“Why don’t I go first,” he said.
Now that she’d worked up the nerve, she couldn’t back down. “I think I should go first.”
“What I have to say might impact what you have to say.”
All the more reason to say it right now. The last thing she wanted was to make a huge deal about this. If she made a fool of herself, so be it.
It sure wouldn’t be the first time.
Three
Luc was watching her expectantly, and she knew that the longer she dragged this out, the harder it would be. What she was about to ask him was no small favor. She wouldn’t blame him at all if he said no.
Okay, Jules, you can do this.
Hoping he didn’t hear the slight quiver in her voice, notice her unsteady hands or the erratic flutter of her pulse, she said, “I may have come up with a way to stay in the country. But I need your help.”
His brow rose expectantly. “What kind of help?”
Her heart lodged in her throat, so when she opened her mouth to speak, nothing came out. For several seconds she sat there like a fool, the words frozen in her vocal cords.
Wearing a quirky smile, Luc asked, “Are you okay?”
Yes and no.
She was being silly. He was her best friend. Even if he said no, it wouldn’t change anything. Hopefully it would only be slightly humiliating.
Come on, Jules, just say it.
Gathering her courage, she said, “You know that I really don’t want to leave the US.”
“And I don’t want you to leave,” he said.
“Royal has become my home. I feel like I belong here.”
“You do belong here.” He said it as if there were no question in his mind. “And you know that I’ll do anything I can to help. As a matter of fact—”
“Please, let me finish.” Earnest as he appeared, he might want to take that back when she told him her plan. “I’ve looked into every possible avenue, but there’s only one way I’ve come up with that will assure I can stay.”
She paused taking a deep, empowering breath. Then another.
“Are you going to tell me,” he asked, looking mildly amused. “Or do you want me to guess?”
Oh, for Pete’s sake, just say it, Jules. “We could get married. Temporarily of course,” she added swiftly. “Just until I can earn my citizenship. Then we can get a quickie divorce and pretend it never happened. I’ll sign a contract or a prenup. Whatever makes you most comfortable.”
Luc blinked, then blinked again, and then he burst out laughing.
Wow. There it was. Her worst nightmare realized.
“You’re right,” she said, quickly backtracking. “It was a ridiculous idea. I don’t know what I was thinking.” She shot to her feet, when what she really wanted to do was curl up in the fetal position and wallow in shame. “Let’s forget I said anything and go have lunch.”
She tried to duck past him, and he wrapped a very large but gentle hand around the upper part of her left arm.
“Just hold on a minute,” he said in that firm but patient way of his. From anyone else it would have come off as condescending. “It is not ridiculous. Not at all. I’m laughing because I came here to suggest the exact same thing.”
It was her turn to blink in surprise. Did he mean that, or was he just trying to make her feel less stupid. “Seriously?”
“But it is a legally and morally gray area. I wasn’t sure if you would be willing to risk breaking the law.”
Desperate times required desperate measures. “I’m willing if you are.”
“We can’t risk anyone else knowing the truth.”
“I won’t tell if you don’t.”
“Drew knows. He’s the one who suggested it. But we can trust him. And I won’t lie to my mother.”
Julie had never known Drew to be anything but a stand-up guy. If Luc trusted him, so would she. And she would never expect Luc to lie to Elizabeth, nor would she want him to.
Julie had no one else to tell, except her sister, Jennifer, who probably wouldn’t care anyway. When she married her husband, an older, wealthy man she’d met on a trip to New York, he became the center of her life. She quit college and set her sights on being the perfect trophy wife. Between charity balls and country club brunches with the other trophy wives in her elite social circle, she had little time for her nomadic, unsophisticated sister.
Though she had never actually met Jennifer’s husband—nor did she care to—her sister’s description of him gave Julie a bad feeling. He sounded very controlling, like their father. But now was not the time to dredge up those old memories. She had promised herself a long time ago that she would never look back in regret, but instead learn from her past and always move forward. Always strive to better herself. Marrying Luc, though completely unexpected, would be just another leg of her journey.
“Having second thoughts already?” Luc asked, and she realized she was frowning.
“No, of course not. Just wondering what happens next.”
“Drew suggested we have the ceremony and reception at the club and we have to do it soon.”
“How soon?”
“How’s this Saturday afternoon looking for you?”
This Saturday? That was only five days away. She knew absolutely zero about planning a wedding, but less than a week sounded ridiculously fast. “Is it even possible to put a wedding together that quickly? And what about immigration? Don’t we have to have an interview or something?”
“My attorney is taking care of all of that. And as for the wedding, we’ll keep it simple. Close friends only. Very informal.”
“I don’t even know where to start.”
“All you need to do is find a dress. And a maid of honor. I’ll take care of the rest.”
Of all her friends in Royal, Lark Taylor was the closest. They’d met during the first few weeks of the cleanup efforts and became fast friends. She was a nurse in the intensive care unit at the hospital. They often took coffee breaks together, and sometimes went out for drinks after work. She was planning her own wedding to Keaton Holt, a longtime Cattleman’s Club member, so perhaps she could give Julie a few pointers.
“We’ll have to kiss,” she heard Luc say, and it took her brain a second to catch up with her ears.
“Kiss?”
“During the ceremony,” he said.
“Oh...right.” She hadn’t considered that. She thought about kissing Luc and a peculiar little shiver cascaded down the length of her spine. Back when she first met him, she used to think about the two of them doing a lot more than just kissing, but he had been too hung up on Amelia and their recently broken engagement to even think about another woman. So hung up that he left his life in Royal behind and traveled halfway around the world with Doctors Without Borders.
A recent dumpee herself, she’d been just as confused and vulnerable at the time, and she knew there was nothing worse for the ego than a rebound relationship. They were, and always would be, better off as friends. In her experience, it was usually one or the other. Mixing sex and friendship would only end in disaster.
“Is that a problem?” Luc asked.
She blinked. “Problem?”
“Us kissing. You got an odd look on your face.”
Had she? “It’s no problem at all,” she assured him, but if that was true, why did her stomach bottom out when she imagined his lips on hers. It had been a long time since she’d been kissed by anyone. Maybe too long.
“We’ll have to start acting like a married couple,” he said.
“In what way?”
“You’ll have to move in with me.”
She hadn’t really considered that, but of course a married couple would live together. Having separate residences would raise a very bright red flag. Since Julie left home, wh
en she wasn’t volunteering abroad, she’d lived alone. She liked the freedom of answering to no one but herself, of doing what she wanted to do, when she wanted to do it. That would be hard to give up.
As if Luc read her mind, he added, “Nothing in our relationship is going to change. We only have to make it look as if it has.”
But by pretending that it changed, by making it look that way to everyone else, wasn’t that in itself a change?
Ugh. She never realized how complicated this could be. She could already feel the walls closing in on her.
“Look,” he said, and this time he was the one frowning. “If any of this makes you uncomfortable, we don’t have to do it. I want you to stay in the US, and I’ll do whatever I can to help make that happen, but if it’s going to cause a rift in our friendship, maybe it’s not worth it.”
“I’m just used to living on my own. The idea of changing that is a little intimidating. But it is worth it. And I don’t want you to think that I’m not grateful. I am.”
“I know you are.” He smiled and laid a hand on her forearm, and the feel of his skin against hers gave her that little shiver again. What the heck was going on? She never used to shiver like that when he touched her. She was sure it was due only to the stress of her situation.
What else could it possibly be?
* * *
“It’s bad, isn’t it?” Julie looked up at Lark, her maid of honor, in the dressing room mirror at the Cattleman’s Club. Julie was on her third attempt of giving herself “smoky eyes.” But she looked more like a cheap street walker than a bride.
“When it comes to eyeliner and shadow, especially for someone as naturally pretty as you, I think less is more,” Lark said, which was her kind way of telling Julie to give it up.
“Oh my God, what a mess,” Julie said, swiping at her eyes with a damp cloth. It had looked pretty simple in the instructional video she’d found online, but her technique lacked a certain...finesse. Which is why she never wore the stuff.
Her father had lived by very traditional values and as teens, Julie and her sister had been forbidden to use makeup of any kind. Or wear pants. Dresses and skirts were the only acceptable attire for a female in her father’s home, and Julie had played the role of obedient daughter very well. It was easier not to make waves. She concentrated on her studies and getting into a good college. She never did develop the desire to wear makeup, but after eighteen years of wearing only skirts and dresses, she swore she would never wear anything but pants. Yet here she was now in a newly purchased, off-white, silk shift dress, which she had to admit hung nicely on her athletic frame. But with her raccoon eyes Luc was going to take one look at her and run in the opposite direction.
Her sister, the queen of all things girly and impractical, would have been a big help right about now but she wasn’t answering calls or texts. If it was anyone but Jennifer, Julie might have worried, but that was typical for her sister. She was either completely distant and unreliable, or smothering Julie with her sisterly love. There was no middle ground.
“I suck at this,” she said.
“Maybe just a little mascara and liner,” Lark suggested, with a sympathetic smile. “Would you like me to help?”
Julie looked up at her with pleading, raccoon eyes. “Yes, please.”
Lark worked her magic and she was right. Julie was lucky to have been blessed with smooth, clear skin, and just a touch of liner and mascara and a little clear gloss on her lips subtly enhanced her features.
“You’re a genius,” she told Lark.
“And you look beautiful,” Lark said, smiling and stepping back to admire her work. “Lucas is a lucky man. And forgive me for saying, but it’s about darned time you two tied the knot.”
Julie had heard that same remark from a dozen people since she and Luc made the announcement earlier that week. “It doesn’t seem...sudden?”
“I always suspected you and Luc had something going—I think everyone has—but you’re a very private person, so I didn’t want to ask. I figured that if you wanted me to know, or needed to talk about it, you would tell me.”
If there had been anything to tell, Julie probably would have.
There was a rap on the dressing room door and Lark’s sister Skye stepped into the dressing room. She looked surprisingly healthy for someone still recovering from a near-fatal car crash during the tornado. Luc had performed an emergency cesarean to save her unborn child, and her injuries had been so severe she’d been in a coma for four months. Until Skye was well enough to care for her daughter, Lark had taken responsibility for Baby Grace, who was the sweetest most adorable infant Julie had ever seen.
“It’s time,” Skye said, then sighed wistfully. “You look beautiful. Luc is a lucky guy.”
Julie took a good look at herself in the mirror, spinning in a circle to get every angle. Not half-bad.
Though she usually kept her hair pulled up into a ponytail, she’d worn it down today, in loose, soft curls that tumbled across her shoulders. She’d even put on her mother’s diamond earrings. It was the only thing of her mother’s that she had left. In his grief after she died, Julie’s father had removed every trace of his wife from their home. Photos, personal items, anything that reminded him of her. Julie had only been four at the time, but she remembered sitting on her parents’ bed, crying as she watched their housekeeper clear out her mother’s closet, shoving her clothes into black trash bags.
Between his wife’s death and having a newborn infant to care for, her father seemed to forget that he had another child who was mixed up and lonely and desperate for the unconditional love and affection her mother had always given so freely. Within weeks of her death he’d hired a nanny and began traveling extensively. He had never been what anyone would consider an attentive father, but after her mother’s death he had become virtually nonexistent.
Julie breathed deep to ease the knot of sadness in her chest, the burn of tears behind her eyes. Now was not the time to think about her less than ideal childhood. God forbid she start crying and ruin her makeup.
“How are you doing?” Lark asked. “You nervous?”
Julie shook her head. This wasn’t going to be a real marriage, so what reason did she have to be nervous?
Though they wouldn’t be married for long, she had insisted on a prenup. To protect not just his interests, but her own, as well. She’d never been the type to flaunt her wealth, but with the inheritance her father had left her and her sister, and a little savvy investing, Julie was pretty much set for life. A simple, no frills life, but that was fine with her. She didn’t need much.
“So, are you ready?” Lark asked, and Julie turned to find her and Skye watching her expectantly.
After one more quick glance in the mirror, she nodded and told her friends, “Let’s do this.”
Four
With so little time to plan the wedding, Drew had volunteered to put a guest list together for Luc. But now, as Luc stood with Drew at his side, waiting for the ceremony to begin, scanning row upon row of guests idly chatting, he was beginning to think that had been a bad idea. It seemed as if half the town was there.
He leaned in close to Drew and said in a harsh whisper, “This is your idea of small and intimate?”
“Just helping to make it convincing,” Drew said with a wry smile. It was obvious to Luc that he was thoroughly enjoying himself. “Are you nervous?”
“Of course not.” What reason did he have to be? This was nothing more than a business arrangement between friends. In fact, he felt exceedingly calm. A little bored even.
“All grooms get nervous,” Drew persisted.
“But I’m not a real groom, am I?”
“Look around you. This sure looks real to me. Besides, you can’t argue with a marriage license.”
Okay, so maybe he was a real groo
m, but not in the traditional sense. They would be married, but not really married. Together, but not really together.
Luc glanced over at his mother, who sat in her wheelchair in the front row, an encouraging smile on her face. When he told her about the marriage she was beside herself excited, even when he explained the true nature of the situation.
“It’s just a way to keep Julie in the States,” he’d explained.
“Of course it is,” she’d said with a twinkle in her eyes, as if she knew something he didn’t. If she believed it to be anything more than a friend helping out another friend, if she had her heart set on Luc and Julie falling in love, she would be sorely disappointed.
Stella Daniels, who was officiating, touched Luc’s shoulder and said softly, “Words cannot express how happy I am for the two of you. And forgive me for saying this, but it’s about damned time.”
He kept a smile planted firmly on his lips, but he felt a distinct twinge of guilt. He’d heard many similar remarks this past week, and as much as he hated the idea of lying to everyone, he and Julie had no choice.
The music started and everyone turned to the doorway where Lark stood, carrying a small bouquet of miniature yellow roses—Julie’s favorite color.
Here we go, Luc thought, his stomach bottoming out.
Okay, so, maybe he was a little nervous.
Lark made her trip down the aisle, but Luc’s attention remained fixed on the doorway, anticipation tying his stomach into knots. Then the “Wedding March” started and Julie appeared in the doorway, and all Luc could think was wow.
Rarely did he see Julie with her hair down, and in all the time he’d known her he couldn’t recall ever seeing her in a dress. Cut several inches above the knee, it was just long enough to be tasteful, but short enough to showcase her toned, suntanned calves and a little bit of thigh...
Whoa, he thought, as his pulse picked up speed. This was Julie he was gawking at, his best friend. But damn, who could blame him? She looked stunning and sexy and as his eyes met and locked on hers, he experienced a distinct tug of sexual attraction. Bordering on red-hot lust.
More Than a Convenient Bride Page 3