Wild Irish (Book 1 of the Weldon Series) (3 page)

"No," Nan grabbed Alexi's shoulder. "No, don’t turn this on yourself. I don’t think you’re blind, but I do think you wanted to please your family so much that you didn't notice some things about Roger and yourself that you should have."

Alexi bit her lip, trying not to cry over Roger. He wasn't the man she thought he was, and he wasn't worth wasting Kleenex on. "I have a few things to say to Roger."

"Okay. You know I’m here if you need me."

"I know." Alexi headed directly to the groom's tent. Her attentive groom who always opened doors, sent flowers and chocolates for every occasion, held a responsible, prestigious position in his family’s bank, and carried a lily white reputation on his sterling heritage. Who could have known the family's silver was so tarnished? More like corroded.

An easy breeze laced with the salt of the sea tried to cool her cheeks, but she didn’t want calm. She wanted to scream.

Trust? Friendship? She was nothing but a fool. She reached Roger’s tent and gulped in air, bracing herself to face him as she brushed tears from her eyes. Inside, Roger stood, adjusting his bow tie in front of a mirror. She marched toward him, waving the pictures.

“
How could you do this?” She threw a picture at him. "You’re despicable!” Tears fell against her will as she looked hard at the man she’d been about to marry. Without the backdrop of her rosy assumptions, he looked weak, as if he wouldn’t be able to stand, were it not for the starch of his tux.

Roger snatched up the picture. "Where did you get these?" He had the decency to flush a deep red, but there was no remorse in his eyes. There was no “I’m sorry. I made a mistake." But then, there were no words that could take away the hurt.

All the scathing remarks on the tip of her tongue vanished. They weren't worth the breath she'd waste to say them. With a few deft jerks, she tore the train emblazoned with the Holstead’s family crest from her gown and threw it at him. “You aren't worth the dirt on its hem.”

“
Wait, Alexi. We need to talk. Work this out.”

“
Never." As she left, the long flow of her veil caught on tent’s support pole. She slid the veil’s cap off her upswept hair and jerked hard on the resilient net. The pole gave way and the tent collapsed on top of Roger. She could still hear his muffled yells three tents over when she came face to face with her grandmother's cast iron frown.

"Alexandria Jordan! What is the meaning of this, dear?" Katherine Jordan's reign in Savannah's society had never had the least blemish of scandal attached to it. This was a scandal.

"Roger is a philandering jerk. The wedding is off." Alexi fisted her hands, forcing calmness. Ladies didn't scream.

Katherine Jordan didn't even blink with surprise as she handed Alexi an old-fashioned laced handkerchief. Lowering her voice, Katherine patted Alexi’s shoulder. "Men
do
that, dear. Your grandfather wandered like a country road. Now go back to your tent and I'll fix this disaster. You don't allow emotions to dictate the wellbeing of your family, your position in society, or your wealth. My goodness, I thought I'd taught you better. Merging the Jordan shipping empire with the Holstead's banking assets is insurance that both families need during these troubling economic times. Just make sure you get diamonds for his indiscretions and everything will work out all right."

Alexi stared, shocked. “Diamonds for indiscretions!”

“
Yes, dear. There isn’t a woman in Savannah who doesn’t envy my collection.”

Alexi’s mind reeled. Her grandmother had an extensive diamond collection. What Alexi had thought beautiful suddenly became nauseating. “I'll never settle for that in life.”

"Dear, there are things that are more important than your feelings, like your heritage and financial well-being. I’ll explain to the guests that you are ill, and a private ceremony will take place at a later time. We’ll fix this problem and the scandal will soon die out.”

“
Scandal! Money! Heritage! That’s all you care about?” Alexi had never realized how irrational her grandmother was when it came to her position in Savannah’s society. Katherine Jordan was ready to sacrifice anything for it.

“
By knowing what’s important, I’ve kept the Jordan wealth intact and our name without blemish.”

Alexi shook her head, seeing her life in a whole new light. Tears flooded her eyes. “I’m not willing to pay that price.”

“
There she is!”

She looked to see a blur of reporters zooming her way and turned in the opposite direction, hoping to escape in the maze of tents. Word of the wedding's cancellation was out, and she had no interest in facing reporters now.

"Alexandria, you can’t do this!" her grandmother cried.

It was the first time in her life that Alexi heard her grandmother yell. Apparently, despite what she’d been told all her life, ladies did scream after all. That was good to know. Stiffening her shoulders, she marched through the park, a frenzy of flashbulbs and questions trailing behind her. She wanted to run, but she had too much training and pride to let them see her hurt. Up ahead a band was busily unloading equipment to play in one of the reception tents for her wedding.

Her grandmother's insensitivity hurt as badly as Roger's betrayal. For the first time in her life, she didn’t want to be Alexandria Jordan. She didn’t want to have a place in society. And more than anything else, she didn’t want to be the kind of person that ended up with a man like Roger.

Diamonds for indiscretions. Was that the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow she’d been chasing all of her life? She looked up toward heaven and it started to rain.

* * *

Stripping off and tossing his shirt aside because he felt a spider crawling on him, Jesse Weldon brushed off his back and then moved passed the speakers he'd delivered to his brother Jackson when he heard a loud commotion in the park. Jackson's band would be playing in one of the entertainment tents for the Jordan-Holstead wedding. The day had started out sunny, but intermittent rain showers were quickly turning it into a downer. Stepping out into the rain to see what the ruckus was about, he had to shake his head and blink twice.

Damn. What was the bride doing marching through the rain and the grass in her wedding dress instead of walking down the aisle like she was supposed to be?

Hell. He knew the second his brother Jackson had asked him to bring the forgotten speakers that it would be a mistake. Ever since he'd learned Alexi was getting married, he’d told himself that after today he could wipe her out of his mind. Once she married, he could forget her, her made-for-kissing mouth, and move back home without being tempted to see her, without having to revisit the wrenching past.

Apparently, she’d decided not to marry after all. He ducked out of sight, despising the relief stealing through him.

Fisting his hands, he forced his erupting emotions back into the neat box he’d built around them over the past twelve years. He didn’t care what her problem was. This time, he wasn’t going to rush to the rescue. This time, Savannah’s reigning royal princess, the pampered darling of one of Georgia’s oldest moneyed families, could save herself.

The Weldons had always been considered dirt beneath people like the Jordan’s feet. He’d learned the hard way that by fair means or foul, people like the Jordans would keep it that way.

Half hidden by hanging gray tendrils of Spanish moss burdening a sprawling oak tree, he watched Lexi’s stiff walk, thinking it poetically ironic that she was dressed to the nines just like she'd been dressed the last time she went running.

Reporters, like hounds after a fox, followed her as she marched his way. Damn, he tried to look away, but couldn’t keep his gaze from drinking in the visage of beauty bearing down on him. The seventeen-year old girl had become a woman worth more than a passing glance. Hell, even a two hour movie of her wouldn’t be enough and he couldn’t put his finger as to the reason why. She wasn't Cosmopolitan material. Alexi was slender, almost frail. No Pamela Anderson curves were hidden beneath her satin dress. Was it her regal bearing? The porcelain quality of her skin? Or her sexy mouth that still played in his dreams. His blood rushed and his chest tightened, making him remember all too well his want of her and her betrayal of him.
You’re a fool, Weldon
.

Eight years in the army, mostly in Special Forces, and building a highly specialized security company hadn’t left much time for leisure. He could count on three fingers the number of times he’d been back to Savannah, and this was the first he'd seen of her since the night he'd been railroaded by her family.

He should have stayed away, he thought, stepping deeper into the shadows as she drew nearer. He saw she was wearing the damn pearls. Of course she would, it was her day to wear the cursed things. He’d never forget what she and those pearls had cost him. Reporters, like sharks in a feeding frenzy, snapped pictures and yelled questions. Alexi ignored them all. He had to admire that, he thought, his jaw clenching in protest.

Where she was going
?

He knew what it was like to be shark bait and Alexi was sailing through the water with her head held high, but even through the light rain he could see she was bleeding inside as she drew abreast of him. Tears streamed down her face and her full lips trembled. She stumbled and reached for something to break her fall, but only grasped air.

Shit. He rushed forward and caught her arm before she hit the ground, his instinct towards her stronger than his will.

"Oh!" She turned and surprise washed over her face. She breathed his name, as if he were an answer to a prayer. “Jesse.”

Hell, she still looked too damn innocent and vulnerable for his good. Twelve years and she still had the power to get under his skin even though he knew how deadly she could be. Maybe it was time to turn the tables, collect on what he missed and wipe her from his mind. She couldn’t be as good as he remembered her being.

Alexi blinked as heat invaded the chill that had stolen through her since she’d seen the pictures of Roger. She tingled as she looked at the rugged face and chiseled chest of the man who'd just saved her from falling. Half a day’s dark stubble covered his rough jaw; and his deep sea-blue eyes, crinkled at the corners from the sun, warily assessed her then stared at her mouth. Tension oozed from him. She had no trouble connecting the man to the wild devil who'd led her astray years ago then broke her heart.

Small towns had their good side and bad side of the tracks, and the wild Weldon boys had been known a time or two to paint their side a bit blacker. Jesse’s reputation had been the worst. She hadn’t believed that until he'd used her to steal from her family. Over the years, she’d heard from Jesse's mother Emma, who worked at the hospital, about Jesse’s stellar military career and security business in Washington D.C. Knowing he’d turned his life around made her glad, but didn’t ease the hurt he’d left behind.
“Still a virgin on the run after all these years, Lexi?” he drawled. His voice, as steamy and seductive as Southern summer day, challenged her on an elemental level, a sensual one.

"Almost," Alexi said, letting the last illicit picture she had of Roger fall from her grasp to the ground. She'd only ever been with Roger and
he
didn't count. Not anymore. She sucked in air, latching onto Jesse’s appeal. The reporters encircled them. Jesse lifted his hot gaze to her eyes and smiled.

"Almost?" Slow and sexual, his grin spread awareness through her. "Sounds frustrating. Interested in changing that?" He ran his finger under her chin and she caught her breath.

Yes, some part deep inside her shouted. Yes, she wanted to change that. Here was one situation her grandmother couldn’t smooth over with a lie. With the cameras rolling, Roger and her grandmother would get a clear picture that Alexi meant it when she said she wasn’t marrying Roger ever.

“
Yes,” Alexi said to Jesse, stepping closer to him. Waves of his sex appeal washed over her. Waves she had no trouble remembering, though she'd only been seventeen when she'd last dipped into them. His nearness and touch sparked something inside of her that wanted to rebel against everything that had just happened to her. “Kiss me,” she demanded, loudly.

Jesse arched his brow and asked softly, "What’s your game Lexi?” He slid an arm around her and pulled her flush to his bare chest, her breasts to his smooth, hard muscle. Then his mouth covered hers. She gasped at the desire shooting through her as his demanding tongue entered her mouth and his gaze dared her to respond.

She wound her arms around his neck, pressed closer to him, and met his tongue with hers. Surprise that she’d taken him up on his challenge filled his eyes and he hesitated, but only for a moment before he delivered a four-alarm kiss. He bent her back over his arm, inserted his leg between hers and had one hand cupping her bottom, no doubt knocking the socks off the gossip hounds surrounding them. In one kiss Jesse thoroughly ravished her from the inside out and she burned for more. By trying to deliver a message to her grandmother, Alexi wondered what message had she delivered to herself instead.

Jesse ended the kiss, but kept her captive in his embrace as he stared into her eyes. She ran her fingers into the silk of his hair and then surprised herself by kissing him again. His heat chased away the chill Roger had left inside her and she couldn’t seem to get enough of it. He groaned then and deepened the kiss. Her hands clung to his broad shoulders, feeling the heat of his bare skin and the strength of his muscled torso. The cameras continued to flash and the world swirled crazily around her as her heart pounded hard at the line she crossed by embracing a half-naked Jesse so intimately in public.