at the foot of the stairs, the marriage celebrant coming forward to discuss the service and deal with the necessary paperwork, the barrage of cameras as she and Mack stepped out into the sun-drenched garden, the sighs of admiration as her bridal gown was duly inspected and approved and finally the stunned faces of the guests as she walked between them with Mack by her side, Lucy following close behind.
They exchanged vows in front of a shady gazebo, with Mack producing a wedding ring which, he confided, had belonged to his mother. Mack had been close to his mother, so the ring would mean a lot to him. Suzie was touched by the gesture.
“I do,” she heard herself answering when the time came, and suddenly she was married, and everyone was waiting for Mack to kiss her. He did….
The cameras went mad. As a newlywed couple, they had to sign more documents at a table in the gazebo, before enduring another barrage of photographs, not only from their own official wedding photographer, but from the clamoring fashion media. The guests, many resplendent in Jolie fashions, were also photographed. Suzie’s bosses were ecstatic.
It was a relief to finally escape the media circus, the bridal couple retreating with their guests to the reception house, where the media weren’t permitted. But they had their pictures and went away happy, dispersing quickly, keen to be the first with their fashion scoop.
As the guests spilled into the various rooms of the brightly lit, flower-bedecked reception house, champagne and appetizers were served, and the noise level rose. Everyone was having fun, the mood heightened by the astonishing turn of events.
Tristan and his mother had wanted a formal reception, but Suzie had insisted on a party instead, with a smorgasbord-style buffet set up in one of the rooms and a towering profiterole dessert instead of a formal wedding cake. A jazz band was playing in the conservatory, and some of the guests were dancing already.
“Can’t we get out of here?” Suzie begged Mack as they moved from room to room, neatly avoiding probing questions. A good few of the guests were Tristan’s friends, who’d stayed on out of curiosity. “I want to go home. You must want to escape, too. Nobody will notice we’ve gone. With all these rooms, we could be anywhere.”
“Fine with me.” Mack’s dark eyes were unreadable. “We’ll slip out the back way. But you’d better let your mother know.”
“I guess so. You wait here.” Suzie dashed off, weaving through the crush until she found her mother, flopped in an armchair. “Mum, I need to get away from everyone. I’m exhausted. I’m going to slip away.”
Her mother nodded in sympathy. “I’ll come home with you,” she offered. “You must need a comforting shoulder to cry on after all that’s happened.”
Suzie hid her alarm. The last thing she wanted was her mother’s sympathy—especially if she started commiserating about Tristan! She immediately changed tack. “Mum, Mack and I are going to have a quiet drink somewhere away from all the fuss. I’ll be home later tonight,” she promised. “I’ve no intention of spending the night with Mack,” she assured her mother, who nodded in relief.
“Don’t wait up for me,” she added, and fled.
Moments later she was out in the floodlit courtyard with Mack. The cool air hit them in the face. The afternoon had been sunny and mild—a perfect autumn day—but now it had clouded over, with one ominously dark cloud directly overhead, and there were already a few spots of rain.
She looked round. “The wedding car’s not here,” she groaned. “It must be round the front.”
“You won’t need the wedding car.” Mack was ushering her toward a big gleaming black motorcycle.
She balked. “I’m not riding on that thing. I hate motorbikes.”
“You loved riding with me once.”
“That was before—” She stopped, a deep shudder quivering through her. Before her father had crashed his high-powered Harley into a power pole.
“I know, Suzie, and I’m sorry about your father, but you’ll be safe with me, I promise.”
Safe with Mack Chaney? When had she ever been safe with Sydney’s wild-boy bachelor?
Only he wasn’t a bachelor now. He was her husband. She began to tremble. Reaction was setting in.
As she stood hesitating, Mack’s fingers closed over her shoulders—warm, strong fingers that sent a tingling heat through the delicate lace. “You know what they say when someone falls off a horse.” His voice held a seductively persuasive note—a familiar note that brought back disturbing memories. “Get right back on and get rid of the demons.”
She looked up into his compelling black eyes and shivered, her mouth twisting. The only demon she had to fight was Mack himself. She’d been fighting that particular demon for the past three years, and for another year before that, when they’d been together—on and off. When Tristan Guthrie swept into her life three months ago, she thought that she’d finally succeeded in ridding herself of the demon that was Mack Chaney.
Tristan. Her golden prince. Her charming, sensible, honorable, dependable, perfect…Pah! She should have known he was too good to be true. Hot tears pricked her eyes.
“You want to get away from here or not?” Mack was already mounting his shiny black Harley and waiting for her to make up her mind.
“Yes, get me away! But I—I’ve decided not to go home yet. Mum will be home shortly, and I just can’t face her again tonight. Let’s have a quiet drink somewhere.”
“We’ll go to my place. Hop on!”
His place? But she hardly cared where. She just wanted to get away from here, before someone saw them and tried to drag them back inside.
She looped the long skirt of her wedding gown over her arm—she’d discarded her veil and headpiece earlier—and jumped up behind Mack. He’d pulled his helmet on and had unhooked the spare one for her.
“Here, put this on,” he ordered, thrusting it at her, but she gave a reckless shake of her head.
“I want to feel the wind in my hair. I’ve a lot of cobwebs to blow away.”
“It’s illegal not to wear a helmet,” Mack reminded her with rare deference to the law. She laughed—a brittle, almost hysterical laugh. Illegal? Bigamy was illegal! Not wearing a helmet was hardly the crime of the century. But she took it and rammed it on her head. “Come on, are we going or not?”
“We’re going.” Mack revved the engine. “Hang on!”
She did, clinging to him for dear life as his high-powered machine sprang forward and roared off down the sweeping driveway to the street. The spatters of rain were increasing, great splashing drops now, gathering momentum by the second.
She shut her eyes, relishing the wind and rain in her face because it gave her something else to think about other than the shocking events that had taken place at Bouganvillea Receptions.
She could feel her carefully straightened hair sprouting curls as the rain seeped under the helmet. Well, it hardly mattered now. Tristan wasn’t going to see it. Mack, on the other hand, was bound to make some cutting remark about her new look—her artificial new look—when they finally reached
