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Marriage by Mistake(10)

By:Alyssa Kress


Kelly found herself blushing, too. On the way out of the chapel, laughing, he'd bought a pair of handcuffs. "It was no big deal," she now claimed. They'd been fur-lined and hadn't even had real locks — nor had they ended up getting used.

His face resumed its normal color as he set his printout to the side. "You're right. Not much of a big deal, compared to what is conspicuously missing. Miss Williams — " Slowly, he clasped his hands and set them around one knee. His dark lashes lowered. "Miss Williams, nowhere on this credit report is there a record that I bought protection. Condoms. Anything of that nature."

Kelly stared at him.

"I assume we had sexual relations and so I need to ask." He lifted his lashes enough to give her an amazingly direct look. "I have to ask: were such relations unprotected?"

Kelly continued to stare. His eyes were steady, his mouth flat. "We didn't use protection," she heard herself admit.

His stare went into laser-mode. "Then you could be — "

"No."

"But — "

"I'm not pregnant." Her gaze averted and she found herself blushing all over again. "I already know."

"Oh," he said a moment later, and released a deep breath.

"God." Kelly jumped from the sofa, stalked to the nearest wall, and crossed her arms tightly. She glared at a painting of a beach. "What a thing to have to tell a rank stranger."

They both stopped. A heavy silence descended on the room. As she stared at the beach, Kelly felt a prickling all over her skin. Slowly, she turned.

He was watching her, very alert. Waiting.

Kelly's heart started pounding. Was it possible — ? Could he actually — ? That is, she'd considered the scenario for half an instant here and there, but could it actually be true? Was he a rank stranger, someone who didn't remember meeting her...or anything?

Kelly swallowed. She didn't want to believe it. It was too outrageous. It smelled like getting bamboozled again. She cleared her throat, intending to tell him she wasn't fooled when, even as she looked at him, he transformed.

Not physically. No, physically he was the Dean she remembered; dark hair, wavy, left a little too long, blue eyes like a midnight sea, body like a panther. But behind the eyes —

Behind the eyes was someone she'd never met before, herself.

Kelly had to think in order to breathe. Her knees felt shaky. "Oh," she said. "Oh."

The new man, the stranger, got to his feet. "There is one other document. Would you, please?" He indicated the sofa with his hand.

Kelly shifted her gaze to the sofa but didn't dare move. She tried to go back to skeptical mode, but it wouldn't work. He wouldn't be the other man again, the one she knew. He was...somebody else. Somebody who'd been hypnotized, who didn't even remember meeting her, let alone remember falling in love.

Apparently giving up on the idea she would sit, he plucked up something from his briefcase. It was a tiny piece of paper, only about an inch square and soiled, as by kitchen oil. He held it out to her.

The insistence in his gaze finally made Kelly move. She took a step, close enough to see he was holding a receipt. "Duncan's Donuts," she read aloud. The prickling sensation returned, sweeping over her tenfold.

"Does that mean anything to you?"

Kelly could feel a bubble of hysteria inside. "You got the donuts."

"I was holding a bag of them when I 'woke up.' For you, I presume. I never eat such things, myself."

The bubble of hysteria inside Kelly expanded. She started to laugh. "But you were the one who noticed the store, who wanted them — " She stopped. Biting her lip, she looked at him, looked at the man behind the eyes. "No," she corrected. "That wasn't you." Kelly felt a chill replace her hysteria. "Was it?"

He turned. Delicately, he returned the little piece of paper to his briefcase. "Miss Williams, I can only repeat my heartfelt apology that you got mixed up in this...little accident of mine. The hypnosis — well, I never actually expected to go under, and then my cousin Troy had to get in on the act with his amusing 'suggestions.'"

"Suggestions." Kelly's chill grew. She'd seen men, dignified, elderly men, bark like dogs under the suggestion of a stage hypnotist. She could make the logical deduction. "In real life you wouldn't have done any of it, what we did together. You wouldn't have given me the time of day to begin with."

He didn't say a word. He just looked at her, looked at her with cool, unfamiliar eyes.

Kelly whirled. A part of her wanted to laugh. Here it was, the magical explanation she'd been hoping for. Dean hadn't abandoned her, after all. He'd even bought the donuts.