Page 51

Eleven Years Earlier

Shrimp.

No matter what the bride called it (coral, for the record), Gwendolyn Allen’s bridesmaid dress was the color of cooked shrimp. With her mass of flaming red hair, Gwen thought she rather looked like a crustacean on fire.

Looking at the nine (nine!) other bridesmaids, Gwen felt a flash of camaraderie. Shrimp wasn’t anyone’s color.

The wedding reception was one of the biggest parties to hit Boston in years. People magazine won exclusive photography rights for the event, but the entertainment shows had reporters there, too.

Gwen’s cousin, Kristen Bouchemont, was kind of a big deal.

The most famous socialite on the East Coast was finally getting married, and Gwen herself was still surprised.

Looking at the bride and groom, there wasn’t any doubt in her mind that the union was a true one; for the first time in her life, Kristen looked really happy.

“Gwendolyn, stand up a bit taller. Look at all the potential husbands here!” her mother whispered urgently .

“Mom—” Gwen warned. She always wondered how her mother managed to sneak up on her like a matchmaking ninja. Was it something that happened when one became a mother? Or was it a special talent possessed only by Bev Allen?

“Oh, stop,” Bev whispered. She gave a blinding smile to a passing guest wearing a Rolex on each wrist.

Only through years of training did Gwen manage not to roll her eyes.

“Look at Kristen’s glow!” Bev continued.

She smiled fondly at her only child. “I want that for you. Just pinch some color into those cheeks”—she helpfully did it for Gwen, despite Gwen’s attempt to wave her off—“and smile a little. You have the prettiest smile, sweetheart. Your father and I want to introduce you to some of the politicians in attendance.”

“I’m twenty-one, Mom. I have zero interest in marriage.” Or in any senator at all, thanks, she added silently .

“Don’t count these men out just yet, dear. There are some future presidential prospects here tonight.”

“Seriously, Mom, please don’t. I have so much on my plate at college right now…

” Gwen looked around in a panic. Her mom was desperate to see her married to the “most promising” candidate she could find, and in a room full of almost five hundred guests, most with major political ties, Gwen was beginning to feel faint.

And not in the romantic, heart-fluttering, swept-off-her-feet way.

Her mother was a matchmaking force of the worst kind, and Gwen’s usual defense was to escape her presence.

But for the moment, she was stuck. Good manners rooted her to the spot; so many people were always watching them.

Everyone expected Gwen, as the heiress to the Allen fortune, to marry well, and soon.

And her parents expected to decide her future for her.

As her best friend Eleanor always said, it was like a living nightmare from those Regency romance books they both loved.

Bev gave a derisive snort. “I am thrilled you’re taking your education seriously, Gwendolyn, I am. That is important. But marriage is more so. Making the right connections is a good place to start, and this event is the perfect opportunity for you to—oh, hello, Edward!”

With her mother’s attention now locked on one of the congressmen in attendance, Gwen slipped out of the ballroom. She glanced down a long hallway and saw an exit sign; she hurried toward it and pulled the door open.

Perfect. A cool, empty, hotel staircase. She let the heavy door close behind her, and with it came a welcome silence.

She sighed, but nearly jumped out of her skin when a man peered up the stairs at her from the landing below. “You followed me. I knew you would.”

She tried to remember the man, but she couldn’t. He was in his mid-twenties, and typical of the wedding crowd. More money than sense, if the expensive suit and strong smell of alcohol indicated anything.

“I don’t think we’ve met,” she hedged, inching backward toward the door.

“Not yet. You’re Gwendolyn Allen, and I’m Max Drysdale.” He tripped up the steps and gave her a lopsided smile. “Our parents have been trying to get us together for weeks, but you’ve been holding out.”

She wracked her brain, but the name wasn’t familiar. Of course, she wouldn’t put it past her parents to try to set her up with this guy. For all she knew, his was one of the dozen or so names flashed at her weekly.

“Well, school and all that. Come on, let’s get back to the party.” Damn it, the door was locked behind her. She rattled the safety bar, the sound echoing against the cold concrete walls around her.

He was almost beside her, and she felt a frisson of alarm. His eyes were unfocused, and he swayed a little. She caught him by the lapels before he fell back down the stairs, and he grinned at her. “I knew you wanted me.”

“Uh, sorry, pal. I’m not interested. What I am interested in is getting back to the party, though.” She turned her back to him and tested the door one more time.

He reached around her waist and jerked her against him. The tulle overlay of her horrid dress crinkled and swished and he crushed her against him and reached for her breasts.

She slapped his hands away and twisted, coming face-to-face with his lips, which he pushed on her in a sloppy mess of a kiss. She shoved him back, hard, and he stumbled against the small railing. He smiled slowly.

“So you like it rough?”

“Oh my God,” she muttered, annoyed. “No, I don’t ‘like it rough.’ Back off, Drysdale.”

The dimwit decided instead to lunge at her.

She stepped to the side, but he was either not as drunk as she thought, or it was dumb luck that he shifted with her and pinned her against the wall.

In one move, he had her wrists above her head and his body flush against her, grinding his hips into hers.

“Get off!” she shouted, turning her head away from his foul breath. “Stop it!”

He merely nuzzled into her neck, making odd slurping sounds that made her stomach sour.

“I will hurt you,” she grunted, struggling against his unfortunately strong grip.

“I look forward to it,” he murmured, dragging his tongue up her neck.

She clenched her jaw, then brought her knee up as swiftly as she could, jamming it between his legs, hitting exactly the spot she wanted to. She watched his eyes cross, heard the shriek of pain, then watched, satisfied, as he crumpled to the floor in a moaning heap .

The door swung open.

“Don’t let it close,” she said quickly, her adrenaline still in overdrive as she slipped under someone’s arm, back into the hallway. “It locks behind you.”

“Aye,” a man replied in a thick, melodic accent, “then perhaps we ought to leave it a bit propped for your friend here?”

Gwen looked in the oversized mirror on the wall and attempted to fix her hair. Not too much damage. It had taken the hairstylist almost an hour to wrangle it into the complicated half-up, half-down do. “Ugh. He’s no friend of mine. Thanks for opening that.” She turned back to the man and froze.

Holy. Hell.

Her first thought was: enormous . His shoulders were so broad, she couldn’t see the entire (still slightly ajar) door behind him.

He wore a black leather jacket, opened to reveal a dark, button-down shirt.

Perfectly-formed jeans encased his strong, powerful legs, and he wore scuffed black work boots, one of which still propped open the stairway door.

Then she registered his face, and her entire world shifted.

It was perfectly sculpted, all hard planes and smooth skin.

Lips made for kissing. Intense hazel eyes, with striking rays of gold and blue, focused on her own muted, soft green ones, and the look he was giving her stole her breath.

His face held just the right amount of five o’clock shadow to separate the men from the boys.

His eyes on the heap of moaning man on the ground, the man let out a low whistle. “Well done, lass.” Slowly, deliberately, he pulled his foot from the bottom of the door. It closed with a resounding thud. A muffled call of “Hey!” from the other side rang out, but they both ignored it.

“I heard what sounded like a lady in distress.” The timbre of his voice resonated in her chest, the words cascading together in a fascinating lilt. Her ears strained for more, the sounds of the letters at once familiar yet unlike anything she’d known.

She grasped for something clever to say, but then the actual words he spoke registered, and she blinked. “Well, it wasn’t me. I don’t need to be saved.”

“Clearly,” he replied, a small smile playing at his lips as he glanced at the closed door. They both listened to the continued, pathetic cries of pain for a moment more before he added, “Quite the well-placed kick, I daresay.”

“I’m…I’m Gwendolyn. Gwen. Thanks for the almost-rescue.”

“Reilly. And ’twas almost my pleasure.”

She blushed, feeling exposed by his intense gaze. “When I went in there, I didn’t know he was there. I just wanted to get away from the noise for a while.”

The mysterious Reilly grimaced with a glance down the long hallway to the open doorway of the ballroom that showed people milling about. “I believe you.”

His accent was unfamiliar to her, and his voice was so deep, she felt the reverberations in her chest. He was all virile male, and never before had she met anyone like him.

Gwen’s normal confidence slipped a notch. She was way out of her comfort zone.

“Friend of the bride or groom?” she asked, unsure how to keep their conversation going. Dumb . He wasn’t dressed for the wedding, not in those jeans.

Her eyes, of their own accord, strayed back to his legs. Each thigh was thicker than both her legs together.

He chuckled. “Neither. I’m simply here for the entertainment.”

She tilted her head, enchanted by the sound of his laugh. “Ah. A knight and a wedding crasher.”

“A man of many trades, for certain.”

“Can I offer you a ride somewhere? ”