The Groom's Stand-In

“And a temper,” Chloe agreed wryly.

“Did she get it all? Or have you been known to blow your top occasionally?”

“Oh, I have a temper. It just takes longer to set mine off than it does Grace’s.”

There was another pause, and then Donovan spoke again. “Do you think your sister will accept your decision to marry Bryan? It would be difficult for you if your twin couldn’t get along with your husband.”

He’d spoken without any particular emotion, but the word husband seemed to reverberate for a moment in the shallow cave.

Chloe swallowed, then replied, “I’ve told you repeatedly, Donovan, I have not agreed to marry Bryan.”

“He’s asked you, hasn’t he?”

“He suggested it might be an advantageous arrangement for both of us,” she replied carefully. “I told him I would consider his proposition.”

“You decided to accept, didn’t you? You wouldn’t have agreed to spend this week with him if you hadn’t pretty well made up your mind already.”

He was getting to know her well. And, truth was, she had almost made up her mind to marry Bryan when she’d agreed to join him here. But things had changed since then.

Was Donovan trying in his not-so-subtle way to find out her true feelings for Bryan? Was he interested only as Bryan’s friend—or for more personal reasons?

She decided to answer him candidly. “I had almost convinced myself that I would never have a better offer. Bryan is an extraordinary man and I’ve

grown quite fond of him during the past few weeks. I want a family—children—and I’m not getting any younger. I thought I would be foolish not to at least give his flattering offer careful consideration. But that was before—”

“Before?”

Before I met you. She hadn’t grown quite brave enough to let those words escape.

“Before I decided that my sister was right about one thing,” she answered instead. “I don’t want to marry anyone because it seems like the logical and practical thing to do at the time. I want it to mean more than that.”

“You, uh, really shouldn’t be making any decisions under these circumstances,” Donovan said somewhat awkwardly. “You’re exhausted and scared, and you can’t think clearly like that. Things that you feel out here—well, you can’t trust that they’re real.”

So Donovan was worried that their emotions were being influenced by their situation. Maybe he was warning himself as much as her. And while she acknowledged the validity of his concerns, she didn’t really believe she was letting herself be overly influenced by circumstances.

True, the past forty-eight hours had thrown them together so that they’d had no choice but to get to know each other, to lean on each other and depend on each other. But there had to be more to it than that.

What she was starting to feel for Donovan was too powerful to be mere infatuation, too compelling to be simple attraction. She had never been the sort of woman who fell in love easily—and she wasn’t quite ready yet to say she was in love with Donovan—but it was more than circumstantial.

Because she wasn’t at all sure of his feelings for her, she said simply, “I’m not making any big decisions tonight.”

That seemed to satisfy him—at least enough that he let the subject drop. “You’d better get some sleep. We’ll start early in the morning.”

An outcropping of rock jutted from the cave wall beside her. Using her arm for a pillow, she laid her head on it and closed her eyes while Donovan leaned against the opposite wall. The only sound in the cave came from the wildlife outside.

They wouldn’t be nestling together tonight. Donovan had deliberately withdrawn from her since he’d brought up Bryan’s name.

He was absolutely right to do so, of course, she reflected as she pretended to sleep. As he’d said, this was no time to make important decisions. Or to take rash actions. After that, she needed to have a long talk with Bryan. And after that…

She couldn’t say now whether she and Donovan would ever spend time together after they were rescued. But she suspected that it wouldn’t be her decision if they did not.

Grace had worried about her being hurt during this vacation. Chloe had wondered if there was a chance she could fall in love this week.

She spent a long time reflecting on the ironic aspects of those uncanny predictions. It gave her something to do besides think about how very close Donovan sat to her—and how nice it would have felt to be lying in his arms rather than against a cold, hard rock.

A wireless telephone in his hand, Bryan Falcon sat in the den of his Ozarks vacation home and gazed somberly at the woman sleeping restlessly on the couch across the room. He’d draped an afghan over her earlier and she had stirred, but, to his relief, she hadn’t awakened. He’d needed a break from her pacing and questioning.

He’d tried to talk her into taking one of the bedrooms for the night, but she’d refused. She wouldn’t sleep, she had vowed, until Donovan and Chloe were safe.