The Case Of The Vainshed Groom
“To you. You’ve made me a very happy man today. You have given me riches beyond compare.”
“I do love you,” she whispered, gazing into his warm brown eyes. Desire tickled her deep inside. With it came guilt. Her one affair had happened a long time ago when she was in college, but the shame from then mingled with her recent infatuation with Ross Duke. A horrible urge filled her to confess everything.
“Dawn? What’s the matter?”
She had to look away. She had never meant to deceive him, but now she was trapped in her lies. “There are things about me you don’t know.” She pressed the rim of the flute against her lower lip. The fuzzy sweetsourness tickled her nose. “I should have told you before. I—I—I have done something I’m rather ashamed of.”
“I know everything about you I need to know.” He touched her chin with a fingertip and gently urged her to look at him. “Darling Dawn. You are precious to me. If what you mean to say is you have acted a bit indiscreetly in the past, rest assured it makes no difference to me. What matters is now.”
She searched his eyes, fearing she’d find anger or insincerity or jealousy. She found warmth, compassion and shining love. The urge to confess withered.
He touched her champagne flute with his. Crystal against crystal rang like a bell. “A toast to the happiness you have given me by becoming my bride.”
He drank deeply; she followed suit, draining her champagne. An aftertaste tightened her cheeks. The wine had soured, leaving an acrid taste in her mouth. She smiled quickly so as not to spoil the moment.
Seconds later her head began to spin and nausea roiled in her belly. She regretted every drop of champagne she’d swallowed this evening.
“Darling?”
Quentin’s voice seemed to come from a hundred miles away. Rosy lights swirled and danced, offering no opportunity to focus on anything. She swayed and was vaguely aware of dropping the truffle. She knew she had dropped it, but could not make her hand grab for it. Before she realized it, she was sitting on the bed while Quentin loomed over her. Her vision doubled and his image swam before her eyes.
“Are you all right?” he asked, smiling as he held her shoulders.
“The champagne.” Her voice sounded froggy and slow. Her head felt as if it weighed a thousand pounds and it took every ounce of willpower she possessed to hold it upright.
“An excellent vintage, wouldn’t you agree? Only the best for you, darling, only the very best.”
DAWN OPENED her eyes slowly, painfully. Gradually her vision adjusted enough to give her a shadowy view of curtained windows. As her head cleared, she remembered she was in the honeymoon cabin with her new husband.
Chilled, she rubbed her bare arms. Stiff fabric against her forearms roused her curiosity. She felt her bosom and belly, tracing the patterns of leaves and roses. She recognized her sash and the embroidered-rose fasteners.
She was still wearing her wedding dress!
She gingerly felt about her and figured out she lay atop the covers on the bed. Which meant the large shape under the covers next to her was Quentin.
She covered her eyes with both hands. Only she—clumsy, inept, ridiculous she—could get drunk on her wedding night and pass out on her groom. She swore she’d never drink another drop of champagne as long as she lived.
“Quentin?” she said softly. “Dear?” She sat up and looked over his body. The cold blue light of the clock showed it was not yet five in the morning.
She eased off the bed. With both hands outstretched, she groped her way to the bathroom. Only after she had shut the door did she turn on the light.
The light seemed as bright as a phosphorous flare, piercing her eyeballs with needles. Eyes squeezed shut, she sagged against the door and groaned. So this was what a hangover felt like. Lovely.
The pain faded quickly and by degrees she opened her eyes, testing her tolerance. Except for a mild throbbing in her sinuses she felt fine.
She glowered at her reflection. Her beautiful dress was rumpled and dingy-looking. Half her hair had come loose and now hung in scruffy hanks around her face. What remained of the twist had tangled into a lopsided knot. Mascara was smeared under her eyes and her face was blotchy. The string of pearls had left a red imprint along her neck, giving her the appearance of a strangulation victim.
Groaning, she turned away from the mirror, and faced another. The bathroom was lined with mirrors and inset lighting. The afteraffects of her overindulgence were thrown back at her in triplicate and quadruplicate.
Her gaze rested on the bathtub, an oval gold- and-pinkmarble delight big enough for two. If she hadn’t been such a lush, she and Quentin could have spent an hour or two frolicking in the tub. “But, no,” she muttered. “You have to drink too much and spoil everything.”
She stripped out of her clothing, praying a good dry cleaner could repair the damage she’d done to her dress. She stepped into the shower stall and turned on the water full force in hopes that the hot, pulsating spray would make the remainder of her headache vanish.
When she was done, she peeked out of the bathroom. The room had lightened enough for her to discern Quentin’s bulk under the covers. Not enough, though, for her to figure out where the employees who’d transferred her belongings from the lodge to this cabin had put her negligée.
She mustered courage. They were married, which meant no secrets—or shyness—between them. She looked down at her nude body. A strict regimen of exercise and proper diet kept her trim, but her breasts were too small and her hips were angular.
For better or worse, she thought. Quentin knew he hadn’t married a beauty queen. Giving herself no time for cowardice, she stepped out of the bathroom. She left the door ajar and followed the narrow strip of light to the bed.
Quentin lay on his side with his back to her. The morning was cool, but not cold, yet the covers were bundled to his ear. She eased pillows out of the way, and slid under the sheets.
The heat radiating off him took her aback. She laid a hand against his bare shoulder, finding him damp with sweat. She marveled he could bear the weight of the sheets, blanket and comforter. A smile tugged her lips. Perhaps he had overindulged in the champagne, too. Perhaps she wasn’t the only one who had been in no shape last night to take advantage of the bridal bed.
Perhaps he might forgive her.
She folded back the covers, baring him to the waist. Between the pale glow of the clock, the silvering light of dawn seeping through the curtains and the light from the bathroom, she had a view of a shadow man. He smelled hot and distinctly masculine. She caressed his shoulder and was amazed by how hard his muscles felt in repose. She explored his ribs and waist, finding him lean and muscular without a trace of softness. For a man who showed not the slightest interest in exercise or sports, he was in surprisingly good shape.
Heat flooded her midsection, centering deep within her belly. She pushed the covers all the way off, kicking the comforter off the bed. Wide-eyed, she sat up and admired his long, sleek body, now outlined in gold and silver.
“Quentin?” She poked his shoulder with a finger. “Quentin, it’s morning, dear. Time to wake up.”
He remained exactly as he had been.
Irked by his lack of response, she considered her options. Leaving him alone seemed the most considerate thing to do. Unlike her, Quentin was not a morning person. She could order coffee and breakfast. Surely the smell of coffee would rouse him in a gentle, friendly manner. Or, she could take a morning jog through the forest and he’d be awake by the time she returned.
She poked him again. This time he grunted and shifted his arm. “I love you, dear,” she said. “I’m sorry I drank too much last night. I have no head for alcohol.”
She ran her tongue over a hard ridge of muscle along his triceps. His skin had a faintly salty taste, with a woodsy undertone. He shifted again and pawed at his face. She kissed the side of his neck and his hair tickled her nose. He made a soft mmm sound, and she decided it meant approval.
Amused, but frustrated, she wondered if there were boundaries of taste in marital relations. This one-sided exploration was beginning to make her feel as if she were molesting him.
She grasped his shoulder with both hands and pulled him over onto his back. He lolled, his right hand flopping onto the mattress.
“Are you playing a joke on me?” She peered closely at his face, longing to see his features. “Wake up, dear.”
She delicately touched the center of his chest, resting her fingertips over his heart. His chest rose and fell, and crisp hairs parted before her caress. His skin had cooled. She followed the cleft between his pectorals, up to the bony ridge of his clavicle, detoured in the intriguing musculature at the base of his throat and then to his chin. Beard stubble rasped her fingers. She found his lips supple and soft.
She pressed a kiss to his mouth.
She drew back a few inches. He smacked his lips.
“I knew you were awake,” she whispered. She kissed him again, savoring the erotic sensitivity of her lips and the warmth of his.
He touched a hand to her shoulder. Triumphant, grown giddy with excitement, she pressed the kiss and he responded by parting his lips. She touched the tip of her tongue to his and fire burst within her, filling her with liquid heat. He clutched her shoulder, his fingers touchingly awkward, but very strong.
Unable to bear either the silence or darkness, she reached over his chest and groped for the nightstand. He slid his hand over her back and pressed her closer to him. His mouth turned hot against her neck, kissing her with wet lustiness. She shivered.
“Let me find the light, dear.” Her body was twisted into an awkward position, so she struggled for balance. He resisted her efforts, holding her against him with one arm. Her breasts burned against his chest. She almost gave up on finding the lamp when his hold relaxed and she lunged over his body.
He mumbled unintelligibly and stroked his hand flat along her spine, ending up resting it boldly on her bare bottom. She gasped and found the lamp. She turned on the light.
Turning about, resting across his body, she smiled down at her groom.
She realized instantly the situation was not right, but it was so not right her brain locked up, unable to process what she saw. Instead of falling in heavy, jet-black, straight hanks, his hair was brown and soft with a curl. His face, instead of being rather full with heavy jowls, was lean and chiseled with high cheekbones and a squarish jaw. The eyes were all wrong, too. Instead of warm brown, they were bleary, bloodshot and pewter-gray.
He squinted as if the light pained him.
Dawn remembered a time she’d absentmindedly walked into a men’s room instead of the ladies’ room. It had taken several seconds for the sight of urinals and the absence of a vanity to sink in so she could realize her mistake. Once she had, she’d been horrified.
But not half as horrified as she was now.
Ross Duke grimaced. “Dawn? What are you doing in my room?”
Chapter Three
A reasonable explanation existed. One always did, even if it didn’t appear exactly reasonable at first glance. Or so Dawn told herself as she stared at Ross’s confused face.
But explanations, reasonable or otherwise, eluded her completely. Ending up naked in a bed with her husband’s best man defied explanation. Scarcely daring to breathe, her heart drumming in her ears, she inched backward, cringing as her breasts collided with his chest. She groped blindly for a pillow, found something fluffy and snatched it to her bosom. Never taking her eyes off Ross’s face, she crawled slowly, clumsily across the bed.
Ross watched her as if she were a strange, potentially dangerous species of animal.
The mattress seemed a hundred yards wide, but finally her feet found empty air and she slid onto the floor. Hunched over, holding the pillow over her breasts and belly, she backed toward the bathroom.
Ross suddenly dropped an arm over his eyes.
She scooted into the bathroom and slammed the door, fumbling with the lock until it turned. She looked wildly around the bathroom. Spying a pair of fluffy, terry-cloth robes hanging on the back of the door, she grabbed one, dropped the pillow and clothed herself.
Half-fearing Ross would come bursting through the door, she kept a fierce gaze on it as she sank onto the rim of the bathtub.
“A nightmare,” she whispered. Her heart thudded, making her chest ache.
This had to be a-nightmare—a reasonable enough explanation considering all the champagne and rich food she’d indulged in last night. If she went to the door and peeked out, the man on the bed would be Quentin. She’d married Quentin, she’d gone to bed with Quentin, she’d explored Quentin’s body and nearly made love to him.
She was going insane.
Or perhaps. Her eyes widened, and her heart began hammering anew. She’d had a nightmare and sleepwalked, something she’d done often as a child. This wasn’t the honeymoon cabin, it was Ross’s room in the lodge. By now, Quentin must have realized she was missing and he’d never understand how she’d ended up in his best friend’s bedroom.
Sharp raps on the. door made her moan. She clutched her knees, certain she was going to be sick. Please be Quentin, she prayed, let me wake up and discover the man banging on the door is Quentin.
“Dawn? What’s going on? Open the door.”
Ross! Tears rose, but she choked them down, leaving her throat sore and her eyes burning. She rocked on the tub edge.
“I’m in trouble here,” he called. “Please open the door.”
He was in trouble? As far as he was concerned, this situation held the potential for a funny story to tell all his friends. She, on the other hand, had awakened from a somnambulist nightmare in another man’s bed and hadn’t the faintest idea how to explain her near-adultery to her husband!
“Dawn? Sweetheart, answer me. Are you all right? Dawn!”
The edge of fear in his voice reached her. She crept to the door. “Please go away,” she called through the wood.
“I can’t. Open the door.”
Steeling her nerves, she unlocked the door and opened it about an inch. She peered out. To her relief Ross had wrapped a sheet around his waist.
He held up a hand, showing her his empty palm. “I swear to God, I don’t know how I got in here. Where’s Quent?”
She opened the door wide enough to take a good look at the room. She recognized the honeymoon cabin. So it was her bed, not Ross’s. She opened the door all the way.
With one hand clutching the sheet, Ross held his head with his other hand and staggered toward the bed. He sat heavily, bent over so his face nearly touched his knees. “Where’s Quent?”
Good question. She tiptoed out of the bathroom and turned on a nearby light. Ross winced away from the new source of illumination. He rubbed his eyes with the pads of his fingers. Glancing frequently at him to make certain he didn’t try anything funny, she searched the room. No Quentin.
She did find her belongings. Her luggage was stacked neatly inside a closet and her garments had been draped on hangers or folded and placed in dresser drawers. But she didn’t find anything belonging to her husband. Not a suitcase or a shirt or a hairbrush, nothing. Feeling a rise of panic, she dropped onto a chair and lowered her head between her knees. She breathed deeply until she could think again.
“Dawn?” His eyes were a little clearer. “Do you feel sick, too?”
“Where is my husband? What have you done with him?”
“I didn’t do anything.” He gave his head a shake, and winced. “Feels like two weeks’ worth of bad booze.”
“Get dressed and get out! If this is a joke, it isn’t funny. So you—”
“Quit yelling at me.” He pressed his hands to his ears. “I can’t think.”
Dawn jumped off the chair and rushed to the bed. She tore through the covers around the floor, looking for Ross’s clothing. She didn’t find so much as a sock. “I don’t want you to think. I want you out of here. Where are your clothes?”
“I don’t know.” He held out a hand, but she skittered away, putting as much distance between them as possible without actually leaving the room. He groaned and dropped his hand. “Fine. I’ll just march my naked butt across the grounds to the lodge. Everybody will get a big laugh out of that.”
She gazed at the window. The sun was up. “You don’t know where your clothes are? You don’t know where my husband is?”
“No.”
The mournful look he gave her went straight to her heart. Acknowledging his status as a victim did little to calm or assure her. She clutched her knees with shaking hands. “There is a perfectly reasonable explanation for this.”
“Okay?” He eyed her expectantly. “What?”
“To start with, how did you get in here?”
He turned his attention to the door. Neither the chain nor the security catch were fastened. “I think I got conked on the head.” He lifted a hand to his head and poked around the back of his skull. He winced. “I’ve got a bruise.”
Warily, hoping he was telling a tall tale—the implications of his telling the truth were too horrible to contemplate—she moved to his side. He leaned forward and she examined the back of his head. She found a tender spot and a bump on his scalp.
“Do you think you have a concussion?”
“Maybe, I don’t know. I saw a prowler sneaking around the honeymoon cabins. He must have hit me.”
She sat on the edge of the bed, but away from him. Even touching his hair reminded her too vividly of how closely she’d come to unwitting adultery—how much she’d desired him. Even looking at him was dangerous.
“I was helping out Stefan last night. Playing valet and fetching cars for your guests—”
“You were working?”
“I made twenty-eight bucks in tips.” A ghost of a smile appeared on his haggard face. “Anyway, your last guest left around midnight. I was about to turn in when Stefan said he saw someone carrying luggage to the parking lot.”
“Why is that unusual?”
“It’s unusual at midnight when there aren’t any guests checking out. But when I reached the parking lot, I .couldn’t find anybody. It bugged me. Stefan is just a kid, but he doesn’t make things up. He and I hung out in the parking lot for about an hour. I finally sent him to bed, but then I saw somebody on the walkway headed toward the Honeymoon Hideaway.”
She made herself look closely at his face while he spoke. The story had a fishy ring to it, beginning with him helping Stefan fetch cars for the guests. None of this led to an explanation as to where her husband had gone.
“The lights were on inside this cabin. I thought I saw somebody peeking in the window.”
Dawn inhaled sharply. “A peeping Tom?”
“I don’t know for certain,” he added quickly. “The bushes and trees are thick. Shadows are funny. What I really had was a feeling.”
“A feeling?”
“Call it a hunch.” He averted his gaze. “I was worried about you. The Colonel doesn’t have professional security people. He thinks he can handle any problems himself. So I snooped around.” He touched the back of his head, his expression turned thoughtful. “Somebody hit me.”
He looked much, much better than he had only a few minutes ago. His color was normal and his eyes had cleared. Dawn shook her head in denial. If he’d been struck hard enough to render him unconscious for hours, then he would have a severe concussion. Yet at the moment he didn’t display a single symptom of a head injury.
He narrowed his eyes. “You don’t believe me.”
“My husband is missing. You’re not. I’m sorry, Ross, but your story has a few holes in it.”
“I’m telling the truth.”
“Like the Jesse James suite was the truth? Or what about the white stallion your father caught trying to steal mares from the stable, which turned out to be a valuable circus horse kidnapped for ransom? I believed those tall tales, at first.” She jumped to her feet and paced. The snakes in her belly writhed painfully. “If this is some kind of horrible joke you and Quentin have concocted, it isn’t funny. It will never be funny.”
“Dawn, look at me. Do you see me laughing? Do you see one teeny-tiny ha ha anywhere in this scenario? Yeah, I like a good joke, but I’m not cruel.”
She paused in her pacing and stared miserably at the floor. “Then where is Quentin?”
“I don’t know.” He combed his fingers through his hair and frowned, his gaze distant. “Look around. See if he left a note. A message on the phone. Anything.”
She had already looked, but did so again. Confirming that all of Quentin’s luggage and other belongings were missing only heightened her fear. “Robbers,” she said. “They stole all of Quentin’s belongings and took him hostage. I must call the police.”
“Robbers,” he echoed, making no attempt to soften his skepticism. “I can think of a lot easier things to steal than your husband. Maybe it was Quentin who Stefan saw carrying luggage to the parking lot.”
“Are you saying he deserted me?”
He lowered his face.
“He wouldn’t do that. He loves me. We’re newlyweds!” She rushed to the telephone. “I must call the police. Quentin could be hurt. Oh my God, he’s been kidnapped—”
“Haven’t you forgotten something?”
She pressed the handset to her breast. “What?”
“I’m in my birthday suit.”
His meaning sank in. A naked man who was not her husband, but inside her honeymoon cabin, might distract investigators. Not to mention the embarrassing scandal it would cause when Ross’s family and the resort employees found out. Her only consolation was that all her guests had returned to Colorado Springs. Deliberately scandalous acts were usually forgiven, but stupidity rarely was. Ending up with the wrong man in her bridal bed reeked of idiocy. She caught her lower lip in her teeth.
The more she considered it, the more Ross’s words rang with truth. This situation was cruel. Not to mention the fact that her valuables weren’t missing. If robbers had invaded the cabin, why wouldn’t they have stolen her wallet and jewelry? She hung up the telephone. “Did you say something to Quentin?”
He drew his head warily aside. “Like what?”
Guilt tangled with her fear. Quentin could have intuited her doubts about the wisdom of their marriage, or worse, somehow sensed her attraction to Ross. Quentin could have punished her by arranging for Ross to end up in her bed.
“About us. Did you say something to make him jealous?”
Her question appeared to offend him. He rose from the bed and straightened the sheet about his waist.
“Answer me.”
“You don’t deserve an answer.”
“You can’t deny you tried to stop me from marrying him.”
“Any aspirin around here?” He headed for the bathroom.
“Answer me!”
He turned her a black scowl. “Yeah, I didn’t want you marrying him. He’s a sleazebag and you’re too good for him. But I didn’t say a word about you to him. I’d never hurt you like that. Not in a million years.”
“If you’re trying to convince me of your nobility, it’s not working. That’s a mean, rotten thing to say about your best friend.”
“Best friend?” He snorted. “I barely know the guy.”
Before she could demand an explanation of what he meant, he entered the bathroom and closed the door.
ROSS EXCHANGED the bulky sheet for a bathrobe. As he tied the belt, he gazed at the Elk River logo embroidered on the robe. Harassing the colonel was a lot of fun, but this mix-up held the potential to give the old man a stroke. Not to mention the harm it might do to Dawn. What a mess.
He cursed himself for not listening to his gut instincts concerning Quentin Bayliss.
Steeling himself, grateful that the fuzziness in his head had abated, he opened the bathroom door.