Switched At The Altar

The bride whipped around. Her blue-green eyes widened with shock. Twin spots of color climbed her cheeks. Alex stared at those rose-colored lips rounded in surprise. Crazily, for the space of a heartbeat, he wondered what it would be like to sample that mouth.

“How dare you?” she demanded.

“Quite easily,” Alex shot back, shaking off his strange reaction to the woman. He curled his hands into fists at his sides as he realized that in another two minutes he would have been too late. “There’s no way I’m going to allow you to marry my brother.”

Dismissing the round of gasps that went up and the furious look the bride cast his way, Alex shifted his attention to his brother. He waited, braced for Kevin’s outburst.

“Oh, that was perfect!”

Alex yanked his attention back to the bride at the same time that she launched herself at him. Not stopping to think, he caught her in his arms, holding on to her at the waist. But instead of hitting him as he expected, she proceeded to curl her arms around his neck.

He snagged her wrists, sure she was intent on strangling him. “Listen, lady—”

She cut off his protest with her mouth. Alex sucked in a breath at the feel of those soft lips brushing against his own. Desire—unexpected and unwanted—put fire in his belly, raced to his loins.

Suddenly she was pulling her mouth free and staring at him. Judging by her stunned expression and the confusion in those blue-green eyes of hers, he wasn’t the only one who’d felt as though he’d just been whacked by a thunderbolt. It was insane, Alex told himself. But he couldn’t stop himself from sliding his gaze to that ripe, lush mouth of hers again. Desire, sweet and aching, bit at him once more.

As though sensing his thoughts, she tugged her wrists free and eased back one step, then another. She gave him a lazy smile and followed with a single “Wow!”

“Wow” was right, Alex thought. Still reeling from the unexpected kiss and its effect on him, he shook his head to clear the sensuous fog that seemed to have ensnared him.

“Hey, that was pretty good,” one of the bridesmaids called out.

Good? Good didn’t even come close to describing that kiss or the strange way it had made him feel. And since when does a bridesmaid critique a kiss delivered to the intended bride by a stranger?

The bride spun around, presenting him with another view of her back and more cream-colored skin where her dress dipped along her shoulders. She headed toward the critiquing bridesmaid. “Didn’t I tell you guys that Bernie would come through for us?” she exclaimed in a voice that was decidedly huskier than it had been a few moments ago.

A voice that reminded him of sultry summer nights and hot sex, Alex decided. He sucked in a breath. What in the hell was wrong with him? Lusting after the little gold digger who’d been about to marry his brother.

His brother! Alex nearly groaned. Oh, Lord, he’d forgotten about Kevin. He jerked his attention back to his brother. But instead of getting ready to charge over and tear into him for interfering, Kevin had one arm draped around his kissing bride and the other one around a bridesmaid and was chatting with them as though nothing had happened. Frowning, Alex started toward him. “Kev—”

The minister blocked his path. “You cut in too soon,” the reverend admonished, pointing an accusing finger in his face. “Why didn’t you wait for me to give you your cue?”

Alex frowned at the portly clergyman. His cue?

“Yeah. You were supposed to wait for your cue,” the best man informed him.

“Hey, they’re right, pal,” the groom added as he came over to join them. “You cut in before I got a chance to deliver my lines.”

Alex sucked in his breath as he stared at the face of the groom. The guy was dark-haired, brown-eyed and just about Kevin’s height and size. He even had an endearing choirboy grin that was similar to his brother’s.

Only he wasn’t his brother.

Relief rushed through Alex like water overflowing a swollen creek. Kevin hadn’t been on the verge of marrying the sexy redhead after all. But on the heels of that revelation came an equally disturbing and surprisingly disappointing one. The woman he’d been lusting after for the past sixty seconds was about to marry someone.

And he’d just interrupted her wedding.

“Are you OK?” the bride asked him as she came back to stand before him. “You look... upset.”

“No. It’s just that I thought... That is, I didn’t realize...” Alex clamped his mouth firmly shut, chagrined to be stumbling over his words like a tongue-tied teenager in the throes of his first crush. After a moment, he tried again. “I’m terribly sorry.”

“Whatever for?” she asked in that soft, honeyed voice. “You were great.”

He was great? “I’m afraid I—”

She smiled at him again, and Alex forgot what he’d been about to say. Cursing himself, he took a deep breath. He had to get out of here. “I’m sorry. I can see now that I made a mistake. Please accept my apologies for the, um, interruption. I’ll just leave you and your...your...”

He flicked a glance at the groom he’d mistaken for his brother. The man appeared to be making time with the bridesmaid. Alex swallowed. “I’ll just get out of your way and let you get back to your wedding.” Without wasting another moment, he turned to leave.

“Wait!” She caught his arm before he’d managed to take the first step. “Listen, I know I said you were great, and you were, but I still think it could use some work. Why don’t we try it again? Just do everything exactly the same way you did a few minutes ago.”

Alex’s jaw dropped. His body tensed. He couldn’t help it. His gaze fell to her lips and he felt that slap of heat again. “You want me to kiss you again?”

“Well, yes. That, too.” She gave him another of those lazy smiles that did strange things to his brain and made it difficult for him to think clearly. “But this time, be sure to wait for your cue.”

Alex blinked. “My cue?”

“Yes. When the reverend asks if there are any objections, that’s where you’re supposed to come in. Otherwise, do everything exactly the way you did it a minute ago,” she instructed him. “Your inflection was perfect, and I loved the ad lib, by the way. It was a nice touch. You can go ahead and leave it in.”

His inflection? The ad lib? What in the hell was she talking about?

“Oh, and be sure to do that steely-eyed thing that you did with your eyes again. For a minute there, you even had me believing you were serious about stopping the wedding.”

“I was serious,” Alex countered, growing more confused by the second. “I thought—” His tongue twisted in his mouth as she curved her lips into another one of those smiles and sent fire singing through his veins. “Damn!”

Her smile slipped. “What is it? What’s wrong?”

Alex took a long, measured breath and struggled to regain control of the situation and of himself. “Lady, I don’t have a clue as to what you’re talking about.”

She tipped her head and eyed him curiously. “What is it you don’t understand?”

“I don’t understand anything you’ve said. I don’t know a thing about any cues or ad libs or steely-eyed looks. If I was convincing when I came in here and demanded you stop the wedding it’s because I thought I was stopping a wedding.”

“You thought this was a real wedding?”

“Yes.”

She narrowed her eyes. “And just whose wedding did you think you were stopping?”

“My brother’s.” He squeezed his eyes shut a moment, mortified to have made such a mistake. For a smart man who was considered to be great when it came to assessing businesses, he had just scored a big, fat zero in assessing this situation. If he’d been the least bit astute, he would have noted earlier what he saw now—a stage at the far end of the room, drapes drawn across that stage and a sign tacked to one curtain that read Wet Paint.

“I see,” she said, sighing. “Then I guess Bernie didn’t send you after all.”

Exasperated, Alex dragged a hand through his hair. “I don’t even know anyone named Bernie.”

“I was afraid of that. I don’t suppose there’s any chance that you’re an unemployed actor looking for work, is there?” she asked hopefully.

Alex almost laughed at the notion, and he would have if he weren’t feeling as though he’d wandered into the Twilight Zone. “Hardly. I’m an attorney. My name’s Alex Stone.”