Until today. When she’d run out of that cathedral, she’d had no plan in mind, no destination in her sights. She’d just wanted to get away, with no thought for what would come next. Thank goodness Raif had run after her when he did. He might not be someone she thought of as a white knight, but he’d certainly come to her rescue. And the certainty that he had the situation in hand for the time being was enough to let her relax. For now, at least.

A steady rain began to fall and Raif switched on the windshield wipers. The rhythmic clack-swish of the blades across the glass was soothing and Shanal let her eyes close again, barely even aware that she was drifting off into sleep. When she awoke she found she was alone in the car. She struggled upright and rubbed her neck to ease the kinks out. Looking around, Shanal couldn’t identify exactly where they were, but she spotted Raif exiting a small grocery store across the road. As he got back in the car he tossed a plastic bag in her direction.

“I didn’t want to wake you so I guessed your size.”

She opened the sack and spied a six-pack of multicolored cotton panties and some ladies’ toiletries inside. A blush bloomed in her cheeks at the thought of him choosing her underwear, but she pushed it aside. She should be grateful he was being practical about things.

“Thanks, it looks like you guessed right. And thank you again for helping me today. I—I don’t know what I’d have done without you.”

Emotion threatened to swamp her, and she felt his warm strong fingers close over one of her hands. A surprising tingle of response made her pull away. He gave her a sharp look.

“No problem,” he said steadily. “Are you hungry yet?”

She should be enjoying the sumptuous repast that had been booked at the reception center. Her stomach twisted. She couldn’t think of anything less appealing.

“I’m okay for now. How about you?”

“I can wait,” he said calmly as he started up the Jeep and swung back onto the road.

“Are we far from the river?” she asked.

“About ten minutes.”

True to his word, they pulled up at a small marina a short while later. The rain had stopped, but there was a cool wind blowing, and Shanal wrapped her arms around herself as they got out of the vehicle. She should have grabbed that jacket of Cathleen’s back at the house.

“Here, put this on.”

She caught the down-filled jacket Raif tossed toward her from the back of the Jeep, and gratefully slid her arms inside. Instantly, she began to feel the warmth, almost as if he’d closed his arms around her and given her the comfort she so desperately craved today. She followed him in silence to the pier where a man waited for them.

“Mac, this is my friend Shanal.”

Mac nodded a grizzled head in her direction. “Come aboard, I’ll show you around.”

Shanal was surprised by the luxury of the fittings on board. The boat, apparently one of Mac’s smallest, boasted three bedrooms and was more spacious than the compact town house she’d rented back in Adelaide before having to move home to help her parents. In fact, the layout was similar, the only major differences being the helm positioned near the dining area of the boat’s large main entertainment cabin, and the fact they were floating on the river.

“You driven one of these before?” Mac asked.

“No, but I’m sure Raif will show me.”

“Better you get Mac to show you now,” Raif said. “You’ll need to know what to do when you’re out on the water.”

She noticed he didn’t make mention of “we.” Shanal turned troubled eyes to him and fresh panic clawed at her throat. “You’re not coming with me?”

* * *

“Give us a minute,” Raif said to Mac, before drawing Shanal onto the deck at the front of the boat.

He was shocked to feel her trembling beneath his touch. She’d appeared calmer after that nap she’d taken in the car, and some of the shell-shocked look in her eyes had faded, but it was back again now, with interest.

“Here,” he said, pulling out one of the iron chairs that matched the glass-topped dining table on the deck. “Sit down.”

He squatted in front of her, taking both her hands and chafing them between his. He was worried at how icy cold she felt to his touch.

“I thought you’d be coming, too. You’re not going to leave me, are you?” she whispered.

Raif studied her, taking in the blatant plea in her beautiful green eyes and the worried frown that pulled between her brows. He hadn’t planned to go with her. Honestly, it had never occurred to him that she’d want him there with her. All he’d done today was remove her from a bad situation and organize the escape she had wanted. He hadn’t imagined she’d have any use for him beyond that.

And yet everything he knew about who she was—how strong and intelligent, how confident and admired—seemed to crumble before his eyes as he looked at her now. He’d thought the houseboat would be the ideal opportunity for her to get away and to think—to get things straight in her mind again before she went back to face the music. Why would she want him there for that? Why would she want any man around her when she’d just left her intended groom at the altar?

Though this was a woman who, in his experience at least, had no qualms about publicly humiliating men. Witness his own embarrassment when, in front of his entire family, she’d laughingly spurned his attempts to ask her to his high school graduation dance all those years ago. The sting of embarrassment had hurt far more than he’d ever admitted. Granted, it wasn’t on par with what she’d done to Burton, but her method of making clear she wasn’t interested had a way of staying with a guy.

“I’m sorry,” she said, interrupting his thoughts. “I’m asking for more when you’ve already done so much for me. It’s just...” She worried at her lower lip with her teeth and her gaze slipped out over the river that stretched before them.

“It’s just?” he prompted.

“I don’t want to be alone,” she whispered, her words so quietly spoken.

The sudden vulnerability in her voice, hell, in her entire body, hit him fair and square in the solar plexus. Her slender fingers closed around his.

“You’ve already packed a bag,” she said in a lame attempt at humor before becoming all serious again. “Raif, please? I know this is a big favor for me to ask, but I really need to be with someone I can trust right now. Just while I work things out.”

She trusted him? Well, he wished he could say the feeling was mutual, but he certainly didn’t trust her. During the drive here he’d had more time to think. When he’d talked to her after her engagement, she’d been so adamant that the wedding would go ahead. He doubted that anything he’d tried to say back then had been the trigger to change her mind. She’d certainly never before given his thoughts or feelings any weight in the choices she’d made. So what had changed things for her? She had to be holding something back, perhaps the very something that had put the haunted look in her eyes.

He considered her plea, turning it over in his mind. He wasn’t prepared for this. Still, what harm would it do? Working the viticulture side of the family business certainly had its advantages come wintertime in that things definitely slowed down for him once he’d finished winter cane pruning on the vineyard. There was no other pressing business holding him at The Masters, nothing to prevent him from taking a week off work, if that’s the time it took for Shanal to ready herself to face the world again. Besides, there were three bedrooms on the boat.

Movement in the cabin caught his attention. Mac was getting fidgety, casting them a curious glance every now and then. Raif had to make a decision. Leave her to her own devices, or go with her. He knew what Ethan would do. More importantly, what Ethan would expect him to do.

Sometimes family honor was a bitch.

“Fine,” he said with a huff of breath. “I’ll come with you.”

Three

Relief swamped her and she put out her hands to grasp his.

“Thank you. I owe you so much already—”

Raif pulled away from her and stood up. “You don’t owe me anything.”

She felt his withdrawal as if it was a slap. She lifted a hand to her throat as she watched him go back inside the main cabin. God, she’d made such a mess of all this. Did he regret rescuing her today? She wouldn’t blame him if he did. It was one thing to whisk her away from the scene of her shattered future, quite another to continue on the journey with her. She was asking such a lot from him. And it wasn’t as if they’d ever been close.

Aware of his crush on her, she’d always made a point of keeping her distance, never doing anything to lead him on. She’d felt that in the long run, that was the kinder choice—though admittedly, that had been as much for her sake as for his. Ever since he’d transitioned from schoolboy to young man, there had been something about Raif that had made the hairs on the back of her neck stand to attention. Something indefinable that always put her on edge when he was around, and that made her uncomfortably aware of herself and her body’s reactions to him.

She’d told herself way back then that it was ridiculous. She had her whole life planned out, and someone like Raif had no place in it. He already had that devil-may-care attitude to life, while she was always quieter, more considered in her decisions. They’d had nothing in common whatsoever aside from Ethan as a link.

But that had been nearly a decade ago. A lot had changed, for both of them, since then. He’d become fully a man, and was now even more confident, more self-assured, with that air of entitlement and power that all the Masters men effortlessly exuded. And she? Well, she was still that nerd with her nose in her research, and she was no less discomfited by his presence than she’d ever been.