Czytaj książkę: «Fugitive Bride»

Chapter One

The afternoon was perfect for a wedding, currently sunny and mild, with no hint of rain in the forecast until after the ceremony. Staring out the bride’s room window at the blooming dogwood trees that lined the church lawn, Tara Bentley had the urge to check her to-do list to see if “achieve a perfect day” was somewhere on the page.

Everything she had so meticulously planned had fallen into place with ease. Her dress fit perfectly. The white tulip bouquet brought out the delicate floral pattern of the lace in her veil. Her wavy hair had, for once, cooperated when the hairdresser straightened it and twisted it into a sleek chignon low at the back of her head, where the snowy veil provided a striking contrast. And she was ten minutes ahead of schedule, which gave Tara a few moments to simply breathe and think about what came next.

Robert. He came next. Robert James Mallory III, successful lawyer and all-around Mr. Perfect. Literally.

Two years ago, as her midtwenties suddenly became her almost-thirties, Tara had written out her list of perfect traits for a potential mate. It hadn’t been a particularly long list—she might be hyperorganized and prone to overpreparing, but she wasn’t a robot. People weren’t ever really perfect, so her list included only things that would be deal breakers.

Things like honesty. Hard work. Respect for her mind. Ambition. And, okay, a few bonus wishes, like a man who was good-looking, fit and amusing.

Three dates with Robert Mallory, and Tara knew she’d met the man who ticked off every item on her checklist. Now she was less than an hour from marrying him.

“I’m so happy,” she told the green-eyed woman who stared back at her in the full-length mirror by the vanity table.

Her reflection looked skeptical.

Dang it.

She turned away from the mirror and sat on the small vanity bench, taking care not to wrinkle her wedding dress. Without planning it, she snaked out her hand and snagged the cell phone lying next to her makeup bag. She gave the lock screen a quick swipe and hit the first number on her speed dial.

A familiar, growly voice answered on the second ring, his soft drawl as warm as a fuzzy blanket on a cold Kentucky night. “Shouldn’t you be practicing your vows?”

“Owen, am I making a mistake?”

Owen Stiles was quiet for a second. When he spoke again, the lightness of his earlier tone had disappeared. “What’s happened?”

The serious tone of his voice made her stomach hurt. What was she doing, dragging poor Owen into her self-doubts? As if he hadn’t already suffered half a lifetime of being her sounding board and shoulder to cry on.

“Nothing. Forget I said anything. See you soon.” She ended the call and set the phone on the vanity table again.

A few seconds later, the phone trilled, sliding sideways on the table with the vibration. Tara didn’t even look at the display. She knew who it was. She picked up the phone. “Owen, I told you it’s nothing.”

“If you’re wondering if you made a mistake, it’s not nothing. Are you in the bride’s room?”

“Owen—”

His rumbly voice deepened. “I’ll be there in two minutes.”

“Owen, don’t.” Her voice rose in frustration. “Please. Just stay where you are. Everything is fine.”

There was a long pause before he spoke again. “Are you sure?”

“Positive. Today is absolutely perfect. Beautiful weather, the sanctuary is gorgeous, my dress fits perfectly and I’m marrying the most perfect man in the world. Nothing can possibly be wrong on a day like this.” She stared at the bride in the vanity-table mirror, defiance glaring from her green eyes.

“If you’re sure.” Owen didn’t sound convinced.

“I’ll see you at the altar.” She hung up the phone again and set it in front of her, her hand flattened against the display.

“Nothing will go wrong,” she said to the woman in the mirror.

The bride stared back at her, unconvinced.

It was just cold feet. Everybody got cold feet, right?

This was where having a mom around would have come in handy. Orphanhood sucked. Her mom had died when she was small, and her father had never remarried before his death three years ago. Not that Dale Bentley would have been much help on a day like today. “Suck it up, soldier,” she muttered aloud, mimicking her father’s gravelly growl. “Make a decision and stick to it.”

Man, she missed the old sergeant. He’d have known what to make of Robert. He’d have known whether or not Tara really loved the man or if she loved the idea of him instead.

That was the sticking point, wasn’t it? She just wasn’t sure she loved the man she was less than an hour away from marrying.

She pushed to her feet. What in the world was she doing getting married if she wasn’t sure she loved the man? Had she lost her mind? Was she so addicted to her stupid lists that she trusted them over her own heart?

She had to tell Robert what she was feeling. Talk to him, let him try to talk her out of it. Then she’d know, wouldn’t she?

You already know, Tara. Listen to your gut.

Maybe she already knew, but either way, she had to tell Robert. And now, before it was too late.

She was halfway to the door when a knock sounded from the other side. She crossed to the door and leaned her ear close. “Yes?”

The voice from the other side was male and unfamiliar. “Ms. Bentley? There’s a package outside we need you to sign for.”

“A package?” Sent here, to the church? That was strange. “I’m not expecting anything.”

“I don’t know, ma’am. It’s just for you and it requires a signature. You want me to tell them to send it back?”

“No,” she said quickly, curiosity overcoming her impatience. Maybe a distraction was just what she needed to get her head out of her navel for a few minutes. Robert would still be on the other end of the church with his groomsmen, so it wasn’t like he’d accidentally get a peek at her dress before the wedding, right?

Assuming there was even going to be a wedding...

Stop it. Just go see what the package is. One thing at a time.

She opened the door to a tall, broad-shouldered man wearing a blue polo shirt and khaki pants. “Hi,” she said, feeling a little sheepish as he took in her seed pearl–studded dress and tulle veil. “It’s my wedding day.”

“I see that.” He nodded toward the door down the hall that led to the church’s parking lot. “Out here.”

She followed him down the hall and out the door, taking care as she crossed the threshold not to let the skirt of her dress get caught in the door closing behind her. Once her dress cleared the door, she started to turn her attention back to the deliveryman, but something dropped over her face suddenly, obscuring her view.

Instinctively sucking in a quick breath, she got a lungful of something sweet and cloying. Her lungs seemed to seize up in response, making it hard to take another breath. Fighting panic, she tried to lift her hands to push the offending material off her face. But thick, strong arms roped around her body, holding her arms in place. Her head began to swim, her throat closing off as she struggled for oxygen. She seemed to float into the air, which was impossible. Wasn’t it? She wasn’t floating. People didn’t float.

Somewhere close by, she thought she heard a voice shouting her name. It sounded familiar, but her suddenly fuzzy brain couldn’t make sense of what she was hearing. Then she heard a swift thump and the voice went silent.

There was a metallic clank and suddenly she wasn’t floating anymore. She landed with a painful thud onto a hard, cold surface, unable to make sense of what was happening to her. The sweet, slightly medicinal smell permeated everything, seeping into her brain as if it were a sponge soaking up all those heady fumes.

Another thud shook the floor beneath her, and something solid and warm settled against her back. She struggled against the encroaching darkness, one lingering part of her acutely aware that something terribly wrong was happening to her. Today was supposed to be her wedding day, even if she’d decided it was a wedding she didn’t want.

She should be looking for Robert to tell him what she’d decided. She had to let people know the wedding was off. She had to call the florists to take away the beautiful roses and tulips that festooned the sanctuary. She supposed she could let the reception go on as planned, feed everyone as an apology for her attack of cold feet.

She had too much to do to be sinking deeper and deeper into the darkness now spreading through her fuzzy brain. But within seconds, she could no longer remember what those things were.

Slowly, inexorably, darkness fell.

* * *

OWEN STILES WOKE to darkness and movement. He tried to lift his hands to the hard ache at the back of his head, but his arms wouldn’t move. He was bound, he realized, animal panic rising in his throat. He forced it down, trying to remember what he’d learned at Campbell Cove Academy.

First, ascertain where you are and what the danger is.

The where was easy enough. He was in the white van that had been parked outside the church when he went looking for Tara.

He hadn’t liked the way she’d sounded on the phone. And if he was brutally honest with himself, there was a part of him that had been nearly giddy with hope that she was going to call off the wedding.

He wasn’t proud of feeling that way. His love for Tara was unconditional. Her happiness meant everything to him.

But he couldn’t deny that he wanted her to be happy with him, not some blow-dried, Armani-wearing Harvard Law graduate with a chiseled jaw and a cushy job with a top Louisville law firm.

Ignoring her command to stay put, he’d turned the corner of the hallway that led to the bride’s room just in time to see a wedge of tulle and lace disappear through the exit door about twenty yards away.

Hurrying out after her, he’d been just in time to see a large man throw a pillowcase over Tara’s head and haul her into a white panel van parked in front of the door. He’d called her name, shock overcoming good sense, and earned a punch that had knocked him into the side of the van. At least, that was the last thing he could remember.

Okay, so he’d ascertained where he was. And the fact that he was trussed up inside the moving van made the danger fairly clear, although he couldn’t see anyone lurking around, ready to knock him out again, so he supposed that was a plus.

The back of the van seemed to be closed off from the driver’s cab area by a metal panel. That fact posed a problem—he couldn’t see how many people were in the front of the van, so he couldn’t be sure exactly what he was up against. However, he had seen only two men wrestling with Tara, and they’d both been big guys. He wasn’t sure there was room in the van’s cab to accommodate more people.

So there were probably two bad guys to deal with. And thanks to the closed-off cab, he could move around unobserved, which would give him a better chance of working out a way to escape.

He felt warmth behind him. Tara?

With a grimace of pain, he rolled over and peered through the gloom. A bundle of silk, lace and tulle lay on the floor of the van beside him. The pillowcase over her head was still there, and he caught a whiff of a faintly sweet, medicinal odor coming from where she lay.

He wriggled closer, ignoring the pounding ache in his head, until his face lay close to the pillowcase. The odor was much stronger suddenly, giving off fumes that made him feel light-headed.

Ether, he thought. The pillowcase was soaked with ether.

Those idiots! Ether could be deadly if used without care, and they weren’t even monitoring her condition.

He jerked at the bindings that held his arms behind his back to no avail. They’d apparently duct-taped his hands together. They weren’t going to come apart easily. But he had to get the pillowcase off Tara’s head.

Wriggling closer, he gripped the top of the pillowcase with his teeth. The smell of ether nearly overwhelmed him, but he held his breath and tugged upward. Inch by harrowing inch, he dragged the ether-soaked pillowcase from Tara’s head until he finally pulled it free.

He spat the taste of ether out of his mouth. Then, his heart in his throat, he leaned over to make sure Tara was still breathing. A few terrifying seconds passed before he felt her breath on his cheek. Shaking with relief, he pressed a kiss to her forehead. “That’s my girl. Stay with me, sweetheart.”

As he waited for her to come around, Owen started working on the tape that bound his wrists together. His eyes had finally adjusted to the darkness inside the van, giving him a better look at their immediate surroundings.

The interior of the cargo van was empty except for Owen and Tara. Also, what he’d mistaken for a closed panel between them and the front cab wasn’t technically closed. There was a large mesh window in the panel that should have given him a look at the occupants of the cab. But their captors had covered the mesh opening with what looked like cardboard, not only blocking out any light coming through the front windows but also keeping them from hearing whatever conversation might be going on between their captors.

The upside to that, Owen thought, was that their captors probably couldn’t hear much of what was going on in the back of the van, either.

He looked around for any sharp edges he could use to tear the tape around his wrists. The covering over the wheel well was bolted to the floor of the van, but the bolts were old and worn, not providing much of a cutting edge. Still, he scooted over to the nearest bolt and gave it a try.

The van must have left Mercerville Highway, he realized a few minutes later when the swaying of the vehicle increased, forcing him to plant his feet on the cargo hold’s ridged floor to keep from toppling over with each turn. But he couldn’t stop Tara from rolling across the floor. A moment later, her head knocked into his hip with a soft thud.

“Ow,” she muttered, her voice thick and slurred.

“Oh, sweetheart, there you are,” he said softly, twisting so that his bound hands could reach the side of her face. He brushed away the grit on her cheek with his fingers. “Tara, can you hear me?”

Her head lifted, her hair and the torn remains of her tulle veil obscuring part of her face. “Owen?”

“Yeah, it’s me. Careful,” he added when she tried to sit up and nearly fell over.

She managed to steady herself in a sitting position and shoved her hair and the veil away from her face with clumsy hands. They, too, were secured by duct tape, he saw, though her captors had bound her hands in front of her rather than behind her. She seemed to belatedly notice the bindings and stared at her wrists. “What’s happening?”

“We’ve been abducted,” he said, though he wasn’t sure abduction was the right term. Neither of them was exactly rolling in dough, so he didn’t imagine they’d been taken for ransom purposes. Tara’s fiancé was successful but not what anyone would term wealthy. Not yet, anyway.

So why had the men grabbed her?

“That’s insane,” she muttered, still pawing at her veil, which sat askew on her head. “Why am I so woozy?”

“They put a pillowcase over your head.” He waved his hand at the offending piece of material lying against the front of the cargo hold. “I think it was soaked with ether.”

“Ether?” Tara finally pulled her veil free and threw it on the floor beside her. The van took another turn, forcing Owen to brace himself against the side of the cargo hold. Tara was unprepared, however, and went sprawling against his side, her nose bumping into his shoulder.

“Ow.” She righted herself, rubbing her nose. She finally noticed Owen’s bound hands, her eyes widening. “You’re tied up, too.”

“Think you can get the tape off me? Then I’ll return the favor.” He twisted around until his back was facing her.

“My fingers aren’t working so well,” she warned him as she started fumbling with the tape. She wasn’t lying; it took a full minute before she was able to find the end of the tape on his bindings and start to slowly unwrap his wrists. But she finally ripped away the last of the tape, making the flesh on his wrists sting.

He stretched his aching arms, grimacing at the pain.

“What time is it?” Tara asked.

He pressed the button on his watch that lit up the dial. “Just a little after four.”

“Oh.”

He turned to look at Tara. “You were supposed to get married at four.”

She nodded. “I was supposed to.”

He reached for her, taking her bound hands in his. “We’ll get you back there, Tara. We’ll get out of this and get to a phone so you can call Robert and tell him what happened. And then we’ll get you back to the church and you’ll get married just the way you planned—”

“I was going to call it off.”

He went still. “What?”

In the low light he couldn’t make out much about her features, but the tone of her voice was somewhere between sad and embarrassed. “I was going to call it off. Right before that guy knocked on the door and told me there was a package outside.”

“That’s how they got you outside to the van?”

“Yeah.” She wriggled her bound hands at him. “Get this off me, please?”

He pulled the tape from her wrists, taking care with the last few inches to spare her as much of the sting as possible. When she was free, he rolled up the tape from both of their bindings and shoved it in his pocket. It might come in handy if they could get themselves out of this van alive.

Freed from her restraints, Tara curled into a knot beside him, wrapping her arms around her knees. The puffy skirt of her wedding dress ballooned around her, almost glowing in the low light, making her look like a piece of popcorn.

Owen had the clarity of mind not to speak that thought aloud.

He put his arm around her, trying not to read too much into the way she snuggled closer to him. They were in the middle of an abduction. Of course she was seeking a little comfort from the guy who’d been her best friend since middle school.

“What do they want?”

“I don’t know,” he admitted. “I don’t suppose Robert is secretly a multimillionaire with a hefty trust fund?”

“Not that he’s ever told me.” She made a soft mewling noise. “I am so woozy. They used ether?”

“That’s what it smelled like to me.”

She cocked her head toward him. “Exactly how do you know what ether smells like?”

“I took a history of medicine course in college, when I was still considering a medical degree.”

“And they let you sniff ether?”

Tara’s skeptical tone made him smile. She was sounding more like her old self, which meant the effects of the ether were wearing off. “Not on purpose.”

He glanced to the far side of the van’s cargo hold, where he’d thrown the ether-soaked pillowcase. In this confined area, the fumes it emitted might still be affecting them, he realized.

“We need to find a way to wrap up that pillowcase so that we limit the fumes it’s putting out in this van,” he told Tara. “I wish I had a garbage bag or something.”

“Don’t suppose you carry one of those around in your back pocket?”

“Not in a rented tux, no,” he answered with a grin, feeling a little less grim about their chances of survival now that his smart-ass Tara was back. He shrugged off his jacket. “I can wrap it in this.”

“The rental place isn’t going to like that,” Tara warned.

“Not sure it’s enough, though.”

“Well, I have about twenty yards of silk, lace and tulle you can use.” Holding his shoulder, she levered herself to her feet and started to tug at the seams of her skirt until the fabric tore free. In the darkness of the van’s enclosed interior, Owen couldn’t make out much besides a cloud of faint brightness in the gloom floating away from her body. Tara gathered the fabric into a ball and presented it to him. “Will this do?”

He crossed carefully to the corner of the cargo hold, feeling a distinct unsteadiness he attributed to the moving van, although he should be a lot more worried about the blow he’d taken to the head. He’d been unconscious long enough for their captors to shove him inside the van and tie him up. He might have a concussion. Or worse.

But for now, he was conscious. His head didn’t hurt too badly. And he had a job to do.

He wrapped up the pillowcase inside the layers of silk, tulle and lace, and pushed it back into the corner. Already, the distinctively sweet scent of the ether was almost gone.

Gingerly, he edged his way back to where Tara perched on the wheel well cover. “That should take care of—”

The van gave a hard lurch, sending him toppling over. He landed hard on his side, pain shooting through his rib cage and hip.

“Owen!” Tara grabbed his arms and helped him to a sitting position. “Are you all right?”

He rubbed his side, reassuring himself that nothing was broken. “I’m okay—” He broke off, aware that something had changed suddenly.

The engine. He no longer heard the engine noise, or felt the vibration beneath them.

The van had come to a stop.