“Freddie, please!” Lulu begged, not wanting to make a tense situation worse. “I can handle this. Just please stay back.”
“I know you’re on the side of the angels, Lu, but I ain’t. This bastard isn’t going to go to jail and live another fifty years when Dolores was . . . She was ripped apart.” Sal sniffed and rubbed his nose with the back of his hand. “He dies now. Stand aside, Lu.”
“I won’t. You’re not thinking, Sal. He’s innocent. I swear to you. And I can’t let you kill an innocent man.”
But Sal looked like he was in a trance, his eyes glazed and hard. Nothing she said could break him of his determination to punish the man he was certain was guilty. The man Lulu had told him was guilty.
She had to do something to snap him out of his spell, get him to listen to her long enough to get Emerson to safety and the gun away. But what could she do to distract Sal from his murderous intent?
And then, as Freddie inched closer, Lulu walked up to Sal . . . and kissed him passionately on the mouth.
In his astonishment, Sal’s gun arm fell to his side, and Freddie, reeling, dashed in and twisted it out of his grasp. The two men stood face-to-face, sweating and full of unchecked fury, eyes locked, each daring the other to make the next move. But then the other guests stumbled in, laughing and shouting, not seeming to know whether this was all real or just another bunch of hijinks choreographed for their amusement. The tension was broken. Emerson, shaking with sobs, huddled against the granite wall. Sal turned abruptly and stalked away.
“Oh, Freddie!” Lulu gasped. “I . . . I didn’t mean that. . . . I only . . .”
But Freddie, unflappably confident that Lulu loved him completely, knew exactly what she was going to say. He stopped her words with a kiss so pure, so passionate, that all questions of forgiveness were eradicated. She’d been acting. It had done the trick, and no matter what, Sal was gone and Lulu was his.
He decided then and there to put the matter beyond any further discussion.
With every guest of the Ranch assembled around the Neptune Pool, thrilled by the unexpected excitement, Freddie dropped down to one knee. With his torn, bloody shirt exposing a sliver of his chest, he looked like the prototype of every dreamy romantic hero. He took Lulu’s hand and gazed into her shining eyes . . .
And before he could even ask the question, Lulu simply whispered, “Yes.”
Freddie stood and pulled Lulu into his arms, and neither of them noticed the standing ovation of the crowd.
About the Authors
ADAM SHANKMAN is the director and producer of the exuberant musical remake of Hairspray, the producer of the top-grossing Step Up films, and the director of the adaptation of the Nicholas Sparks bestseller A Walk to Remember, starring Mandy Moore, and Bringing Down the House, starring Steve Martin and Queen Latifah. Adam has also directed episodes of Modern Family, and Glee, and he’s a popular personality as a judge on So You Think You Can Dance. He also produced and choreographed the 82nd Annual Academy Awards (which was itself nominated for a record twelve Emmys).
LAURA L. SULLIVAN is a former newspaper editor, biologist, social worker, and deputy sheriff who writes because storytelling is the easiest way to do everything in the world. Her books include Love By the Morning Star, Delusion, and Ladies in Waiting. Laura lives on the Florida coast.
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This book is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real places are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and events are products of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or places or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Text copyright © 2017 by Adam Shankman
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