Grant could almost feel her nerves tightening one by one along her back. He had never known fear himself—other than the fear of failure, and that had only served to galvanize him. A desire to protect her stirred and strengthened within him. It had to be the costume, he mused.
Lowering his head until his lips were at her ear, Grant whispered, “Just look forward and pretend to be part of the crowd. The room is full of couples.” He nodded toward the couple standing three rows in front of them. “There’s even another Scarlett and Rhett.”
The other Scarlett was a brunette, he noted, but it was the color of the costume she wore that would first draw the eye. Deep emerald green, like Cheyenne’s. If whoever was after them saw the other couple first, it might just give Cheyenne and he enough time to get away.
Cheyenne nodded in reply, but her attention was still on the man who had given her the bouquet. He was obviously working with the man at the front of the room.
“What’s going on here?” she asked before he could meld into the background again.
The little man, who looked like an overgrown elf, scowled at her, as if the answer should have been evident. He gestured around the hall, and then toward the man he appeared to serve.
“Why, you’re getting married, of course,” he informed her, then hurried off to his master.
“Of course,” she muttered, exchanging looks with Grant. She inclined her head toward his. He was the one with ties here; he should know. “More playacting?”
“It would seem that way.” With a subtle nod of his head, he directed her attention toward the front of the hall and the cherub-faced man conducting the mock ceremony. Mardi Gras was filled with more “programs” than any five committees could keep track of. Grant could only make an educated guess as to what was going on here.
Whatever was going on was coming to a head, Cheyenne thought. For a second, she began to raise her camera again, but then, for the sake of blending in, she decided to let it remain hanging from her shoulder.
The man at the podium was gesturing for the crowd to move in closer. It seemed a physical impossibility, but like a huge wave pulling into itself, the crowd clustered even more tightly together.
“Brings a new meaning to togetherness,” Grant whispered against her ear.
Well, at least one of them was enjoying this, she thought, trying very hard not to notice the way his body was being pushed up against hers—or the way she found herself reacting to it.
“Now, if you gentlemen will all repeat after me,” the man at the podium prompted. “I—State your name,” he urged. A singsong murmur rippled through the crowd. “Oh, louder, now, please, like you’re proud of this moment. Again. I...” the minister began a second time.
With a shrug, Grant joined the others, repeating the words the minister intoned.
Sometimes, in his dreams, Grant envisioned himself saying these same words as he stood beside a woman he knew in his heart was the one he’d secretly been looking for. But he could never make out her face. The only thing that was prevalent was a feeling. A feeling that this was right. That she was right. Right for him.
Whenever he awoke from the dream, there was always a deep sensation of loss, of bereavement. A sensation that something precious had slipped through his fingers. He always shook it off within a few minutes. But it was the absence of the feeling that he had something precious in his grasp that had kept him from saying the wedding vow to anyone.
He didn’t want just a warm body beside him at night, sharing his bed, the way his father had. Five failed marriages proved that his father’s criteria left something to be desired. Grant wanted something more. He wanted a partner, a soulmate to share his life with. He was probably aiming too high in this day and age, he surmised, but he wasn’t about to settle for anything less.
Which probably meant that he was going to have to settle for remaining alone, he thought philosophically.
But right now, for the sheer novelty of it, he said the words as he was bidden. A grin played on his lips as he promised to love and cherish the woman beside him all the days of his eternal life.
The “Reverend” nodded, appearing pleased. He turned his attention to the women in the crowd. “Fine, now for the ladies. I—State your name please—do solemnly swear...”
Out of the corner of her eye, Cheyenne could see O‘Hara looking at her, an amused expression on his lips. What the hell, this might even be a cute tie-in to her article. She could even subtitle it, “I was Mrs. Grant O’Hara—for five minutes.”
In a loud voice, she declared, “I, Cheyenne Tarantino, do solemnly swear...” Her voice seemed to stand out above the drone of the hundred or so other female voices reciting the vows.
The reverend laced his fingers together, looking upon the couples with a beatific smile. “By the power vested in me, I now pronounce you husbands and wives.” Unlacing his fingers, he gestured the couples even closer to each other. “You may all kiss your brides, gentlemen.”
Maybe having run into this room hadn’t been such a mistake after all. Grant looked down into Cheyenne’s face, lightly feathering his fingers along her cheek. “If we don’t, you know we’ll stand out.”
There was no earthly reason why she should be having trouble drawing air into her lungs. No earthly reason at all. So why was she? Why did she feel as if everything had just been frozen in time because he’d touched her?
It didn’t make sense.
“Wouldn’t want that,” she agreed, her voice hardly above a whisper. A whisper was all she could manage because, while her lungs seemed deprived, her heart was hammering just the way it had when she’d fled from the devils.
A second before Grant took her into his arms—less than a heartbeat before—she knew.
She knew that this wasn’t going to be something she could shrug off lightly, filing it in some forgotten burial ground along with other meaningless kisses.
She hoped that she was wrong.
But she wasn’t.
From the moment his lips touched hers, she realized that Grant O’Hara was every bit as smooth, every bit as skilled, as she had been given to believe and had secretly surmised. But skill and smoothness could be resisted, catalogued, even perhaps disdained. This was something else.
Something more.
His lips moved first lightly, then more urgently over hers, cutting her off from the real world and creating another one entirely—a world where there were only two inhabitants, where there was only a need for two inhabitants.
Damn it, she could feel the earth move and this wasn’t even California. There wasn’t even the lie of an earthquake to hide behind.
Somewhere far in the distance, Cheyenne could feel the bouquet slipping from her numbed fingers. The next moment, blood rushing through her like fire engines hurrying in response to an alarm, she dove her hands into his hair, fisting them as she molded her body to his. Molded herself to this kiss that was stripping her senseless.
Chapter Four
More stunned than he wanted to admit, even to himself, Grant slowly drew his head back and looked at the woman he had just kissed as if he’d never seen her before.
And maybe he hadn’t, not in ways that really counted. She was attractive, classy and smart—all adjectives that could be used to describe a race horse or any one of a number of other things. Nowhere in that description was there the slightest hint of the devastating force waiting to be released.
Or had that just been a fluke?
Fluke or not, Grant felt as if he’d just been run over by a steamroller and left for dead. And it was one hell of a way to go.
If the mustache he was sporting as part of his costume were real, he knew it would have been curled and singed at the ends. Taking stock, he felt just a wee bit lightheaded. That hadn’t happened to him since his first foray into the land of the opposite sex, and, even then, there hadn’t been this sensation of disorientation mocking him.
Maybe it was the room and the fact that there were so many people in
it, eating up the oxygen. He didn’t really want to entertain the idea that anything else might be responsible for the way he felt. That would be a little too unnerving.
“Why Scarlett,” he drawled, smiling into her eyes, “I find myself pleasantly surprised. You leave me quite speechless.”
“Then how is it you can talk?”
Realizing she’d almost snapped the retort at him, Cheyenne struggled to get hold of herself. This wasn’t like her—not the brusque way she had answered, nor the reaction she’d experienced before that. The former was a direct result of the latter and of her desire to keep her reaction a secret from O’Hara. The last thing she wanted was to let him know that he’d succeeded in splitting her in half like an atom, causing nuclear fission.
But she rather suspected the fact that she was having trouble standing up was giving her away: her legs had suddenly become much too rubbery. Still, it was second nature for her to seek cover in bravado. The last time she had felt anything remotely close to this, the man had only been interested in flaunting her virginity like some trophy. He hadn’t cared about her feelings. That had been made crystal clear in the vicious argument that had ensued.
She didn’t want to face going through that again, especially not with someone of O’Hara’s obvious experience and reputation. It wasn’t that she wouldn’t win, it was just that the battle would be draining.
Grant reflected, trying to ground himself. “Good question.”
Unable to resist, he slowly rubbed his thumb along her bottom lip. From the look that entered her eyes, he guessed it was a toss up just which of them was the more excited.
This definitely bore looking into.
“I don’t know if the coming storm has anything to do with this, but lady, you certainly do pack quite a wallop.”
Ditto, she thought.
Cheyenne tried to compose herself, but she couldn’t seem to move away, even though she was vaguely aware that some of the couples were leaving the hall.
This was absurd: she was a grown woman. Her reaction was just a result of so many bodies being packed into a given space. Still, when she strove for a flippant retort, she could barely find her voice. Her attention was completely focused on O’Hara’s mouth, on the way it curved when he smiled, on the way it moved when he spoke.
“You haven’t seen my one-two punch,” she managed to whisper.
He figured it was a safe bet to say he’d at least had a good preview. “Why don’t you show me?”
Grant’s lips had barely brushed against hers again when he felt someone’s hand on his arm. Raising his head, Grant saw the reverend’s attendant at his elbow. He tried to curb his annoyance at the inopportune interruption.
The little man shook his head. “Sorry, you’re going to have to do that someplace else, I’m afraid. The hall’s only rented until seven.” To emphasize the point, he tapped his watch. Eyes like tiny black marbles shifted from one face to the other. “Did you sign your certificate?”
Puzzled, Grant raised an eyebrow. “Certificate?”
The attendant huffed. “Didn’t think so.” He spun around on his elevated heel. “Come with me,” he instructed. He took two steps, then glanced over his shoulder. They hadn’t moved. “Well? Why are you just standing there? Come on.”
“You heard the man.” Gamely, Grant took Cheyenne by the arm and ushered her before him. He noted that nearly half the couples had already left the hall. It looked as if this particular party—not a very exciting one at that—was officially over.
“And just why,” Grant asked, following the attendant to the front of the room, “are we coming with you?”
The man stopped just short of the altar. Over to one side stood a vinyl-top card table, looking completely out of place. On it were stacks of neatly arranged pages. The attendant took one from the last pile and laid it in front of Grant on the table. Simultaneously producing a pen, he offered it to Grant.
“Why, to get your wedding certificate properly signed.”
“Wedding certificate?” Grant looked at the paper. The words Certificate of Marriage were written across the top in blue script, followed by the name of the county and the state. The reverend and his helper certainly had gone to a lot of trouble to make it look realistic. The certificate even bore the state’s seal as well as an authorizing signature.
Thinking it might make an interesting souvenir for Cheyenne, Grant played along and signed his name, then handed the pen to her.
Cheyenne chewed her lower lip, feeling a little uneasy about putting her name to the document even though she knew it had to be counterfeit. Then, shrugging, she followed Grant’s lead and signed just beneath his name. She’d barely finished the last stroke before the attendant took the pen from her. Quickly, he added his own signature above the line marked “witness.”
The queasiness in her stomach grew. “Don’t you think you’re carrying this a little far?”
The attendant snorted at the question. Taking the certificate, he made a copy of it on a small copier. Finished, he placed the original on the table. “Only as far as the state of Louisiana requires.”
Grant looked again at the document on the table. It did look authentic. Maybe too authentic. “Wait a minute, isn’t this just part of the festivities?”
The look of confusion on the attendant’s face gave Grant an uncomfortable feeling.
“Yes,” the man said slowly. “It is part of the festivities. The better part.” He drew himself up to his full height, which despite the elevator shoes was just shy of five feet. “The reverend thought it would be a nice contrast, amid all this shameless idolatry around us, to have something worthwhile and decent take place.”
The full impact of what the man was saying began to penetrate Cheyenne’s consciousness. The queasiness in her stomach turned into a full-scale whirlpool. Her eyes grew wide. “Like...?” she demanded.
The attendant stared at them as if he thought they were demented. He shoved the various piles of papers into his briefcase, then snapped the locks shut.
“Look, you two came in here. Nobody dragged you off the street. You were the ones who wanted to get married.” He shook his head. “I’ve heard of getting cold feet before the ceremony, but not after.”
As he turned to leave, Grant caught him by the shoulders, pinning him to the wall. The man squirmed, but to no avail. Grant was going to hold him there until he got his answers. “Let me get this straight. We’re married?”
The attendant’s eyes darted toward the altar, looking for the reverend, but the man wasn’t there. He began to quake. “Yes.”
Cheyenne moved Grant aside, pinning the attendant not with her hands but with a look. She struggled to keep the horror out of her voice. This couldn’t be happening. “Really married?”
“Really married,” the attendant repeated. He rubbed his shoulder where Grant had held him, then quickly moved to Cheyenne’s other side to get out of Grant’s reach. “Stay away from me,” he warned.
Cheyenne refused to believe him. “But we can’t be. There’re blood tests, waiting periods, licenses....” she protested, trying to keep panic out of her voice.
She’d heard of ministers marrying large groups of people before, but that had always been part of some sort of mass conversion movement, or simply a publicity stunt. She wasn’t aware of anything like that ever being planned. If Stan had been aware something like that was in the offing in New Orleans he would have told her—if only to get photographs of it.
Right, Stan. The man who didn’t always know what year it was, even with the calendar staring him in the face.
She turned desperate eyes on the attendant, willing him to tell her that it was all a giant hoax.
“All waived,” the attendant declared with pride. “I handled all the details myself. The mayor had the decency to think this might reflect well on the city.” The wrinkles in his forehead lessened as something resembling a tolerant smile slipped over his lips. “Look, don’t spoil a good thing. Sleep on it. If you
still feel like this in the morning,” he shrugged, “get an annulment started. But for now, you two are married.” He tapped the original certificate on the table. “Congratulations.”
Numbed, disoriented, Cheyenne picked up the document and looked at it. Oh God, it’s true. She was married. How could this have happened?
“I don’t think we’re in Kansas anymore, Toto,” she muttered under her breath.
The attendant gave her an odd look. “No, this is New Orleans, Louisiana, lady. Unless the storm decides to relocate us.” His part of the job completed, he tucked the briefcase under his arm. “If I were you two, I’d get myself back to my house or my hotel room and wait this one out. It looks like those guys at the weather bureau might finally be right about something. This one’s going to be a big one. I can feel it in my bones.”
So saying, he hurried past them and hurried out the door.
“Let me see that.” Grant took the certificate out of Cheyenne’s hands. Scanning it quickly, he frowned as he looked for any flaw or inconsistency.
Cheyenne sighed. “It looks legal enough.”
His eyes were hard when they looked up at her. “Legal or not, this isn’t binding.”
She didn’t like his tone. Did he think she was going to try to make this stick? Just what sort of a woman did he take her for? A hot retort leaped to her lips, but she let it pass. Maybe she was being unfair. Other than taking Stan’s word for it, O’Hara couldn’t know what kind of woman he was dealing with.
“Don’t worry,” she assured him, “I have no intention of holding you to that thing.” She flicked a finger at the paper in his hand. “I do have scruples, probably more than you do. When I get married, really married, it’s going to be for love, not money.”
He folded the paper and put it into his jacket, his eyes on Cheyenne. And where had he heard that before? he mused sarcastically. Only from every woman he had ever gone out with.
“Very noble of you.”
So much for being fair. She didn’t care what sort of grasping people O’Hara was accustomed to. She was telling him that she didn’t want to be bound to that paper any more than he did. Who did he think he was, patronizing her?
Suddenly...Marriage! Page 5