Married in Haste

by Christine Rimmer

  He swore. It was one of those words a man shouldn’t say in front of his mother. Then he lifted his head and looked up at her. “I guess I’ve really screwed up, huh?”

  Her smile had all the wisdom of the world in it. “You’re lucky that wife of yours loves you so much. I’ll bet she’s just waitin’ for you to come to your senses.”

  “God. I hope you’re right.”

  She squeezed his shoulder again. “Go on, now. Don’t hang around here a minute longer. You go to her. You make it right.”

  He decided he’d walk over.

  It was a gorgeous day, a great day to be on foot. Plus, the walk would take six or seven minutes—as opposed to three in the SUV. He could use the time to figure out how to tell Angie what a hopeless fool he’d been.

  Was he stalling?

  Yeah, well. Maybe a little. But what the hell difference would three minutes make?

  He started off down the street, walking briskly, rehearsing the things he would say to her, telling himself she’d forgive him for the living hell he’d put her through the past several weeks, hoping against hope that he was right. Folks waved as he went by them. He waved back, hardly seeing them, his mind on Angie, on how he was going to make things right.

  In no time at all, he was turning onto Catalpa Way, walking fast, approaching the house, the moment of truth almost upon him.

  Strange. All the blinds were drawn…

  At ten in the morning?

  That didn’t make sense. Angie was an early riser. She was always up by seven and the first thing she would do in the morning was to open all the blinds for the day.

  His steps slowed as he came even with the house, on his way to the driveway on the south side. He spotted that squeegee she used on the windows, fallen half over the railing, as if she’d dropped it and just left it there. That big pink bucket of hers waited, too, beneath a streaked-looking window.

  Shivers of apprehension crawled beneath his skin. It didn’t add up, her washing windows with the blinds shut.

  And she was such a tidy kind of person. She wouldn’t walk off and leave her equipment hanging halfway off the deck.

  Brett picked up his pace again—but now he was careful, to tread lightly, to make as little sound as possible as he rounded the side of the house and moved close to it, heading up the bank beside it.

  Okay, he was probably overreacting. It was probably nothing—the drawn blinds, the abandoned bucket and pole. But some deeper instinct had kicked in. If there was trouble inside the house, he wanted to get the jump on it, to assess the situation before he revealed his presence.

  He scaled the steep bank, watching where he put his feet, taking care not to dislodge any rocks or gravel. The shades were drawn everywhere he looked, including the side window at the lower floor. The window itself was shut. As he came even with it, he pressed his ear to it, but heard no sounds within.

  On this side, at the upper level, only the four-inch-thick glass-block bathroom window was near the bank. No sense trying to hear anything through that.

  He reached the concrete retaining wall that jutted off the entrance side of the house. Lightly, he hoisted himself onto it—and over the decorative split-rail fence that ran between the house and the garage. He hustled up the front walk—and found what he was looking for. One of the breakfast nook windows was raised.

  Through the screen and the drawn blinds, faintly, he heard a voice from inside. It was deep and rough. Clearly male.

  He crept to the window and listened.

  “The money,” the voice said. “Now.”

  “Jody…” That was Angie’s voice, low and even, carefully controlled. But he could hear the terror in it. And the hatred, too. If Brett had ever been jealous of the bastard who hurt her, he never would be again. “I’ve only got about a hundred in cash,” she said.

  “Get it. And your checkbook and credit cards, too.”

  “If you’d only—”

  “Shut up.”

  “But—”

  “You think I won’t shoot you, bitch?”

  Not good, Brett thought. Not good at all. Jody had a gun. That would make things harder.

  The crook demanded, “The money. Where?”

  “My purse. On the kitchen counter.”

  “Let’s go. Over there. Now.”

  Brett heard the footsteps coming toward the kitchen and had to accept that the open window wasn’t going to do it for him. The S.O.B. would shoot him before he got the damn screen off. A pity, too, because Brett owned a nice pair of hunting rifles. He kept them safely hidden in a special panel built into the kitchen ceiling.

  No way he could get to them, though. He’d have to improvise some kind of weapon—but first, he had to get inside the house.

  Brett turned back the way he had come. Moving swiftly on silent feet, he went over the rail fence and ran full-out down the bank to the patio below, chancing a minor slide that might have been heard inside.

  The French door to the central downstairs room was locked. But he had his key. Too bad he didn’t have a cell phone, damn it. He could call 9-1-1, get the sheriff over here.

  But cell phones didn’t work in the Flat. The surrounding mountains cut off the signals. He was on his own.

  He let himself in, shut the door with aching, silent care and took off his shoes.

  Now, for a weapon.

  The door to the spare room that they’d been using for storage stood ajar. He went to it, slipped inside. A sturdy-looking handle stuck out of a box of kitchen stuff that Angie had brought from the cottage: a cast-iron frying pan.

  It wasn’t a rifle. But if he could get the jump on Jody and swing it good and hard, it would deliver one hell of a blow.

  Frying pan in hand, Brett soundlessly opened the door again and crept toward the stairwell. He could hear the scumball talking upstairs, giving Angie orders. “Over there. Sit down.” A silence, as Brett moved up the stairs—and, presumably, Angie did what the dirtbag told her to do. Then he was yakking again. “Nice setup you got here. I like me a woman who lands on her feet. I heard all about you. Piece of cake, gettin’ all the news I needed. Lotsa people in this town with real big mouths. Hear you’re havin’ a few problems with that new husband of yours—real sad, Angie baby. You got such bad luck with men…”

  A low wall rimmed the stairwell. Brett crouched as he reached the top step. Carefully, he peered around the wall.

  And got lucky.

  Angie sat in a chair, facing Brett. Jody stood over her, pistol in one hand, Angie’s wallet and checkbook in the other, talking a mile a minute. “Now, the big question, Angie, honey, is what am I gonna to do with you? I got me some trouble, you know? Big trouble…”

  Brett emerged from the stairwell. Angie saw him—and somehow, amazingly, managed not to give him away. Her gaze stayed flat, wary. It showed no surprise, only carefully controlled fear of the muscle-bound crook in dirty jeans and a torn T-shirt who loomed over her. She had a bruise on her cheekbone, blood in the corner of her mouth.

  Brett knew rage then, a boiling fury—icy at the same time as it burned. The bastard had hit her, hurt her. Again.

  He made himself breathe slow and even. Above all, from here on, he mustn’t lose focus. He had one solid chance—maybe. If he worked it right, he might get in one good blow. If he screwed up, Jody would shoot him.

  Jody kept on talking. “I’m thinkin’ I’m better off to leave no witnesses, babe.” Brett moved forward, on the balls of his feet, making no sound. Jody said, “I’m thinkin’, if you can’t talk, who’s gonna know it was me that was here to see you?”

  “Well, Jody…” She dared to speak up, though he’d ordered her not to. Brett knew why. She wanted to make sure the guy’s attention didn’t wander, that he didn’t just happen to glance over his shoulder. “People would know,” she said. “The people you talked to in town, the people who told you all about me, remember?”

  Jody muttered an obscenity. “You think you’re so damn smart. You always did. And you
never did listen when I told you to keep that trap of yours shut.” He hauled back his gun hand to hit her again.

  Brett was in place by then, not two feet away. He raised the frying pan high and brought it down on the back of Jody’s head. It made a weird bonging sound. The shock of the blow jittered up Brett’s arms.

  Angie gasped and brought her hand to her mouth.

  And Jody Sykes dropped like a sack of rocks.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Angie called for help.

  In ten minutes, the sheriff was there. Jody was still out cold when the EMTs appeared two minutes after that. He started groaning as they examined him.

  Brett let the med techs deal with him. They checked his vitals and loaded him onto a gurney. He was semi-conscious by then, muttering under his breath, disconnected phrases, as they carried him out.

  In Brett’s professional opinion, he was a prime candidate for a deadly case of post-concussive syndrome.

  The sheriff took them—Angie first, Brett second—into one of the empty rooms downstairs. They each gave their story. The tech guy came and took pictures—of the spot on the rug where Jody had bled, of the frying pan and the checkbook and wallet, of the “scene of the incident” from a number of angles.

  They bagged and tagged. And finally, about three hours after Brett bopped Jody with the pan, they had what they needed and were ready to leave.

  As he was going out the door, the sheriff paused to confide, “Don’t worry, Brett. We got a lot on Jody Sykes—and that’s besides what he did here today, and to Angie in San Francisco.”

  “He might not pull out of it,” Brett said with real regret. If he had it to do over again, he would. In a minute. But still, he was a doctor. His job was to heal, not kill.

  The sheriff gave him a bleak grin. “Don’t worry. We’ll see he gets the best medical care there is—and then we’ll put him away for forty years.”

  The sheriff’s SUV was barely down the driveway before Angie’s mom and dad—followed by Chastity in her old pickup—came driving up. Word had already spread around town that Angie had been attacked and Brett had saved the day.

  There was much crying and hugging. Rose fussed over the bruise on Angie’s cheek and called Brett a hero—again. Little Tony put his arm around him and called him, “Son.”

  Brett grabbed Chastity and squeezed her good and hard. “Thanks, Ma.”

  She laid her hand on his cheek. “Looks like I set you straight just in time.”

  Angie made coffee and offered a late lunch. Of course, everybody stayed.

  It was four in the afternoon before Brett and his wife were finally alone. He shut the door and locked it.

  And then he took her in his arms.

  With a tender sigh, she rested her head against his shoulder. “Oh, I have missed you. I’m so glad you’re home.”

  “I’ve been a first-class jerk. Not to mention, a fool.”

  “Yeah. Yeah, you have. But I’m so happy that you’re my fool….” She lifted her mouth to him. And he took it in a slow, deep, hungry, kiss.

  When he raised his head and she gazed up at him, eyes shining, that dimple he adored showing in her cheek, he said, “I love you, Angie. I’m in love with you. I plan to stay that way. For the rest of our lives.”

  She kissed his chin. “You think maybe you could get used to it, then, to loving me? Is that what you’re telling me?”

  “I’m telling you I know I can trust you. I’m telling you that it’s an honor, to be in love with you.”

  “Oh, Brett.” She cuddled into his shoulder again. “It’s nice…to hear the words.”

  He nuzzled her hair. “Well, you’ve been saying for a long time now that I don’t talk to you anymore.”

  “Yeah. But it’s funny…”

  “What?” he demanded gruffly.

  “When you came up the stairs with that old frying pan in your hand, somehow I knew…”

  He teased, “That Jody Sykes was going down?”

  “Oh, yeah. There was that—and it was a big relief, I can tell you. But I also knew…that it would be okay, between us. That we would be really together again.”

  “All that in an instant?”

  She laughed. “That’s right. And now, well, the words are nice. But it’s looking in those eyes of yours and knowing that you’re really here, with me. That you love me and you know it, that you’re mine and I’m yours… That’s it. That’s the bottom line. Everything else is just gravy, you know?”

  He did know. So he kissed her again.

  And again, after that.

  And then he swept her high in his arms and carried her to the bed where he’d been so lonely without her.

  They made slow, sweet love, in the dim, early evening light that peeked in through the tilted slats of the blinds.

  Later, he told her how much he wanted the baby. “It’s earlier than we planned, I know, but a baby is just fine. A baby is great. Please believe me.”

  “Oh, Brett. I do believe you. I don’t doubt you now. I can see the truth, shining there in your eyes.”

  “And tomorrow, no matter what, you’ll go and see Father Delahunty, arrange to do whatever we have to do, so we’ll be married in the eyes of your church.”

  “I will. First thing. Oh, Brett. It’s a promise…”

  Epilogue

  Six months later, Angie and Brett stood before Father Delahunty in the New Bethlehem Flat Catholic Church. Outside, a light snow drifted down to cover the ground in a blanket of purest white. In the front pew on the bride’s side, Mamma Rose was sobbing and Aunt Stella was sniffling.

  Father Delahunty asked, “Have you come here freely and without reservation to give yourselves, each to the other, in holy matrimony?”

  Angie had eyes only for Brett as they answered, together, “We have.”

  “Will you love and honor each other as husband and wife for as long as you both shall live?”

  They replied, “We will.”

  “Will you accept children lovingly from God and bring them up according to the law of Christ and his Church?” In the second-row pew, Trista was heard to clear her throat at that one.

  Angie only smiled, put her hand on the ripe bulge of her tummy and, in unison with her soon-to-be husband, proudly declared, “We will.”

  Father Delahunty invited them to exchange their vows.

  Angie said hers softly, repeating the age-old promise with slow and tender care.

  Brett’s deep voice was firm and sure when he gave the sacred words back to her.

  “I, Brett, take you, Angela, for my lawful wife, to have and to hold from this day forward, for better, for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health, for all the days of my life.”

  From this day forward…

  The solemn words echoed in Angie’s mind and heart, during the blessing of the rings, the offering of prayers, the “Our Father” and the final nuptial blessing.

  Father Delahunty gave the sign of peace, offered a last prayer and then announced to all present, “Mr. and Mrs. Brett Bravo.”

  In the front pew, Angie’s mother sobbed a little louder than before. Glory, who’d come all the way from New York for this special day, beamed wide.

  Angie went into her husband’s open arms. He kissed her and when he did, whispered, “From this day forward…” as if he had known what she was thinking, known exactly what was in her heart.

  She smiled against his lips, thinking, Well, of course he knows.

  He always had.

  He was her husband. Her best friend. Her companion. The man who owned her heart, and thrilled her with just a touch.

  She was his and he was hers.

  For all the days of their lives.

  ISBN: 978-1-4268-6228-1

  MARRIED IN HASTE

  Copyright © 2006 by Christine Rimmer

  All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical or other mea
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  All characters in this book have no existence outside the imagination of the author and have no relation whatsoever to anyone bearing the same name or names. They are not even distantly inspired by any individual known or unknown to the author, and all incidents are pure invention.

  This edition published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.

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