Free The Bride Tamer by Ann Major

had been very much in love. I’m afraid they left her with a highly romanticized notion of marriage.”
    â€œSo, you think it’s okay for men to cheat?”
    â€œNo. Not usually. But Vivian never wore makeup or pretty clothes. Then she got so fat and swollen when she was pregnant. She was sick a lot too.”
    Cash imagined a young girl in a strange land who’d been misunderstood, pregnant, sick, her emotions in turmoil. It sounded like she’d had no one, not even her husband, to turn to.
    â€œClearly Vivian won you over at some point.”
    â€œAs soon as Miguelito was born, I began to adore her.” Isabela explained, “She’s a wonderful, selfless mother. He was a sickly baby at first.”
    â€œMy wife had a difficult pregnancy,” Cash said. “I didn’t cheat on her.”
    â€œWell, Julio said she gave Miguelito more attention than she gave him. But I don’t want to talk about her.” Isabela’s hand curled over his.
    Cash’s fingers remained stiff. He couldn’t stop thinking that Vivian deserved a better life. He wanted to go to her, to find her, to apologize for this morning—not to sit here where he had to force every smile.
    He was in a strange mood. If the maid hadn’t been heading toward them with a breakfast tray and his huevos motuleros, he would have made some excuse to Isabela and gone to look for Vivian.
    â€œHow’s your father feeling?” he asked after the maid left them alone to enjoy glasses of fresh orange juice, plates of fruit, and huevos motuleros.
    Warily he observed the dish of mole, a favorite, spicy, chocolate-flavored sauce. Marco had splashed it on everything. Cash detested mole. Luckily Isabela had served it on the side.
    â€œPapacito?”
    Isabela watched him attack his huevos motuleros, a dish composed of refried beans, fried eggs, chopped ham and cheese on a tortilla slathered in tomato sauce, bits of fried banana, and peas.
    â€œBetter?” she asked. Isabela was watching him as she picked at her fruit.
    He kept their conversation to the old days, to impersonal, shared interests. They talked of their impending trip to her beach house this afternoon and her ideas for its renovations.
    â€œI want something much grander,” she said.
    â€œThen you shall have it.”
    He relaxed when she didn’t flirt with him, and he could think about the house instead of her. But the more questions he asked about the beach house, the more tense she became.
    â€œWhat’s the matter?” she finally whispered, leaning forward.
    â€œNothing.” He dropped his fork on the stones of the patio and had to shove his chair back to pick it up.
    â€œYou’re different than you were in the city.”
    When their eyes met, he looked away. “I’m just tired…jet lag. Maybe I drank too much last night.”
    He resumed eating, but his eggs were cold and tasteless now, and the pineapple was too sweet. He set his fork down and looked up at her beautiful face. When she smiled, he told himself there was nothing for it but to propose. And yet…
    â€œIsabela, there’s something I’ve got to do before…”
    He pushed back his chair and stood up. Then he leaned across the table and took her hand and brought it to his lips. “Wait for me? I’ll just be a minute.”
    Her face grew radiant. “I’ll be right here.”
    Unfortunately, as soon as he was in the pool house and had the black velvet box clenched in his palm, he made the mistake of looking at the seven gilded mirrors. In an instant hewas flooded with memories of silken copper-red hair cascading over slim shoulders, of large blue eyes filled with longing.
    He snapped the box closed and tossed it back into his suitcase. Before he could ask Isabela to marry him, he had to find Vivian and make things all right between them. Maybe when they met fully clothed and had a real conversation, she would