Hasty Wedding
New York Times Bestselling Author
Debbie Macomber
There’s more than one way to capture a man’s heart…
On the day of her best friend’s Las Vegas wedding, Clare Gilroy fears that her own walk down the aisle will never happen…until she finds herself falling for best man—and town outcast—Reed Tonasket.
After a dizzying night in the glitter of Vegas, Clare wakes to find a ring on her finger and a husband by her side. It should be everything she’s ever wanted, but can a man like Reed ever fit into the life she left back home?
Look for more heartwarming titles from New York Times bestselling author Debbie Macomber, available now from Harlequin MIRA!
Other titles by Debbie Macomber now available wherever Harlequin ebooks are sold:
Blossom Street Books
The Shop on Blossom Street
A Good Yarn
Susannah’s Garden
Back on Blossom Street
Twenty Wishes
Summer on Blossom Street
Hannah’s List
The Knitting Diaries: “The Twenty-First Wish”
A Turn in the Road
Cedar Cove Books
16 Lighthouse Road
204 Rosewood Lane
311 Pelican Court
44 Cranberry Point
50 Harbor Street
6 Rainier Drive
74 Seaside Avenue
8 Sandpiper Way
92 Pacific Boulevard
1022 Evergreen Place
A Cedar Cove Christmas (5-B Poppy Lane and Christmas in Cedar Cove)
1105 Yakima Street
1225 Christmas Tree Lane
Dakota Series
Dakota Born
Dakota Home
Always Dakota
The Manning Family
The Manning Sisters
The Manning Brides
The Manning Grooms
Christmas Books
A Gift to Last
On a Snowy Night
Home for the Holidays
Glad Tidings
Christmas Wishes
Small Town Christmas
When Christmas Comes (now retitled Trading Christmas)
There’s Something About Christmas
Christmas Letters
Where Angels Go
The Perfect Christmas
Angels at Christmas (Those Christmas Angels and Where Angels Go)
Call Me Mrs. Miracle
Heart of Texas Series
VOLUME 1 (Lonesome Cowboy and Texas Two-Step)
VOLUME 2 (Caroline’s Child and Dr. Texas)
VOLUME 3 (Nell’s Cowboy and Lone Star Baby)
Promise, Texas
Return to Promise
Midnight Sons
VOLUME 1 (Brides for Brothers and The Marriage Risk)
VOLUME 2 (Daddy’s Little Helper and Because of the Baby)
VOLUME 3 (Falling for Him, Ending in Marriage and Midnight Sons and Daughters)
This Matter of Marriage
Montana
Thursdays at Eight
Between Friends
Changing Habits
Married in Seattle (First Comes Marriage and Wanted: Perfect Partner)
Right Next Door (Father’s Day and The Courtship of Carol Sommars)
The Man You’ll Marry (The First Man You Meet and The Man You’ll Marry)
Orchard Valley Grooms (Valerie and Stephanie)
Orchard Valley Brides (Norah and Lone Star Lovin’)
The Sooner the Better
An Engagement in Seattle (Groom Wanted and Bride Wanted)
Debbie Macomber’s Cedar Cove Cookbook
Debbie Macomber’s Christmas Cookbook
Contents
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Prologue
Why did it have to be her? Reed Tonasket asked himself as he strolled into the Tullue library. Clare Gilroy was standing at the front desk, a pair of reading glasses riding the bridge of her pert nose. She glanced up when he entered the front door, and as always, Reed experienced a familiar ache at the sight of her.
He guessed she was holding her breath, as though she were afraid. Not of him, but of what he might do. He had a reputation, well earned during his youth, as a rabble-rouser. Being half-Indian added flavor to the stories circulating town about him. Some were true, while others were fiction in the purest form.
His grandfather, in his great wisdom, had wanted Reed to appreciate the part of himself that was not Indian. From ages ten to twelve, Reed had attended school off the reservation. Until that time, Reed had thought of himself as part of the Tullue tribe, not white. He hadn’t wanted to become like the white man, nor had he been eager to learn the ways of his mother’s people. But his grandfather had spoken, and so Reed had attended the white man’s school in town.
Those years had been the worst of his life. He’d fought every boy in the school who challenged him, and nearly everyone had. Usually he was obliged to take on two or three at a time. He defied his teachers, resisted authority and became the first boy ever expelled from the Tullue school district while still in grade school.
Perhaps it was his blunt Indian features that continued to feed the rumors, or the way he wore his thick black hair in heavy braids. It amused him that he caused such interest in Tullue, but frankly, he didn’t understand it.
In reality he was pretty tame these days, but no one around town had seemed to notice. Certainly Clare Gilroy hadn’t. Whenever he came into the library, she eyed him with concern, as though she suspected he was going to leap atop a bookcase and shout out a piercing war cry. Then again, Reed could be overreacting. He had a tendency to do that where Clare was concerned.
Reed longed to reveal his feelings for her, but words were not the Indian way. He couldn’t think of how to tell Clare he was attracted to her and not sound like a fool. Nor was he convinced his love was strong enough to bridge their cultural differences. He was half-Indian and she was a beautiful Anglo.
Reed walked to the back of the library toward the mystery section. He could feel Clare’s gaze follow him. It pleased him to know he had her attention if even for those few moments, which wasn’t something likely to happen often.
Then why her? Why did he lie awake nights dreaming of holding her in his arms? Why was it Clare Gilroy he wanted more than any woman he’d ever known? He could find no logic for his desire.
Even now he had trouble remembering that he wasn’t pure Indian. His blood was mixed, diluted by a mother who was blond and pure and sweet. She’d died when he was four, and the memories of her remained foggy and warm. He understood well his Indian heritage, but he’d ignored whatever part of him was white, the same way he ignored his desire for this uptight librarian.
If Reed had required an answer for his preoccupation with Clare, it was that she intrigued him. She presented a facade of being proper and untouchable. Yet he sensed a fire in her, an eagerness to break free of her self-imposed reserve. He saw in her a fragile spirit yearning to soar. In his mind he gave her the Indian name of Laughing Rainbow because he felt in her a deeply buried joy that was ready to burst to life and spill out into the full spectrum of colors. Colors so bright they would rival that of a rainbow.
That she was involved with Jack Kingston didn’t set well with Reed. He’d waited, dreading the time he l
earned of their marriage. The white man wasn’t right for her, but Reed could do nothing. He wasn’t right for her, either. And so, like a green seventeen-year-old boy, he dreamed of making love with the one woman he knew he could never have.
Chapter One
“If Jack said he’d be here, then he will,” Clare Gilroy insisted, although she wasn’t the least bit convinced it was true.
Erin Davis, Clare’s closest friend, glanced at her watch and sighed. “You’re sure about that?”
“No,” Clare admitted reluctantly, lowering her gaze. When it came to Jack, she wasn’t sure of anything. Not anymore. Once she’d been so positive, so confident of their relationship, but she felt none of that assurance now. They’d been unofficially engaged for three years, and she was no closer to a commitment from Jack than the evening they’d first discussed the possibility of marriage.
Come to think of it, Jack never had actually proposed. As Clare recalled, they’d sort of drifted into a conversation about their future and the subject of marriage had come up. No doubt she was the one to raise it. Jack had suggested they think along those lines, and ever since then that was all he’d been doing. Thinking.
In the meantime, Clare was watching one friend after another marry, have children and get on with their lives. She loved Jack, honestly loved him…she must, otherwise she wouldn’t have been so willing to wait for him to make up his mind.
“We’ll give him five more minutes,” Clare suggested, knowing Erin was anxious. This dinner party was important to her best friend. Although Erin and Gary were planning a Las Vegas wedding, they were meeting with family and friends for this dinner before flying to Nevada the following afternoon with Clare and Reed Tonasket, who was serving as Gary’s best man.
“Five minutes is all we’ll wait,” Clare promised. No sooner had the words slipped from her lips than the telephone rang. She hurried into the kitchen, knowing even before she answered that it would be Jack.
She was right.
“Clare, I’m sorry, but it doesn’t look like I’m going to be able to get away.”
Disappointment swamped her. “You’ve known about this dinner for weeks. What do you mean you can’t get away?”
“I’m sorry, babe, but Mr. Roth called and asked if I’d come over this evening to give him an estimate. We both know I can’t afford to offend a member of the city council. Roth’s got connections, and his account could be the boost I’ve been waiting for.”
Clare said nothing.
“I’m doing this for us, babe,” Jack continued. “If I can get this landscaping contract, it might lead to a project for the city.”
Again Clare said nothing, gritting her teeth.
“Are you going to be angry again?” Jack asked, using just the right amount of indignation to irritate Clare even more. Jack had a habit of purposely doing something to upset her and then making it sound as if she were being unreasonable. At times it seemed as though he intentionally set out to annoy her.
“Why should I be angry?” she asked, knowing her voice was brittle, and not caring. Not this time. “It’s only a dinner party to honor my best friend. Naturally I’ll enjoy attending it alone.”
“Which brings up another thing,” Jack said, his voice tightening. “Rumor has it Gary Spencer’s asked Reed Tonasket to be his best man. That isn’t true, is it?”
“Yes.”
“I don’t like the idea of you flying off to Vegas with that Indian. It isn’t good for your reputation.”
“Really? Then why don’t you come along?”
“You know I can’t do that.”
“Just like you can’t make the dinner party?”
“You’re in one of your moods, again, aren’t you? Honest to Pete, there’s no reasoning with you when you get like this. I’m working hard to get this business on its feet and all you can do is complain. Fine, you go ahead and be mad. Now if you’ll excuse me, I’ve got an appointment to keep.”
Clare was still holding on to the receiver when the line was disconnected. The drone in her ear continued for several seconds before she set down the receiver. Oh yes, she was in one of her moods again, Clare silently agreed. This sense of annoyance came over her whenever another friend married, or delivered a baby.
She was thirty-two years old and sick and tired of waiting for Jack’s struggling business “to get on its feet.” She was tired of holding on to empty promises.
“That was Jack,” Clare announced when she joined Erin. As always, she kept her frustration and anger buried deep inside, not wanting her friend to know how upset she was. “Something’s come up and he won’t be able to come with us after all.”
Erin didn’t say anything for a moment, but when she did, Clare had the impression there was a whole lot more her friend would have liked to have said. “We should leave then, don’t you think?”
Clare agreed with a curt nod and forced herself to smile. “Here you are marrying for the second time, and I haven’t managed to snare myself even one husband,” Clare joked as they walked out the front door.
Clare had put a lot of stock into this evening, hoping that once Jack was around Erin and Gary he’d see how happy the two of them were. Both had been through disastrous first marriages, and after several years of being single and despairing of ever falling in love again, they’d met. Within eight months, they’d both known that this time, this marriage would be different.
Gary was the football coach for the local high school. Clare loved sports and each autumn made an attempt to attend as many of the home games as she could. In a town the size of Tullue, with a population of less than six thousand, football was a wonderful way to spend a Friday evening. Jack had gone with her a couple of times, although he wasn’t nearly as interested in local sports the way she was.
Clare had inadvertently been responsible for Erin meeting Gary. Erin had stopped to talk to Clare after a game, and because she’d got held up, she’d met Gary on her way to the parking lot. The two had struck up a conversation and the relationship had snowballed from there. Although Erin had been her best friend since high school, Clare couldn’t ever remember Erin being this happy.
The dinner party was being held at The Tides, which was the best restaurant in town. Until Jack’s phone call, Clare had been looking forward to this evening, but now she could feel a headache coming on. One of the sinus ones she dreaded so much, where the pressure built up in her head until it felt as though a steel band was tightening around her forehead.
“It looks like everyone’s here,” Erin said animatedly as they pulled into the parking lot.
By everyone, Erin meant her mother and stepfather, her father and stepmother, and Gary’s elderly aunt. His parents lived on the East Coast and weren’t able to fly in. Following a short honeymoon in Vegas, Gary and Erin were heading east so Erin could meet his mother and father.
Naturally Reed Tonasket would be attending this dinner. It made sense that he’d have a date with him. That meant that Clare and Gary’s maiden aunt would be the only ones without partners. Clare groaned inwardly. She’d smile, she decided, and get through the evening somehow. It wouldn’t be the first time she was odd woman out.
The Tides had set aside their banquet area for the dinner. It was a small room overlooking the Strait of Juan De Fuca, the well-traveled waterway that separates Washington State from Vancouver Island in British Columbia. As Erin predicted, everyone had arrived and was waiting when the two of them walked in.
Gary stood and wrapped his arm around Erin’s shoulders, leading her to the chair next to his own. The only other seat available was the one on the other side of Reed Tonasket.
Clare didn’t hesitate; that would have been discourteous, and being rude to anyone was completely alien to her. It wasn’t that she disliked Reed, or that she was prejudiced, but he intimidated her the same way he did most everyone in town. His size might have had something to do with her feelings. He was nearly six four, ï and built like a lumberjack. By contrast Clare was slender
and nearly a foot shorter. Although it was only the middle of June and summer didn’t officially arrive in the Pacific Northwest until August, Reed was tanned to a deep shade of bronze. Clare knew that like most of the Skyutes, he lived on the reservation. She’d heard that he carved totem poles, which were sold all around the country. But that was all she knew about him. Just enough to engage in polite conversation.
What troubled Clare most about Reed was the angry impatience she sensed in him. She was familiar with several Native Americans who frequented the library. They were graceful, charming people, but she found little of either quality in Reed Tonasket.
“Hello,” she said, taking the seat beside him. Since they’d be spending the better part of two days in each other’s company, it made sense to Clare that she make some effort to be cordial.
His dark eyes met hers, revealing no emotion. He nodded briefly, acknowledging her. “I’m Clare Gilroy,” she said. He didn’t give any indication he recognized her from the library, although he was a frequent patron.
“Yes, I know.”
He wasn’t exactly a stimulating conversationalist, Clare noted. “I…I wasn’t sure you remembered me.”
His eyes, so dark and bright, made her uncomfortable. They seemed to look straight into her soul. It was as if he knew everything there was to know about her already.
“Has everyone had a chance to introduce themselves?” Gary asked.
Reed nodded, and Clare wondered if not speaking was a habit of his; if that was the case, she was about to spend two very uncomfortable days in his company.
“You don’t have a date?” Gary’s Aunt Wilma leaned across the table to ask Clare. “I seem to remember Gary saying something about you bringing your young man.”
Clare could feel heat seeping into her face. “Jack…my date couldn’t come at the last minute. He has his own business. He’s been working very hard at getting it established.” She didn’t know why she felt the burning need to make excuses for Jack, but she did, speaking quickly so that the words ran into one another. “He got a call from an important man he’s hoping will become a client and had to cancel. I’m sure he regrets missing the dinner, but it was just one of those things. It couldn’t be helped.” She realized as she finished that she was speaking to the entire table of guests.