Almost To The Altar

by Neesa Hart

  “You were engaged six times, and married zero. That’s not exactly the world’s best track record.”

  LuAnne shrugged. “So I was smart enough to know they weren’t the right one. Maybe you should try that.”

  In spite of herself, Elise laughed. “All right, all right,” she said, holding up her hands in surrender. “I promise I’ll think about it. Now, are you going to do my hair or not?”

  LuAnne grinned at her. “Of course. I’m not going to have you walking around with this gray showing. People might start to talk.” She paused as she reached for the hair dryer again. “And you still haven’t told me if he kisses good.”

  Elise spun her chair around so that she faced the mirror. “I do not have gray,” she insisted. The familiar joke calmed her nerves. She and LuAnne had been sharing this same conversation about coloring her hair for the past three years. Once a month LuAnne put a color wash in Elise’s hair to hide the gray, and once a month Elise denied it. The familiarity seemed to anchor her thoughts back in the present, where they belonged. “And yes,” she added, “he’s good.”

  At seven o’clock Saturday morning, her phone rang. Elise awoke through several layers of fog. For days she’d been wrestling with her reaction to Wil, and the mental turmoil had taken its physical toll. She’d planned to sleep in that morning, before making a Saturday trip, necessitated by the details of the Collingham auction, to the of-!!fice. At the jarring ring, she squinted at the clock with a low groan.

  It had to be Parker. With the time difference between Chicago and Bangkok, he called at strange hours. She reached for the phone with a weary sigh. Grappling for a moment with the receiver, she finally managed to juggle it to her ear.

  “Hello?”

  “Elsa?” The heavily accented voice momentarily confused her.

  “Hello?”

  “Elsa, this is Jan Larsen.”

  She frowned. “Jan?”

  “I woke you, no?”

  The fact that he sounded more amused than contrite heightened her irritation. “Yes. Is something wrong?”

  “Yah. We got a problem with the Packard.”

  Instantly she came awake. Elise sat up in the bed, clutching the receiver. “Problem?”

  “Yah. I found rust inside the body.”

  “Rust? How much?”

  “Bad. Painted over. Collingham might not have known.”

  This, Elise knew, was a potentially serious problem. The cars had to be ready for sale, and certifiably restored, in less than two weeks. A problem like this could mean weeklong delays in finding replacement parts and restoring the vehicle. Expenses would rise, and if Jan spent too much time working on the Packard, the refurbishment of the other cars might suffer in the meantime. Roger Philpott was not going to like this.

  Elise quickly considered the options. “The whole body, or just several parts?”

  “Mostly the rear quarter panel. The rest, I think I can grind and putty.”

  “Can you get a new part in time?”

  “This is the thing,” he told her. “I have found the part, but I need it today. Rob McKitrick has one, but he will be gone, on vacation, after tomorrow. If I don’t get it today, we will not have it until too late.”

  “Fine. Great. Whatever you need.”

  “Not so easy,” Jan said. “This part, it is expensive. I didn’t know before, so it’s not part of our original esti-!!mate.”

  “Not a problem. I’ll authorize the extra expense, and fire you out the paperwork on Monday.”

  “No. Won’t work. I can’t get the part without credit authorization from you.”

  A sinking sensation settled in the pit of her stomach. “From me?”

  “Yah. As I say. It’s expensive. McKitrick wants to know your firm will pay. I will need the paperwork.”

  “I can fax it to you this afternoon.”

  “I have to have an original signature. That’s part of the contract we signed with your firm.”

  Frustrated, she mentally cursed Roger Philpott to hell. He’d insisted on the unwieldy contract, and now they were stuck with its terms. “Do you need it this morning?”

  “Yah. It’s a two-hour drive to McKitrick’s.”

  “Oh, all right.” There didn’t seem to be a choice. She glanced at the clock. “I’ll be there in thirty minutes.”

  By the time she reached the garage, her nerves were ready to split her in two. From the moment she hung up the phone, she’d begun a silent vigil of prayer that Wil would have the good sense not to be at the garage when she arrived. She needed another confrontation with him like she needed a hole in her head. She still hadn’t recovered from the last one.

  In the days since she’d seen him, she’d done all she could to put him out of her thoughts, but memories had intruded on her peace of mind like berry seeds stuck be-!!tween her teeth. If only she could find a way to spit him out, she thought wryly, she could get on with her life.

  Between arguing with Roger all week about the details of the auction, crushing down the overwhelming feeling of panic she’d experienced both times Parker phoned her from Bangkok and trying not to ponder all the reasons why she was allowing the havoc Wil caused in her life, she’d worked herself into a first-class case of neurosis.

  The last time Parker called, she’d told him she wanted to be married in September. He’d hedged, telling her he didn’t think six months gave her adequate time to plan the wedding, but Elise had insisted. She felt better, more in con-!!trol, knowing the date was on the calendar. At the moment, control was at a premium, and she’d take whatever she could get.

  Scanning the quiet garage for signs of Wil, she killed the engine with a sigh of relief. He didn’t appear to be on the premises.

  “Jan?” she called as she entered the service bay. “You in here?” Silence greeted her. Only Edsel appeared to be tending the shop. She stopped to scratch his ears. “Morning, Edsel. Where is everybody?”

  The tomcat purred in rapture, then flopped onto his back so that she could scratch his stomach. With a soft laugh, Elise rubbed his wide belly. “You lazy thing,” she told him. “It’s no wonder you’re so fat.”

  “Well, he gets more action than I do, that’s for sure.” The humor in Wil’s deep voice startled her.

  Abruptly she stood. Edsel gave Wil an irate look for having interrupted her stroking. Elise felt a strange sense of relief at seeing him again. Somehow, the conversation they’d had had drained the pressure from their relationship. For the first time, she felt as though she were facing him on equal footing. “Wil.”

  “Morning, Elsa.”

  “I—I wasn’t expecting you.”

  “I figured you probably weren’t.”

  She forced herself not to fidget. “Jan said he had something for me to sign.”

  “Uh-huh. Are you ready to go?”

  “Go?” He leaned against the door frame of the small office, looking just as sexy, and just as lethal, as always.

  He wore a white collarless shirt, its billowy fit offset by an unbuttoned suede vest the color of melted chocolate. Somehow, the loose-fitting shirt made his shoulders seem. even broader than she remembered. Jeans with the faded look of an old friend rode low on his hips, and the morning light found golden accents in his hair. Vividly she re-!!membered the feel of that silky hair beneath her fingers, the weight of him pressing her to the building. She had to stifle the urge to take a hasty step back from the door.

  “Go,” he said. “It’s a long drive. Almost all the way to Milwaukee.” His voice was steady, in stark contrast to her nerves.

  “Milwaukee?” She had the vague idea that she sounded like a fool, but somehow she’d missed an important part of the discussion. Fiddling with the top button of her royalblue cardigan, she continued to stare at him.

  He advanced the final paces across the garage to where she stood. Capturing her fingers, he gently pried them away from the button of her sweater. “McKitrick’s shop,” he clarified. “It’s over two hours away, and if we’re
going to get there before noon, we’d better go.”

  The feel of his fingers on hers broke the spell long enough for his words to sink in. “Oh.” She edged away from him, pulling her fingers free of his grasp. “I’m not going with you. I’m just here to sign the papers.”

  Wil frowned. “Pop didn’t tell you, did he?”

  “Tell me what?” His scent, warm and musky, like leather and soap and pleasantly natural, wrapped around her, a seductive cocoon.

  “Damn it,” he muttered.

  “Tell me what?” Elise insisted, fighting a growing surge of panic.

  “You have to go with me.”

  She stared at him, wide-eyed, then slowly shook her head. “I’m not-”

  “You have to.” He rubbed a hand over his face. “He planned this, the coot.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  Frustration showed in his gaze. “Pop knew you wouldn’t come if he told you you’d have to go up there with me.”

  “He was right about that.”

  “But you’ve got to sign the credit forms. I can’t do it, and I can’t take your signature. It’s a premium part, and McKitrick doesn’t trust lawyers. He wants the real thing, in person.”

  “Well, then, he’ll just have to—”

  “Look, if you want this car done in time for your auction, we have to get the part today.” He paused. “Before noon.”

  “Why can’t Jan go with me?”

  “He left.”

  “Left?”

  “Left. He went after some varnish for the Suiza.”

  “He could have sent you for the varnish.”

  “Yeah, he could have. But he didn’t. He also didn’t tell me that you hadn’t agreed to go.”

  Despite herself, Elise couldn’t quite prevent a smile at the ludicrous situation. “So here we are, right back where we started.”

  He seemed slightly taken aback by her odd mood. “I guess we are.”

  With a shake of her head, she muttered. “Crafty man, your father.”

  “Devious, too.”

  Elise glanced out through the open service bay of the garage. The weather promised a clear day, the kind made for long drives. Jan had deftly outmaneuvered them. The only way around the situation would be for them to take separate cars, which seemed both ridiculous and childish. A part of her suspected that Jan probably could have found a quarter panel closer to Chicago, and less difficult to obtain; but another part, the part that prided itself on best-!!ing a legal colleague, or developing a particularly effective strategy, had to admire the old man’s cunning. With a brief smile, she said, “Okay, look. You’re an adult, I’m an adult, we should be able to handle this.”

  “He set us up, you know.”

  “Sure, I know. Your father’s playing matchmaker. So what else is new?” Deliberately she calmed the flutters in her stomach.

  “We’ll have to be together all morning.”

  “I can promise to get through one day without arguing, if you can. We used to be friends. How hard can it be?”

  His eyes narrowed. “Elsa?”

  “What?”

  “Do I make you nervous?”

  The flutters returned with a vengeance. “Nervous? Of course not.”

  “Hmm. You make me nervous.”

  Her eyes widened. “I do?”

  He crossed the garage to stand directly in front of her. “Sure. You make me nervous as hell.”

  At his quiet admission, what remained of her anxiety ebbed away, like air through a punctured balloon. This was Wil, once her closest friend. Once her lover. She had no reason to fear him. “All right, maybe I am a little ner-!!vous.”

  “Wil paused to tuck an errant lock of hair behind her ear. The feel of his fingers on her skin was like a summer breeze, warm and gentle. “So let’s make a deal,” he said.

  “Last time you wanted to make a deal with me,” she told him, remembering that he’d offered to leave her alone if their lunch date failed, “I lost.”

  The spark in his eyes told her that he remembered it, too. “So you did.”

  “I’m a smart person, a lawyer, for God’s sake. I should know better than to cut deals with a guy who used to trade several million dollars a day at the Merc.”

  His laugh warmed her. “You probably should, Coun-!!selor.”

  “So why do I keep falling into this trap?”

  “Because I figure you have to be at least as curious as I am about why things combusted between us on Tuesday.”

  “What’s going on is a simple case of chemical attraction and overblown memories.”

  “If you say so.”

  “It is. I told you, if we ignore it, it’ll go away.”

  “Just like that?” He waved his hands in front of him. “Poof.”

  “Poof.”

  “So why are you nervous?”

  He’d neatly maneuvered her into a corner. The only way clear was a bluff. “I don’t know. The last time I saw you, we ended up having yet another argument.” With a brief shrug, she tried to ignore the tantalizing way his scent tickled her nose. “It’s not exactly a promising precedent for a pleasant morning.”

  “Have I ever told you,” he asked, with a grin that made the soles of her feet tingle, “how much it turns me on when you speak lawyer?”

  At the quip, Elise frowned at him. It was past time she exerted her own rules in this little game he was playing. “I want you to stop baiting me,” she told him. “And if you don’t, I’m not going.”

  “I’m not trying to bait you.”

  “You are, too. I’ve known you a long time, Wil, and I know just what you’re up to. The only way this is going to work is if you quit trying to get under my skin. Absolutely no conversations about pistons, premature ignition, or Parker Conrad.”

  “What will we talk about?”

  “You figure it out.”

  “That brings me to the deal I want to make with you.”

  “It does?”

  “It does.” He took another step forward, and if she hadn’t been so distracted by wondering how one man could possibly generate so much heat, she might have resented the intimidation tactic. Wil took her hand in his and laid it on his chest. “Today, can we just forget everything that’s happened in the past, and see what’s happening now?”

  A tiny sliver of fear worked its way down her spine. That, she knew, could be dangerous. Without the past to divide them, she could fall hard for this man as she had once before. Only a fool would accept a bargain like that. “It’s impossible.”

  “Of course it isn’t. We’ll just find something else to talk about. Today, it’ll just be you and me, like two normal people. No secrets, no regrets, no hang-ups.”

  “Everyone has hang-ups. If they didn’t talk about their hang-ups, they’d have nothing to say.”

  “Maybe we’ll consider getting to hang-ups around three o’clock this afternoon.”

  Elise hedged. “Then what?”

  The twinkle in his eyes taunted her. “You afraid?”

  “Maybe.”

  “Me too.”

  “There’s only one way I’m going to agree to go with you today.”

  “Name it.”

  “If, after today, we find out we’ve got nothing in common anymore, I want you to leave me alone.”

  “I will.”

  Elise drew a resigned breath. His concession gave her the edge she needed. “Then we have a deal.”

  As if the sun had suddenly found its way through the clouds, Wil felt a pall lift from the prospect of the day with Elise’s concession. His mood eased into one of lazy contentment as he considered spending an entire day learning what made Elise Christopher just so tempting. “Okay,” he told her, flashing her a brilliant smile as he dug into the pocket of his jeans. “Want to drive?”

  Chapter Five

  Five minutes later, they stood behind the garage while Elsa inspected his red Stingray. With what could only be called a loving caress, she dragged her fingers along the sleek
lines of the driver’s-side fender. Wil felt a familiar tightening in his lower body as he watched her slowly examine the car. If he knew one thing about Elsa, it was that she was one of a rare breed of women who truly appreciated the artistic value of a fine automobile, something that had always managed to keep his hormones in an uproar.

  Evidently, he decided, when her hand rubbed the hood emblem, age hadn’t lessened the effect. As he watched her stroke his car, he knew with a primitive surge of satisfaction why car shows inevitably featured gorgeous women draped over the hoods of expensive automobiles.

  “Where did you find this?” she asked him.

  “You want the truth?”

  She stopped to check the polish on the grill as she rounded the hood. “Um-hmm.”

  “I picked it up for twelve hundred dollars at a junkyard where I was scrounging for parts. It was in horrible condi-!!tion.”

  She gave him a look of shared outrage. “How could somebody let that happen to a car like this?”

  “My thoughts exactly,” he told her. “It took me almost two years to get it restored to the way I wanted it. There are still a couple of parts I’m trying to find originals for, but they’re minor.”

  The look she gave him was pure feminine delight. “You’re sure I get to drive this?”

  He laughed. “I wouldn’t tease about something like that, although I confess, when I taught you to drive that clunky sedan, I never imagined I’d be letting you behind the wheel of something like this.”

  “How are we going to bring the part back?”

  “We’ll tie it down. Pop’s got the truck.”

  “Yet another well-laid plan, I guess.”

  “Probably. I doubt he counted on my letting you drive, though.”

  She wrinkled her nose at him. “I drive very well, thank you.”

  He opened the driver’s-side door for her, and waited until she’d settled herself in the luxurious leather bucket seat before he rounded the car to the passenger side. “I don’t doubt it,” he said as he eased into his seat. “I just recall that you really liked speed.”

  She flashed him a brief smile. The engine roared to life with a turn of the key. The feeling of power and energy hummed through the vehicle. It seemed a particularly appropriate backdrop, he decided, for the energy he felt pulsing from Elsa to him. “You know,” she said, “I think, aesthetically speaking, I’ve always preferred 1930s-model cars for sedans, but nobody—” she revved the engine “—no body did sports cars like the fifties.”