How to Be a Blissful Bride Read online

  Even though she hadn’t expected him to agree, the sting of disappointment burned the back of her eyes. “Why not?”

  “Because I would never know if she was asking for me or if she was asking for you...” At her confused frown, he added, “A friend of your grandmother’s, remember? I imagine that friendship pulls a lot of weight.”

  “If you think I used my family’s influence to persuade Roslynn, I swear to you, Chance, I didn’t!”

  He sighed. “You may not have intended to, but I’d never know for sure, would I?” He shook his head. “I don’t know how we went from talking about getting married to talking about my job, but we need to focus on the future. Our future.”

  And Alexa didn’t know how he could talk about his career and their future as if they were two completely separate things. “I made a mistake in not telling you I was pregnant right away, but I’m not going to keep you from our child. You can be in his or her life as much—” or she feared as little “—as you want. We don’t need to get married for that to happen.”

  “When Griffin asked you to marry him, you said you’d think about it.” He cut her protest off with a pointed look. “At least do me the same favor.”

  “All right,” she said finally, not that her agreement was much of a concession. As lacking as his proposal was, she doubted she’d be able to push it from her mind. “I’ll think about it.”

  “And you’ll stay in Clearville until the end of the month?” he pressed.

  Alexa nodded. “I’ll stay.”

  * * *

  “She can’t stay.” Evie stared at him from across the marble reception desk. “When the room opened up, we offered it to another guest. And with the anniversary party last night and the wedding today...” She shrugged a shoulder. “We’re booked.”

  Chance narrowed his gaze as he took in his cousin’s enigmatic expression. His short time in Clearville had either already dulled his edge or she was one hell of a poker player. He prided himself on his ability to correctly read a source, knowing at times his life depended on it. And yet he had no idea if Evie was telling the truth.

  He didn’t even know if she was trying to get rid of Alexa or hoping to push her into his arms.

  If the latter was part of Evie’s plan, she—hell, they—had their work cut out for them.

  Chance had never imagined proposing to a woman, which might have something to do with why he’d screwed it up so royally. All that talk about responsibility and commitment... He probably couldn’t blame Alexa for refusing to marry him. Not when even to his own ears, it sounded like his dad was the one proposing.

  He was still sticking with his plan to marry Alexa, to give their child two parents. He just needed her to get on board, and to do that he needed to keep her in town for the next three weeks like she’d promised.

  Rubbing his aching forehead, he tried to hold on to his temper. “Evie, I swear if this is some kind of a con—”

  “The rooms are full. If you want to go around banging on every door in the place, you can, but I wouldn’t recommend it.” Tucking a strand of her blunt-cut dark hair behind an ear, she added, “Besides, I don’t know what you’re all bent out of shape about. She can always stay at the cottage. From what Rory tells me, that’s where Alexa spent last night.”

  Family... Sometimes he didn’t know if he wanted to throttle them or... Oh, yeah, throttle them.

  * * *

  “I really don’t think this is a good idea,” Alexa protested, and not for the first time as Chance maneuvered up the steps to the cottage, her designer luggage in each hand and under both of his arms. He’d insisted on carrying her bags, and she felt ridiculously embarrassed for having overpacked.

  Honestly, why had she thought she needed to bring so much with her?

  So, in spite of his protest, she hurried across the porch to open the front door before Chance tried to somehow do that himself, too.

  “You shared a suite with your good friend Griffin,” he pointed out as he dumped her bags in the middle of the living room and turned on one of the Tiffany lamps.

  “That’s different.”

  “Not sure I see how.”

  “Probably because Griffin’s never seen me naked!” As soon as the words burst from her lips, a flush rose in her cheeks. “I cannot believe I just said that.”

  Amused, Chance said, “Well, I’m glad to hear it. And it’s not like we aren’t even. You’ve already seen me naked, too. Plus, you’re the one who said we barely know each other. I can’t think of a better way to become more intimately acquainted than to live together.”

  Alexa didn’t think she’d imagined the way he stressed intimately, and the spike in her heart rate was exactly why staying with Chance was entirely different from rooming with Griffin.

  “Besides, it’s late. Do you really want to start calling hotels to see if they have a room available?”

  “If you had told me earlier, I would have had more time.”

  But after Chance came back from talking to Evie, he hadn’t said anything about the hotel being full. Just like he hadn’t said anything more about getting married, confirming Alexa’s belief that he regretted his impulsive proposal.

  Instead, he’d taken her to dinner at Hillcrest’s elegant dining room, where he’d asked about the kind of food her obstetrician recommended and if she’d had any cravings. She told him about her sudden hunger for big, juicy hamburgers and her love of mint chip ice cream, and he laughed when she confessed that particular craving might have predated her pregnancy.

  And it hit her in that moment that by keeping the pregnancy a secret, Chance wasn’t the only one who had missed out. She’d also robbed herself of someone with whom to share all the tiny details.

  So when he carefully repeated, “If I had told you earlier...” Alexa immediately felt the heavy weight of guilt press on her shoulders.

  Catching sight of her stricken expression, Chance swore beneath his breath. “I shouldn’t have said that. What’s done is done, and what we need to do now is to focus on the baby and how to move on from here. Look, it’s been a long day. Let’s get some sleep, and if you want to find someplace else to stay, we can talk about it in the morning.”

  Alexa had to admit she was exhausted. She was also very much aware that the tiny cottage had only one bedroom...and one bed. “I’ll, um, sleep on the sofa. You’ll be more comfortable in the bed.”

  Chance shook his head. “Forget it. I rarely sleep through the night anyway.”

  “You did last night,” she reminded him.

  His eyes glowed at the memory. “That’s because you were there with me.”

  Chapter Eleven

  Chance didn’t argue with Alexa’s insistence on sleeping on the sofa. Instead, he simply waited. After the long and emotional day, she fell asleep with her head on his shoulder as they watched television. He made the most of the opportunity, lifting her into his arms and carrying her to his bedroom.

  He fully expected her to wake up, but the pregnancy must have taken more out of her than she wanted to admit. Other than a soft sigh that had goose bumps rising over every inch of his body, she didn’t stir. She snuggled deep into the covers when he placed her in the center of the mattress, and Chance gritted his teeth as he resisted the urge to join her there.

  Next time they ended up in bed, he wanted them both awake and aware of the undeniable desire drawing them together.

  She’d still been sleeping when he’d left for a physical therapy appointment that morning. His therapist had shaken his head at the sight of his bruises but reassured Chance that his rehab was progressing. He’d been on his way back when he received a text from Rory, asking him to stop by the hotel.

  But when he showed up, Rory was busy with the arrival of her fiancé, Jamison Porter, and his daughter, Hannah. Settling into one of the overstuffed lobby chairs to wait, Chance froze w
hen the little girl climbed right into his lap despite the multiple empty seats around him.

  “Um, hey, Hannah.”

  The blond-haired girl giggled. “Hay is for horses, Uncle Chance. I don’t have a horse. I have a dolly. See?”

  Her body a warm, bubblegum-scented weight, she settled against his chest and right into his heart. “Um, that’s nice?”

  “Miss Rory gots her for me after I was a flower girl in Miss Lindsay’s wedding. I had a basket and I threw flowers and I wore a crown in my hair. Now I get to be a flower girl for my daddy’s wedding to Miss Rory! An’ after the wedding, Miss Rory will be my next mom!”

  His head spinning from the rapid-fire conversation, Chance glanced up as Rory walked over. “Next mom?”

  His sister smiled indulgently at her soon-to-be stepdaughter. “Four-year-old logic for what it means to get a stepmother,” she explained. “Which if you think about it, actually makes more sense as a description.”

  As far as Chance was concerned, none of the babbled conversation made sense. He fought back a groan as Hannah handed him the doll to play with.

  “You should be thanking me,” Rory told him. “This will be good practice for you.”

  The longer Hannah babbled on, the less he understood. Something about dolls or maybe dogs or—He didn’t know what. By the time she scrambled off his lap, narrowly missing the family jewels with a deadly knee, he was exhausted.

  Something that evidently showed, based on Rory’s gleeful laughter. “Oh, my gosh! The look on your face. I don’t think I’ve ever seen my big brother so scared! And of a little girl and her doll, of all things!”

  “I have no idea what she was talking about,” he admitted.

  “She’s four, Chance. It’s not rocket science,” Rory said as she sat beside him. “She was telling you about her dolls and how Jamison built her a miniature gazebo like the one here on the grounds where her dolls can play.”

  “And she thought I’d want to know about that...why?”

  “Because she’s four,” Rory repeated. “Her dolls are important to her, and she wants them to be important to you because you are also important to her.”

  “She doesn’t even know me.”

  “You’re her Uncle Chance. She adores you. Evie, too, although I’m not always sure why since Evie’s never been kid friendly.”

  “And I am?”

  “In your own way, yeah. You love adventure, excitement, exploration, and that’s what being a kid is all about.”

  Chance smiled. Rory was right. He’d loved being a kid. There were some parts he’d never outgrown.

  “And besides, you’re having a baby. By the time your child is Hannah’s age, you’ll have tons of experience at being a dad.” After a slight hesitation, she added, “I talked to Alexa a little at the reception last night. She says she’s only staying through the end of the month.”

  “That’s right.”

  Pointing out what he already knew, she said, “That’s not much time. So what are you going to do? You can’t just let her leave.”

  “I can’t exactly force her to stay.”

  “I’m not talking about forcing. I’m talking about persuading.”

  “That didn’t exactly work either,” he muttered.

  “You asked her to stay?”

  “I asked her to marry me.”

  Rory’s jaw dropped in utter shock. “Seriously? You proposed? When? How?”

  “Last night, and what do you mean how?” Chance shifted uncomfortably, rubbing at the back of his neck where his collar—hell, his own damn skin—felt too tight.

  “Were there flowers? Music? A ring?”

  Only if he counted the ones for another couple’s wedding.

  Throwing her hands up in exasperation, Rory said, “Honestly, Chance, you can’t ask a woman to marry you in some kind of knee-jerk reaction and expect her to say yes. Didn’t you see Alexa at the reception, willing to dance with perfect strangers just to make them smile? This is a woman who’s looking for romance and longing for a man to sweep her off her feet.”

  The last time Chance opened his heart to romance, Lisette had stomped all over it. What kind of fool would he be if he left himself open for that kind of heartbreak again?

  * * *

  “Morning.”

  A shiver ran down Alexa’s spine at the sound of Chance’s voice. She glanced over her shoulder to find him lounging in the kitchen doorway. How was it he could look so good after rolling out of bed to go straight to a physical therapy appointment? Dressed in a faded T-shirt and navy sweatpants, his dark hair mussed from the workout session, stubble shadowing his jaw along with a rainbow of bruises, and her mouth still went dry at the sight of him.

  She wrapped her hands around a fragrant mug of peppermint tea, holding on to the warm ceramic to keep from reaching out as he stepped into her personal space and made it his own. “How was your appointment?”

  “Good. My therapist says I’m ahead of schedule.” He frowned, and she could only imagine his frustration that even ahead of schedule wasn’t healing fast enough. “How’d you sleep last night?”

  “Better than expected, considering I went to sleep on the couch and somehow woke up in your bed.” A hint of annoyance filled her voice, left over from the frustration of his scent, his warmth, his presence invading her subconscious with dreams that left her restless, achy and, as it turned out, alone.

  But instead of owning up to what he’d done, Chance had the nerve to grin. “Do you have a habit of sleepwalking?”

  “Hardly. I told you, you should take the bed.”

  “And I told you...I’m not sleeping there without you.”

  Heat flooded her cheeks, and Alexa only wished she could blame it on the steam rising from her mug. Even though she told herself that giving in to sexual chemistry wasn’t a solution, she wasn’t sure how much longer it would be before she would be asking him to join her there.

  Breaking the sensual spell, Chance glanced over her shoulder at the kitchen counter. “What’s all this?” he asked, gesturing to her tablet propped up against the toaster.

  The video tutorial she’d been watching while brewing her tea had run its course, the television chef now paused and waiting to be played back. Alexa had hoped to have breakfast made by the time he returned from his therapy appointment. But unlike his mother, she needed a recipe. She’d been astounded by the overwhelming number of results for something as simple as blueberry pancakes.

  Which, as it turned out, might not be so simple after all...

  “Do you realize if you type ‘blueberry pancake recipes’ into a search engine, you get more than two and half million hits?” Two and a half million, and she’d never made a single one.

  Not seeming nearly as amazed by this revelation, Chance chuckled. “Blueberry pancakes again? Is this some kind of pregnancy craving?”

  “I thought you liked pancakes.”

  “I do, although maybe not for breakfast every day.”

  “When your mother was here, she talked about cooking for you and Rory when you were kids. About how the two of you would stand on step stools on either side of her and argue over who got to lick the batter from the spatula.”

  “Yeah, my mom loves to cook, and she always wanted to share that love with us. I hadn’t thought about that in a long time.” His voice faded off into forgotten memories as he murmured, “Too long...”

  Alexa didn’t have those kinds of memories of her mother, had precious few memories of her parents at all. “This is the part where I should probably tell you I don’t actually know how to make pancakes.” Embarrassed by that admission, she added, “We always had a chef on staff,” which only made it sound that much worse.

  Because her family hadn’t stopped at hiring chefs, and it wasn’t only her lack of skill as a cook that had Alexa doubting her ability to be the
kind of mother their child deserved...

  “Hey.” Reaching out, Chance took the tea mug from her hands and set it aside to pull her into his arms. With his forehead against hers, he said, “As an annoying and occasionally wise woman reminded me just this morning, we’re not having a full-grown kid. We’re having a baby. It will be months before that baby is old enough to be eating pancakes, and years before the baby’ll be old enough to stand on a step stool by your side to lick the batter from a spatula. We have time to figure this out, to figure all of this out.”

  With her hands fisted in the soft cotton of Chance’s T-shirt, Alexa couldn’t decide if it was wonderful or scary how easily he read her thoughts. Settling on wonderfully scary, she asked, “So what do we do now?”

  “Now, we make pancakes. The old-fashioned way.” After powering down her tablet, he reached into a cupboard over the stove and pulled out a small blue-and-white-striped tin box.

  “What is that?”

  “Copies of my mother’s recipes.” His smile was more than a little wry as he said, “If we’re going to learn how to do this, we might as well learn from one of the best.”

  * * *

  “Alexa, you’re right on time!”

  Rory greeted her with a smile as she crossed the lobby. The pretty brunette was dressed for the season in a brown V-neck sweater and plaid burnt-orange skirt. But the warm colors, like the fall decorations, only served as a reminder that Thanksgiving and the end of the month were drawing near.

  We have time to figure this out.

  Alexa couldn’t help the small smile that came to her lips. After some trial and error, and quite a bit of laughter, they had figured out pancakes. She’d waited breathlessly as he took the first taste before proclaiming, “Best pancakes ever.”

  And when he held out his fork for her to try the buttery, maple-soaked goodness, a different kind of anticipation caught inside her chest as a different kind of hunger sharpened his expression. Alexa wasn’t sure how she managed to swallow a single bite, let alone to finish an entire pancake. Recalling the expression about not being able to take the heat, she had quickly gotten out of the kitchen.