“I look just like Chloe,” she answered gruffly.
“You do, of course. And yet there’s still a difference. Even when you wore your hair the same way, I could always tell you apart.”
She couldn’t really doubt him. It had always surprised her that he could tell them apart so easily, from the first time he’d met them. More than once he had breezed into the shop, taken one glance at her before she’d had a chance to say a word, and said, “Hello, Grace.”
There were people who had known them for years who still couldn’t identify them with just a glance.
She clearly remembered those first few times when he’d strolled into the shop, his thick black hair wind-blown, his bright blue eyes gleaming, his cheeks a bit reddened because it had been winter when he’d first started coming around. Every time she h
ad seen him, her heart had shown an infuriating tendency to flip over in her chest. Because she had known each time that he was there to see Chloe, she had greeted him with frowns and growls.
She’d told herself she didn’t trust this slick-talking, sweet-smiling playboy millionaire as far as she could throw him. She didn’t like him hanging around her sister, and she nearly went ballistic when Chloe confided in her that Bryan had been talking of marriage only weeks after he and Chloe first met. Apparently he had developed a prosaic list of qualifications for a bride, and Chloe met nearly every one.
Chloe had briefly considered taking Bryan up on that offer. She’d told Grace that she would be foolish not to at least consider it. She wanted marriage and children, and she had found a nice, successful, financially secure man who wanted the same things. Chloe hadn’t fallen in love with Bryan—nor, she’d added, did he ever claim to be in love with her—but they had become very good friends.
Grace hadn’t bothered to closely examine her own passionate opposition to Bryan’s calculated courtship of her sister. She had simply insisted that it was wrong, that Chloe deserved better than to be married because she fit some esoterically compiled profile. She’d pointed out Bryan’s widely recorded history of short-lived relationships, and had asked Chloe what made her think he would stay with her any longer than he had the others. She’d been convinced that Chloe would end up disappointed, disillusioned, and very publicly humiliated when he lost interest in her and moved on to someone else—another supermodel, perhaps.
She had been prickly and surly and outright rude to Bryan when he’d dated her sister. He had been unfailingly patient and courteous to her in return. Which, of course, had only made her more disagreeable.
And now he had turned his attentions to her. She looked down at their clasped hands and frowned. This just wasn’t right.
She made an effort to pull her hand away from his. “We should be getting back inside.”
He didn’t immediately release her. “What’s your hurry? We’ve only been out here a few minutes.”
“Yes, well, I don’t want to be gone too long. People might notice.”
“They’ll probably assume we’re out here enjoying a few kisses in the moonlight. Which is pretty much what we want them to think, isn’t it?”
She cleared her throat and tugged at her hand again. “Donovan would probably appreciate it if you’d go back inside and talk to him. I can tell he’s getting a little stressed out by being examined and interrogated by so many people.”
“Donovan’s a big boy. He can take care of himself.” Bryan lifted her hand to his lips and brushed a kiss against her knuckles. “Don’t you like being out here with me, Grace?”
The caress made her shiver. And because that made her mad, she snatched her hand away. “I don’t want you to do that anymore.”
“What? Kiss your hand?”
“No. I mean, yes. That, too. Any kisses. It has to stop.”
“Is that right?”
She sprang to her feet. “Do not be all calm and soothing and polite to me. It drives me crazy when you do that.”
He laid his right arm along the back of the bench and gazed up at her. “I’m sorry. Would you like me to be agitated and impolite?”
“And don’t patronize me. I really hate it when you do that.”
He rose and took a step closer to her. Standing with the moon behind him, he looked tall and dark and a little intimidating. She almost moved back a step, but wouldn’t give up that much pride. “What’s going on, Grace?”
“Nothing. I just think this is all getting out of hand. Reality is getting mixed up with fantasy, and I don’t like it. And this is entirely the wrong time and place to discuss it, anyway, because anyone could come out here and overhear us and then all our efforts would have been wasted.”
“You’re right,” he agreed. She couldn’t see his face, but his tone was somber. “This isn’t the time or place. But we do need to talk. Soon.”
Definitely something she wanted to avoid. “There’s really nothing to say. We both know our parts. We both know what’s going to happen after the wedding. Why complicate things?”
He reached up to touch his fingertips to her flushed cheek. “It’s already gotten complicated.”
“Then we have to…what now?”