by Herron, Rita
But LaPone had called him a dozen times, and he couldn’t keep making excuses. He had to get this case over with.
According to the ad for the wedding shop, Izzy was using her maiden name. Had she filed for a divorce already?
At Lulabelle’s Diner, half the town had been gossiping about the sisters and their shenanigans years ago. Now they were taking bets on whether or not this little enterprise would make it.
The supporters had chipped in to help refurbish the bed-and-breakfast and the chapel the website claimed was magical.
Marry in the little chapel on the hill and your marriage will last forever.
Bullshit.
He adjusted his cowboy hat, pasted on a smile, and opened the door, causing the jingle bells to ring. A sweet floral odor hit him as he entered, then an aromatic hickory coffee smell that made his mouth water.
But the sight of lace and satin, wedding dresses, veils, and glittery shoes made him twitch with discomfort. He’d worn monkey suits to his brothers’ weddings, and he’d felt as if he was choking.
Christmas decorations were interspersed among the feminine wedding paraphernalia, a reminder of holidays and family, something he’d had and lost when his parents died.
Something he’d never have again.
Not that he missed it. Hell, he had brothers, but they had their own lives.
Besides, he liked being alone. Liked bachelorhood.
Which made the farce he was about to embark on even more ridiculous.
Could he really do this? Pretend he was getting married?
The very thought of a wedding band around his finger made his hand throb and sweat break out on his neck.
Voices echoed from the far corner, and he strode that way. A glass case had been installed to hold desserts, and he’d heard Izzy planning to add a coffee bar. For now, they had simply brought in a coffee pot.
He paused by the dessert tray on the counter to study the sisters. Daisy and Caroline were both beauties, but it was easy to pick Izzy out—that honey-blonde hair looked like cornsilk.
Caroline clenched her cell phone, a no-nonsense look on her face. “Izzy, Aunt Dottie called and said Harry’s buddy Woody, who owns those cabins up on Shoutout Creek, agreed to offer discounts to honeymooners.”
“Are the cabins in decent shape?” Izzy asked. “Because honeymooners want romance, not to stay in a run-down fishing lodge.”
Caroline pocketed her phone. “Aunt Dottie’s going to try to convince him to fix them up.”
Levi chuckled to himself. The cabins were run down and definitely designed for fishermen.
Izzy ran her finger around the rim of her coffee mug, then looked up and spotted him. For a moment, her big blue eyes widened, a spark of something that looked like attraction flickering in her gaze.
His gut tightened, heat spiraling through him.
Dammit. He could not be attracted to Izzy Sassafras. She was trouble all the way around.
“Hi,” she said in a honey-sweet voice. “Um, can I help you?”
Devils wear disguises, he reminded himself.
“Howdy, ma’am. I saw your ad online and need help planning a wedding.”
Her blonde eyebrow slid upward, then she looked around the room as if searching for someone else. “Whose wedding is it?”
He forced a smile, although he felt like his lips might crack. “Mine.”
Izzy stared at the sexy cowboy, her nerves fluttering.
One: he was the best-looking man she’d seen in ages.
Two: his gruff voice made her head dizzy.
And three: he was the miracle they’d been praying for. He wanted to plan a wedding!
But drat—he wanted to plan a wedding. Meaning he was taken with a capital T.
Not that she was looking. Or interested.
No, never again.
She had to focus on the business.
One Stop Weddings had its first client! She almost squealed with excitement.
A second later, worries ran roughshod over her joy.
The shop wasn’t nearly ready for customers. They’d barely begun to build the different areas inside the store. And Daisy and Caroline were leaving any day.
Nerves gathered in Izzy’s stomach. This man had greeted her with howdy, which was a Texas term, and she’d just left Texas and was on the run.
What if . . . ?
No. Ray had no idea where she was. For all she knew, he was glad to get rid of her. He was probably too busy boinking the country-club ladies to want her back.
“Have I come at a bad time?” the man asked.
Izzy jerked herself back to the present and the tall cowboy who conjured up images of slow dancing in the moonlight and making love until dawn.
“No, no, that’s fine. It’s just that brides usually oversee the wedding plans.” Of course, she was new in the business. Maybe grooms did want to do more these days. Ray hadn’t, but then he was Ray. All pretty boy, all lies.
“So you’re engaged?” she asked, forcing herself not to gawk at his brawny shoulders. It was barely afternoon, too, and the man sported a five o’clock shadow. Thick dark brows framed the deepest pair of brown eyes she’d ever seen, eyes that gave him a mysterious look.
A small scar that made him look dangerous, like a bad boy walking the line, grazed his temple, disappearing beneath that Stetson.
“Yes, I saw your website and liked it.”
Izzy jerked herself from her sexually induced mental stupor—her biggest flaw was getting distracted by good-looking men. Well, that and taking in strays.
Which sometimes happened to be the good-looking men, especially ones with bedroom eyes.
Determined not to fall into that trap again, she extended her hand, planning to give him a firm professional handshake. “Great. My name is Izzy Sassafras.” His big, wide hand swallowed hers. A tingle rippled up her spine. She quickly pulled her hand away. “And you are . . . ?”
“Levi Fox,” he said in a deep southern drawl, as if he’d just come off the range from a hard day’s work and needed to rest his body in a good woman’s arms.
She fanned her face. She had a good set of arms. “And the bride?” There had to be a bride. Unless he was gay.
No. No way he was gay.
“Actually I’m planning to surprise Elsa,” he said. “She’s been under the weather, and having me take charge of the wedding will alleviate her stress.”
Izzy gaped at him. He either was a total romantic or an idiot. “So you’re going to make all the decisions yourself?”
“Yes.”
Izzy swallowed back a retort. Pity that a man with such good looks didn’t have more common sense between those gorgeous eyes.
“Elsa is . . . a little frail right now,” he said. “But she has her heart set on a Christmas wedding, and I want to give it to her.”
“That’s really sweet.” A seed of envy struck Izzy. The man sounded totally smitten with his fiancée. “But doesn’t she want to pick out her flowers and see the venue? And what about her dress?”
“She already has her wedding gown. It belonged to her mother, who passed away last year.” He gestured toward the crystal cake stand showcasing a ceramic three-tiered white cake decorated with red roses and a string of pearls made from frosting. “I told her I’d coordinate with the wedding planner and send her photos of plans as we go. Then she can weigh in.”
Just how sick was Elsa?
Poor thing. Maybe she had a terminal disease or something incapacitating. Or some injury or a hideous scar that she wanted to heal before venturing out in public.
“How about other family? Does she have a mother or sister who might want to be involved?”
“No, no family, I’m afraid.” He tilted his head to the side with a sheepish grin. “Just me.”
Sympathy for Elsa mushroomed inside Izzy. No family? Not even a sister to fight with and . . . love?
Battling tears for the woman,
Izzy waved for him to follow her to the consultation desk in the bridal boutique section. “Now, sit down and tell me more about Elsa.”
Unable to resist, she reached across the desk and squeezed his hand. “I promise you, I’ll do everything I can to give her the wedding of her dreams. Your Elsa is a lucky woman to have a fiancé like you.”
CHAPTER FOUR
A sliver of guilt needled Levi at the look of sympathy in Izzy’s eyes. Dammit, she’d actually teared up when he’d implied his fiancée was ill.
Why had he concocted that lie?
Because he had to fabricate a believable story. What reason other than illness would any woman not insist on coordinating her own wedding plans? Didn’t females live for this kind of stuff?
“So,” Izzy said with a small sigh. “Tell me what you and Elsa have in mind for your special day.”
“Elsa loves the mountains,” he said, ad-libbing. “She used to come to Georgia to visit family years ago and has fond memories of this area.”
“The mountains are beautiful,” Izzy said. “But different from Texas. That is where you’re from, isn’t it?”
Levi shifted. He was supposed to extract information from her, not the other way around. “Yes.” From his undercover work, he’d learned to keep the story simple or else he’d get caught in his lies. “But since this area is special to Elsa, we want the wedding here.”
Izzy gave him a warm smile. “How long will you be in town?”
“As long as I need to be,” he said. She raised a brow, and he continued, “To get the plans in order, that is.”
“Do you have a date in mind?”
“Like I said, she has her heart set on a Christmas wedding. Christmas Eve, to be exact. Do you have that date available?”
She fidgeted, then made a show of looking at her computer as if she wasn’t sure. But from what he could tell, the business had barely opened.
“If not—”
“No, no, that date would work for us. It just doesn’t give us much time to plan.”
“What can be so complicated about planning a wedding?”
Izzy laughed, her golden hair spilling around her shoulders in waves and drawing his gaze to the long, slender column of her throat. Her skin looked like peaches and cream.
“Spoken like a man,” Izzy said with a twinkle in those sky-blue eyes. “First of all, we set the venue, which we have done. That is, if the little chapel on the hill works for you. But that depends on how many guests you have. It’s not very large. I’d say it holds about seventy-five people, so if you’re thinking a big guest list—”
“No,” Levi said. “We want something small and intimate.”
“The chapel is perfect for an intimate ceremony,” Izzy said as if she thought he was a real romantic. “Have you seen it?”
“Just the photographs on the website.”
“We’ll take a ride and I’ll give you a tour in a few minutes.” She swung her laptop around to face him, then slid into the chair beside him. Her feminine scent wafted around him, distracting him, and making his body harden.
He forced himself to breathe and glanced at the computer.
“Let’s discuss the type of theme you want for the ceremony and decorations,” Izzy said.
“Theme?”
“Yes. We can do a traditional Christmas wedding or you can choose an alternative.” She clicked through several pages of themed weddings ranging from a cowboy wedding to a Hawaiian luau to a disco setting to an adventure theme where the bride and groom, both dressed in mountain-climbing attire, dangled off the side of a cliff as they exchanged rings.
“Have you and Elsa discussed anything specific?” Izzy asked, obviously proud of her smorgasbord of ideas. She’d also used something called Pinterest to categorize wedding gowns, cakes, flowers, decorations, and grooms’ attire into modern, traditional, vintage, hip . . . the categories boggled his mind.
“Levi? Any idea?”
“A traditional Christmas theme,” he said, determined to make this simple.
“Good. That will be gorgeous. And just what the town needs.”
“What the town needs?”
She tangled her fingers in the folds of her skirt. “What with the economy and all, the town has had its troubles. Bringing romance and new businesses back to Matrimony, and a wedding on top of that, will boost everyone’s spirits. Why, it already has!”
She sounded as if she’d started this hocus-pocus One Stop Weddings to boost the town’s economy. Did the town know she’d funded her little enterprise with stolen money?
“Then you’re a local hero, huh?”
Her cheeks reddened as if she was embarrassed. “Hardly. My sisters and I created a scandal ten years ago. I don’t think the old-timers will ever forget it.”
“A scandal?”
She fiddled with her hair. “My poor aunt Dottie tried to raise us to be ladies, but we were always getting into trouble. One night we got into a huge catfight in the Triple D—”
“The Triple D?”
“The Dairy & Donut Delite.”
He remembered the photo of this infamous catfight from the archives of the local paper. “But you’ve changed?”
She shrugged. “Verdict’s still out on that,” she said with a laugh. In spite of the fact that he suspected she was a liar and con woman, he would have enjoyed seeing her half-naked, rolling on the floor in ice cream while she and her sisters went at it.
“Let’s go see the chapel now,” Izzy said, oblivious to his thoughts. “That is, unless you have somewhere else to be?”
“No, now’s fine. After all, that’s why I’m in town.” Although churches were the last place on earth he felt comfortable.
It was something his mother had said when he was small—that he had the devil in his soul. He’d always felt like lightning would strike him down the moment he stepped inside a sanctuary.
Still, he had started this sham, and he had to find out the truth behind Izzy Sassafras.
He steeled himself against her seductive eyes—no way would he fall for her southern charm and lies.
Izzy’s heart melted every time Levi said Elsa’s name. He obviously adored the woman and wanted to make her happy.
Maybe there was one good man left in the world.
“Do you want to take two cars or one?” Izzy asked as they stepped outside. “I’d offer to drive, but my little bug won’t give you much leg room.” Besides, it looked pathetic with that big dent in the front. She had no idea where she’d get the money or time to have it repaired.
Levi’s mouth twitched with a frown when he spotted it. “You had an accident?”
“Tried to avoid hitting an”—she stated to stay armadillo but didn’t want to mention that she’d come from Texas—“animal in the road and I hit a tree.”
“Ah.” He gestured toward a black SUV parked on the street. “We’ll take mine.”
She climbed in the passenger side, surprised by his politeness in opening the door for her. Once she’d tied herself to Ray, his manners had soured like sweet milk left out in ninety-degree summer heat.
When she got in, she glanced around for any signs of his fiancée—a lipstick, sweater, pair of panties on the floor—but saw nothing.
“You asked me if I was from Texas,” Levi said as he pulled away from the main street. “Does that mean you’ve been there?”
The chapel was only a couple miles away, set on a beautiful hill surrounded by roses that surprisingly, in spite of the weather, grew most of the year. Another part of the magic.
Izzy chewed her bottom lip for a moment. “Um, I took a trip there a long time ago. Pretty country, but I missed home.” Well, she had missed her sisters. And now she was back, she realized how picturesque and tranquil the rolling hills, trees, and mountains were.
With winter setting in, they might have snow, which would give the mountain peaks a majestic look.
“About the date—you realize th
at Christmas Eve is only two weeks away. That gives us a short window of time to narrow down details.”
“Yes, I know,” Levi said as he maneuvered the switchbacks on the curvy road. “I guess that means we’ll be spending a lot of time together.”
A frisson of something warm tingled inside her. Spending time with this hunky man would be fun.
Except he was engaged to another woman.
And she needed this job, this wedding, to be perfect. After all, she could build off it to advertise for the future.
She didn’t want to disappoint Aunt Dottie—or Daisy or Caroline, even though a wall as big as Lookout Mountain still stood between the sisters.
He veered onto the graveled lot of the little white chapel, which was set at the top of a hill, the sweeping live oaks and magnolias set against the mountain ridges. Gold flowerpots holding poinsettias flanked both sides of the door, the stained-glass windows glittering in the midday sunlight.
He parked and cut the engine, and she watched him study the chapel. “This is it, the magic chapel?”
Did she detect a note of derision in his voice? No . . . she’d imagined that. “That’s what the locals say. But I think the real magic is the love that a couple brings to the chapel.” She swallowed back a retort about her own failed marriage. “Just like you and Elsa will bring.”
Okay, maybe she sounded sappy now. But how romantic that this man would oversee the wedding plans to make his bride happy?
“We do have something special,” Levi said.
She looked into his dreamy eyes. “Was it love at first sight?”
He jammed his hands in the pockets of his jacket as if the question made him uncomfortable. “Yes. Love at first sight.”
No wonder Elsa had fallen for him. “Ah.” Izzy’s heart fluttered. “How did you two meet?”
He paused for a moment, then cleared his throat. “She came to my ranch, the Silver Dollar, interested in taking riding lessons. She said it was something she’d always wanted to do but never had the chance.”
He hesitated, obviously lost in the memory. Maybe still moved by the first time he’d seen his precious Elsa.