LITMIR.BIZ

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having a good time, baby?”

      The voice was her mother’s, and Hallie had only a moment to paste on a bright smile before facing her. “Yes, Mama, I am. How about you?”

      “I couldn’t be happier. Neely finally married.” Doris Irene smiled. “We’ve come to expect weddings from you, but I’d just about given up hope Neely would ever settle down.”

      The muscles in Hallie’s jaw clenched. Her mother didn’t mean anything by her remark, just as Neely’s comment at the church—You’ll get over it. You always do—hadn’t been meant to hurt, but that did nothing to ease the ache in her chest. She’d always been the Madison family screwup, the one who could never do anything right. Her family joked about it and treated her failures lightly, and she smiled when they did and played along, but failing again hurt. She’d loved Max Parker with all her heart, and she’d believed he loved her, too…right up to the time she found him celebrating her birthday with the star of his most recent movie. He’d broken her heart, but because he hadn’t been the first—or even the second—her family assumed it was no big deal.

      “Well,” she began when she was sure her voice would be steady, “she’s settled now. She and Reese are very happy together.”

      “They sure do look it.” Doris Irene grinned slyly. “Maybe you can take some pointers from them.” Then she leaned over and kissed Hallie’s cheek. “I think I’ll go find William and see if I can get him to dance with me. I haven’t kicked up my heels in far too long. See you, baby.”

      Though she tried her best not to swear, once her mother was out of sight, Hallie muttered, “Damn, damn, damn.”

      “Careful there.” The words were delivered in a low, throaty, lazy drawl from behind her. “Oklahoma’s got a law on the books against swearing in public. I’d hate to have to take you away from Neely and Reese’s party in handcuffs.”

      She turned to find Brady Marshall leaning one shoulder against her tree trunk. Like the other groomsmen, he’d changed out of his tuxedo, and he looked even better in his jeans and a black shirt than he had in the bar the other night. When she’d seen him sitting there alone, she’d been speechless for a moment. He was quite possibly the most handsome man she’d ever seen. He stood six-four, was lean and hard-muscled, and everything about him that night, like tonight, had been dark—from his hair and skin to his shirt, jeans and cowboy hat, to the aura surrounding him. He’d been the epitome of tall, dark and handsome…to say nothing of dangerous.

      She’d spent ten minutes at the bar, watching him, speculating about him. Why was he there, and why was he alone? Was there a Mrs. Tall, Dark and Handsome, and if so, why did she let him out of the house without her protection? Finally she’d found the courage to take him a bottle of beer, and she’d seen that not everything about him was dark. His eyes were as blue as the clearest spring sky.

      He’d looked incapable of smiling, of any tender emotions at all, but later, at the motel, he’d touched her tenderly. He’d made her feel…. She tilted her head to one side, considering that sentence. No, there wasn’t anything missing. That was all she wanted to say. He’d made her feel.

      Shaking off the memories, she forced her attention back to his remark. “You’re kidding, right?”

      Under the neat black mustache his finely shaped mouth was unsmiling, but there was something she thought might be humor in his voice. “Well, I wouldn’t exactly hate it, but I don’t think seeing me arrest their bridesmaid is exactly the sort of memory Neely and Reese want to take away tonight.”

      She made a face. “I meant about the law.”

      “No, ma’am, I don’t kid about such things. It’s punishable by thirty days in jail and a fine of up to $500.” After a moment, he gestured toward the dance floor. “Why aren’t you out there with your sisters?”

      “I’d rather enjoy it from back here.”

      “You don’t look like you’re enjoying it much.”

      Drat him. Her sisters and her mother hadn’t noticed that she was putting on an act. How had this man who didn’t know her at all guessed it? But rather than try to find a response, she turned the subject back on him. “Why aren’t you out there?”

      “I ran out of Madison sisters to dance with.”

      She lowered her gaze to hide the fact that she would enjoy dancing with him. She already knew, both from watching him with her sisters and from the hours she’d spent with him, that his movements were graceful, sensual and powerfully controlled. She would very much like to feel his arms around her one more time, to let the heat radiating from his body warm her, to close her eyes and breathe deeply of his purely male scent and sway slowly in time to the music.

      Sure, and when the dance was over and he walked away from her, what would she want then? How would she feel?

      She was tired of men walking away from her, tired of never being enough for them.

      “I take it you’re not fond of weddings,” Brady remarked.

      “Or too fond of them, according to my family.”

      “They’ve come to expect weddings from you?”

      Realizing he’d overheard her conversation with her mother, she managed a quavery, embarrassed smile. “We weren’t properly introduced, were we?” She stuck out her hand. “Hi, I’m Hallie Madison, Neely’s younger sister and three-time loser at the game of marriage.”

      She’d meant it as a bad joke, but before she could withdraw her hand, he’d taken it, enveloping it in his. His hands had fascinated her Thursday night—large, powerful, his fingers long and narrow, capable of calming a small child, controlling a grown man or arousing a needy woman. She had wondered if his palms were callused, his caresses rough, and decided they were, then he’d proved it in her room. His touch had been enough to make a lonely woman weep.

      “Three times, huh?” he murmured, still holding her hand.

      “At least you kept trying. I gave up after the first one.”

      A flicker of something shadowed his eyes after he’d spoken. Surprise? Uneasiness? Did he know he’d told her more than the simple fact that he’d been married and divorced—that now she knew he must have been brokenhearted over the end of his marriage? With the shortage of marriageable men, it was a fact of life that men as handsome as he, as amazingly sexy as he, didn’t remain single long, not unless the scars from their failed relationships ran too deep to heal.

      “You learned from your mistake. I didn’t.” Though she would be perfectly content to stand there all night with her hand in his, she caught the looks that said people were starting to notice. Gently she tugged, and after a moment’s hesitation, he let go. “What did you think of Kylie?”

      “Truthfully?” He waited for her nod before he went on.

      “She’s not my type.”

      “Nope, sorry, wrong answer. If Neely thinks you two are right for each other, then you are. She’s never wrong.”

      Ignoring her disagreement, he pushed away from the tree. “Come and dance with me.”

      A shiver skittered through Hallie, making her face warm, her palms damp and her hands unsteady. “I don’t think that would be a good idea.”

      “I think it’s an excellent idea.” He pulled the bottle of water from her hand and set it on a nearby table, then clasped her hand in his and started for the pavilion.

      The music was slow and romantic, and the lights cast flickering shadows back and forth as they swayed in the breeze. For one fearful moment, she wished she could break free and run off into the night. He was too tempting. She was too emotionally fragile. Neely honestly wasn’t ever wrong.

      But, as if he sensed her skittishness, he held her hand tightly as he led the way to the middle of the dance floor. There he stopped and pulled

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