Do You Take This Rebel? (14 page)

“You’d better hope there are no paparazzi around,” he teased. “The tabloids would pay a fortune for this picture. You are not at your glamorous best.”

“If you only came over here to harass me and get in the way, you can leave,” she said, frowning at him. “Why anybody would insist on having a wedding in less than a week is beyond me.”

“We didn’t want a lot of hoopla,” he said defensively, aware that she must not know the whole story.

“Maybe you didn’t, but Cassie deserves a lot of hoopla, and, by golly, she’s going to have as much of it as we can pull off on short notice.”

Cole withstood the icy glint in her eyes and the barely concealed criticism. One of the things he’d always admired about Lauren and the others was their fierce loyalty to each other. He’d never had friends like that…except for Cassie. Somewhere along the way, through no fault of his own, he’d lost that. Among the regrets in his life, that one was right at the top of the list.

He sighed at the thought and went in search of his bride-to-be. He found her in the kitchen getting a manicure. Pink flooded her cheeks when he walked in, but Gina barely spared him a glance.

“You’re not supposed to be here,” she said, and went right on painting Cassie’s neatly filed nails a pale shade of pink.

Cassie cleared her throat. “Actually, he is. We’re supposed to talk to Jake, explain things.”

“Well, you can’t do it now,” Gina said briskly. “I’m not finished.” She waved Cole away. “Go in the
living room or out back and make yourself useful. I’ll let you know when she’s free.”

Cassie shrugged. “Better do as she says. I’ve given up fighting with them.”

Amused despite himself, he nodded. “Yes, I can see why it would be a waste of breath. Where’s Jake?”

“Hiding out in his room, if he’s smart,” she said dryly. “Lauren brought him a tuxedo.”

So that’s the way it was going to be, then, Cole concluded. They were going to make this wedding into a special occasion for Cassie’s sake, or die trying.

“I’ll look for him,” he said.

Alarm flared in Cassie’s eyes. “You won’t say anything, though, not till I can get up there?”

“No,” he promised. “I won’t say anything.”

He found Jake in his room, staring not at the computer screen as Cole had expected, but out the window at the frenzied activity down below. He glanced up when Cole came in, but his expression was bleak.

“Hey, kiddo,” Cole said, joining him at the window. “What’s up?”

“You and Mom are gonna get married today, right?”

“That’s right.” Something in Jake’s voice alerted him that the boy found the news troubling in some way. He studied him intently, then asked, “Is that okay with you?”

“I guess,” Jake said, then regarded Cole with a serious expression. “How come I didn’t know anything about it till practically the last minute?”

“That’s when we decided,” Cole said. “I thought you might be happy about it.”

He regarded Cole earnestly. “I think it’s pretty cool that you’re going to be around all the time,” he ad
mitted, then added, “but there’s something I don’t get.”

“What’s that?”

“Nobody seems really excited, not even Mom. In fact, she looks kinda sad.”

Cole winced. “I think maybe it’s just a little overwhelming,” he said. “It all happened so fast, and there was a lot to do.”

“But Grandma keeps crying. I heard her tell Mom that this was all her fault.” His brow puckered with a frown. “But I don’t know what that means. How can having a wedding be anybody’s fault?”

Cole put his hands on the boy’s shoulders and gave him a reassuring squeeze. “It’s just some grown-up stuff. It’s nothing for you to worry about, pal.”

“You love my mom, though, right? I mean that’s why you’re getting married, isn’t it?”

Cole closed his eyes against the tide of pain that that innocent question sent through him. There was no easy answer. A part of him, a part he had worked like the dickens to bury, did love Cassie.

“Yes,” he said, giving Jake the answer he needed to hear, even if it was only half-true, even if the whole truth was far more complicated. If he couldn’t understand it, how could this nine-year-old boy?

Jake nodded, looking relieved. “I thought so.” Suddenly he threw his arms around Cole and hugged him. “I can’t wait till we’re a real family.”

Cole sighed. Would the bond being formed a few hours from now ever be that clear and that simple?

“Cole, can I ask you something else?”

“Anything, pal.”

“Do you think maybe I could have a baby brother?
I guess it wouldn’t be my real brother, but almost, right? That would be so cool. I’d even take a sister.”

For the first time since he’d put this plan into motion, Cole realized the full ramifications. Jake, if no one else, was expecting a real marriage, complete with brothers and sisters. How in heaven’s name was he supposed to get around that? For the last week he’d been moving ahead with caution, taking one day at a time. Now with a single innocent question Jake had forced him to gaze into the future.

“I think maybe we’d better discuss that another time,” Cole said, aware that his voice sounded vaguely choked up. He cleared his throat. “It’s a little soon to be talking about babies.”

He heard Cassie’s muffled gasp and realized she had arrived just in time to hear his comment. Even out of context, she had obviously guessed the general direction of the conversation.

“It certainly is,” she said, stepping into the room and giving Cole a questioning look.

“Jake’s looking ahead.”

“Obviously.” She sat on the edge of the bed and beckoned her son over. “Sit with me. We want to talk to you.”

Jake went to her readily. “What about?”

“There’s something you need to know before Cole and I get married today.” Her gaze sought Cole’s and held. “A long time ago he and I were very good friends.”

“When you were kids, right?” Jake asked.

“Exactly. We were very young and for a long time we were just good friends, but then we fell in love.”

Jake’s eyes widened. “Really?”

“That’s right,” Cole said. “But then some things
happened and we were separated. I didn’t know that your mom was having a baby.”

“You mean me,” Jake guessed.

“Exactly.” He took a deep breath, then added, “I didn’t know that she was going to have my son.”

For a minute Cole’s words hung in the air. Jake looked from Cole to his mother and back again, a puzzled look on his face.

“Cole is your father,” Cassie explained quietly. “But he never knew that until a few weeks ago.”

Cole reached out to touch his son’s cheek, but pulled back before making contact. “Nothing could have made me happier, Jake. I am very proud that you’re my boy.”

Jake swallowed hard, clearly struggling to comprehend the announcement. “You’re my real dad?” he whispered at last. He looked at Cassie. “He is? For real?”

She nodded. “He really is.”

“Oh, wow,” Jake said, awestruck. “Then we really are gonna be a family. I’m gonna have my mom
and
my dad.” He bounced up. “Does Grandma know? I’ve gotta tell her.”

He raced out the door, then turned around and ran back, throwing himself at Cole before taking off again.

Cole met Cassie’s gaze and allowed himself a faint smile. “He seems to be taking it well.”

“You’ve just made his dream come true. He’s finally got his real dad in his life.”

But, gazing into her despondent eyes, Cole had to ask himself if the price he and Cassie were paying for uniting Jake’s family was too high.

T
he ceremony went off without a hitch. Cassie actually managed to say her vows around the lump in her throat. She hadn’t been able to meet Cole’s gaze, though. It would have been too hard to look in his eyes and not see the love shining there that every bride had a right to expect on her wedding day. Just thinking about what was lacking had her blinking back tears as the minister pronounced them man and wife.

Then there was that awkward moment when Pastor Kirkland had announced that Cole could kiss the bride. She had stood there waiting, panicked that he would refuse and embarrass them both. But finally he had lowered his head and touched his lips to hers. It hadn’t been a passionate kiss, but it had lingered, and there had been heat in it, more than she’d had any right to expect.

Her friends made every effort to pretend that this
was a perfectly normal wedding. Lauren had outdone herself to turn the garden into a perfect setting. She had had exotic flowers flown in, along with a designer wedding dress. Cassie had almost wept when she’d seen the delicate lace and organza confection. Never in her wildest dreams had she ever imagined wearing such a gown.

But then, never in her wildest dreams had she imagined a wedding day that was such a sham.

Not that anyone was acknowledging that. Everyone was painfully polite, determinedly upbeat. Frank Davis was acting as if he’d been looking forward to Cassie’s marriage to his son for years. Her mother’s tears could be dismissed as typical of the mother of the bride. If her proud smile seemed a little forced, no one commented on it. And exhilarated by the discovery that Cole was his real father, Jake scooted from one guest to another to share that incredible news.

Meanwhile, her friends were offering up toasts with French champagne and snapping pictures as she and Cole cut the gorgeous three-tiered wedding cake that Lauren had had flown in from Beverly Hills along with the caterer himself. The man had moaned when he’d seen her mother’s kitchen, then gone to work whipping up the most amazing hors d’oeuvres under Gina’s watchful gaze. Though Gina grumbled at not being allowed to do the job herself, Cassie noted that she seemed happy enough taking surreptitious notes on the recipes. It was the first interest she’d shown in anything related to her restaurant business since arriving in Winding River weeks ago.

Studying the small gathering, Cassie concluded that everyone except the bride and groom seemed to be having a blast. They were all happily caught up in the
illusion of happily-ever-after that weddings always evoked.

When she could stand it no longer, she went looking for her new husband. She found him all alone on the front porch, an untouched glass of champagne dangling from his fingers and an unreadable expression on his handsome face.

“Quite a day,” he said without looking up when she joined him.

“It was a dream wedding,” she said, unable to keep the wistful note out of her voice. If only the bride and groom had been happy, she thought.

“Yeah, too bad it was such a farce, huh?”

Hearing him voice it hurt as badly as being a part of the subterfuge. Some part of her had obviously been hoping against hope that the occasion, or maybe the wedding vows themselves, would soften his attitude, that he would want all of this to be real.

“I need to get out of here,” she said stiffly. “I don’t think I can bear it for another second.”

“Anxious for your wedding night?” he taunted.

She swallowed hard and fought tears. “Hardly.” In fact, she hadn’t anticipated a wedding night at all. She was positive that Cole intended this to be a marriage in name only, if only to punish her. Maybe even to punish himself for being foolish enough to marry her.

He glanced at her. “I’ve arranged for you to have your own suite at the hotel until we decide what we’re going to do,” he said, confirming her guess and stripping away any lingering hope she might have harbored that it would be otherwise.

She stared at him blankly. “What we’re going to do?” she repeated. “What does that mean?”

“Whether we’re going to leave Winding River,” he
explained. “I can set up shop in California or anywhere else, for that matter.”

The explanation—the very prospect of leaving—was too much. The thought of running away once more, essentially in disgrace—even if she was the only one who understood that—was overwhelming. She bounced off the swing.

“I am not leaving here,” she said, scowling down at him. “I’ve gone along with everything you wanted, but not that.”

He didn’t seem the least bit disconcerted or distressed by her vehemence. “I just thought it might be easier to start fresh in a new place, where no one knows our history. We’d be just like any other couple who’s grown apart. No one would know we’d never really been together in the first place.”

“No, Cole,” she said, standing up to him on this as she hadn’t on anything else. “We did this to give Jake a family. That means a whole family, including your father and my mother.”

“Heaven help the kid,” he said grimly, but he nodded. “Okay, then, we stay. You can start looking for a house tomorrow.”

“I gather you don’t want to live at the Double D?”

“Not a chance.”

She breathed a sigh of relief. The prospect of living under Frank Davis’s thumb had been daunting. Maybe she and Cole would have half a chance to work things out if they were on their own.

“In town? Or would you prefer a ranch?” she asked.

“Not a ranch,” he said at once. “Though buying some property outside of town and building would be okay. That way we’ll get exactly what we want, a place with plenty of room.”

So they would barely have to speak, much less spend time together? she wondered. How had it come to this? How could there be such a terrible distance between two people who had once shared everything? Of course, the answer was plain enough. She was responsible. She had no one to blame but herself for destroying the trust that they had once felt.

“Building would take time,” she pointed out, even though her imagination was already at work on all the possibilities. She wondered if he even remembered that once upon a time they had spun their fantasies about what their dream house would look like. It had been spacious but cozy, with lots of fireplaces, overstuffed furniture and a king-size bed for the two of them. That bed had been the centerpiece of all their daydreams. Her cheeks burned at the memory. Now there would be separate beds, separate rooms, if Cole had his way.

“We have the time,” he said, his gaze locked with hers.

For a heartbeat she thought she saw affection, at least, in his eyes, maybe a promise that as the weeks and months passed, they would work things out.

Then he had to go and ruin it by lifting his champagne glass and adding in a sarcastic tone, “After all, isn’t this the first day of the rest of our lives?”

Deliberate cruelty had never been in Cole’s nature. As he heard himself taunting Cassie repeatedly on their wedding day, he wondered if this new pattern of behavior was tapping into an uncontrollable dark side of him, a side far too much like his father in the early days after his mother’s death. He hated the hurt that darkened her eyes, hated that he was responsible, but
once his bitterness had been unleashed, he hadn’t been able to stop.

Cassie’s mother had insisted on keeping Jake with her for a few days while Cole and Cassie settled into married life. Obviously, she was determined to keep up the charade that this was a real marriage. And because he cared about her, had always cared about her, he let her have her illusions. He even went so far as to take Cassie’s hand as they ran to the car that her friends had decorated with painted slogans and strings of empty cans.

At the hotel, though, he left Cassie at the door to her adjoining suite, then retreated to the bar, where he nursed a drink and his dark thoughts for hours.

This was the part he hadn’t considered when he’d made his impulsive decision to marry her rather than fight her for custody of his son. He hadn’t imagined what it would be like to know that Cassie was upstairs, dressed in something slinky and sexy, perhaps, wondering if there was to be a real wedding night. He hadn’t thought ahead to how it would feel to know that she was his wife, that legally, at least, they were bound together.

He muttered a harsh expletive and tossed some money on the bar, then headed upstairs. Until he reached the door to his own room, he’d thought he was going to bed—alone. But that image of Cassie wearing lace wouldn’t quit, and his body didn’t seem to understand that she was the enemy, the betrayer.

He took a few steps toward her door, then backtracked to his own, then cursed himself for a fool. He went back to hers and hammered on it.

“Yes?”

Her voice was muffled and sleepy and so damn sexy it made his blood roar.

“It’s me,” he said tightly.

She opened the door and destroyed his illusions. She was wearing an oversize T-shirt that skimmed her knees. Her hair was rumpled, her cheeks streaked with dried tears, her eyes filled with distress. All the same, she was so blasted desirable it made him ache.

If she’d been waiting for him, though, she had long since given up. Cole raked a hand through his hair and bit back another curse.

Still, she was his wife now…if he dared to claim her. He thought about it, then sighed, defeated by his own conscience.

“Sorry,” he mumbled. “I thought you might be awake.”

“I was until a few minutes ago,” she said. “Do you want to come in?”

“No,” he said, then, “Yes.”

A faint smile touched her lips, then faded. “Can’t make up your mind?”

“I shouldn’t be here.”

“Why not? We
are
married. I have a paper that says so.”

“Yeah, but we both know…” His voice trailed off.

“What? That it’s not real?”

He nodded. What amazed him right now, though, was that it felt real, even though it wasn’t supposed to. He wanted her. He wanted all the things they had once talked about…a future, a family, a home. He wanted to make love to Cassie Collins Davis and prove that she was finally his.

He gazed into her eyes, saw the little spark of desire, caught the way her lips parted as if she was about to
speak…or about to welcome his kiss. He steeled himself against his own traitorous desire and took a step back.

“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have disturbed you,” he said stiffly.

“Cole—”

“No, Cassie. I am not coming in there.” He said it as if she were the one who’d set out to tempt him, rather than take responsibility for his own actions in coming to her door.

“Then why are you here?”

“I wish to God I knew.”

She nodded at that. The hope that had been in her eyes dimmed, then died. Her expression hardened. “Then do me a favor,” she said quietly. “Don’t come back until you do.”

He wanted to argue that she was his wife and that he’d damn well come and go as he pleased, but what was the point? She was right. He had no business being here, not unless he was willing to forgive and forget, and he was far from ready to do that. He wasn’t sure he would
ever
be able to do that.

But as he turned and walked away, as he heard the whisper of her sigh as the door clicked shut behind him, he wondered if he hadn’t just consigned them both—not just her, but the two of them—to a life of pure hell.

Cassie hadn’t thought it was possible to be any more miserable than she had been waiting for Cole to decide what he wanted from her, but she’d been wrong. This so-called marriage was worse. Much worse.

To be so close to a man she loved and know that he didn’t trust her, that, in fact, he all but hated her, was
sheer torment. Whatever hope she had felt when he’d held her in his arms just a few short weeks ago at the reunion dance was gone. The hunger and heat stirred by his touch was little more than cold ashes now. All of it had been lost due to her years of deceit.

The day after the wedding she got up, got dressed and waited for some sign from Cole of what he expected. When he hadn’t come by nine, she ordered breakfast in her room. She was tempted to change clothes and go to work, but Stella would have been appalled, and tongues all over town would have wagged. Cassie felt the same way about going to church. To arrive alone on the morning after her wedding would have stirred all sorts of comment.

By noon, though, she was going stir-crazy. Grabbing her keys, she went downstairs, got in her car and headed for Karen’s. If ever there was a time to be with her best friends, this was it.

She found all four Calamity Janes seated around the kitchen table debating the merits of various gourmet coffees. Well, Lauren and Gina were debating them, anyway. Karen and Emma were exchanging amused looks. All of them looked up, clearly startled, as Cassie walked in.

“Any of that coffee left for me?” she asked as if her arrival was nothing out of the ordinary. “And I don’t care what kind it is, as long as it’s strong.”

Karen jumped up, pulled out a chair for her and poured the coffee, as the others simply stared.

“Stop it,” Cassie ordered. “I haven’t grown two heads overnight, have I?”

“It’s just a surprise,” Gina began cautiously. “You got married yesterday. I thought—we all thought…”

“Well, you thought wrong,” she said succinctly.

“Where’s Cole?”

Cassie shrugged. “Beats me. I haven’t seen him since last night.”

Emma scowled. “The man walked out on you right after your wedding night?”

“Only in the loosest interpretation of that,” Cassie said mildly. “Technically there was no wedding night. And he never walked in, much less out.”

Gina clasped her hand. “Explain,” she ordered. “Then we can go strangle him.”

Cassie opened her mouth, but the words wouldn’t come. Instead, all the hurt and humiliation bubbled up from deep inside. Great choking sobs emerged, taking her and the rest of them by surprise.

For an instant her friends just sat there. Then they were all around her, patting her back, handing her tissues and describing Cole in such unflattering terms that eventually even Cassie began to smile.

“He is not meaner and uglier than a hound dog,” she said, sniffing. “That’s the trouble. I’m only getting what I deserve.”