Free The Virgin and the Vengeful Groom by Dixie Browning

was sheer bravado.
    Ignoring the remark, Curt watched her slide on a pair of dark glasses, the kind that marked her immediately as someone to notice, and wondered if he’d have been smarter to write off his losses and forget the whole thing. Was thirty-six old enough for a midlife crisis? Senility?
    Granted, he’d hung on longer than most men in his line of work, but he could have sworn his brain had still been functioning. Evidently it had been deep-sixed right along with his diving career.
    Headed south on Highway 168, Curt dealt with a number of second thoughts. The Powers papers were now in his possession. They were rightfully his. He could lose Ms. Fancy-Pants on the way south, cut her out of the deal entirely, possession being nine-tenths of the law.
    No, he couldn’t. He could be a real bastard when he had to, but his integrity had never been called into question. So he would deal with the situation, share what he felt like sharing and ignore the fact that the lady got under his skin quicker than a whole herd of chiggers.
    By now she was probably having a few second thoughts of her own. She hadn’t struck him as the kind of woman who would follow a strange man home, but then, what did he know about women? He’d proved his lack of expertise. He was willing to give her the benefit of the doubt, considering the situation she was in. Under heavy stress, common sense was often the first casualty. For all he knew she might be after something besides what was in those boxes. It wouldn’t be the first time a woman had come on to him sexually when they’d learned what he was. Being a SEAL was a turn-on for a certain type of woman.
    It would have been funny if it weren’t so damned pathetic. Any man less dangerous would be hard to find. If that’s what Lady Lily had in mind, then she was in for a disappointment. A quick one-night stand was out of the question. Anything quick was out of the question.
    As for anything more protracted, experience had taught him that a man who suddenly drops out of sight for months at a time with no notice is a poor risk when it comes to intimate personal relationships.
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    Lily, following the tailgate of that monstrous silver pickup truck, wondered if menopause could set in at the age of twenty-eight. She’d put it down to an overload ofstress, but it could be hormonal. “It’s only a business trip,” she reassured herself. “It’s even tax deductible.”
    She had a feeling there might be more involved, but this was no time for second thoughts. If she’d been layering a plot, she’d have limited herself on the complications. But she wasn’t, and she couldn’t, and so she settled for justifying—for rationalizing.
    Getting out of town was a good idea. She’d be seeing a different area, and as a writer, it couldn’t hurt to broaden her horizon. But the most compelling reason of all was that she would be sleeping in the same house—maybe even the same room—where Bess had once slept. If she opened herself up to the experience, and she was good at doing that, she could not only tell Bess’s story, she might even be able to generate enough material that she could try her hand at writing historical suspense.
    Lily drove confidently and well, and occasionally too fast, but not today. She had too much on her mind to risk getting pulled over. In scrambling out of harm’s way, she had knowingly, deliberately put herself in the way of a different kind of harm. For her, that was a first.
    Under the hypnotic spell of the road, she let her mind wander. What did he think of her? Just because she wrote about man-woman relationships, men occasionally got the idea that she was easy. She wasn’t easy. What she was, was impossible. If Curt Powers tried anything, he would discover that, while she might not look it, she could easily handle a man who moved as if every bone in his body had been broken and