“I’ll get you reinstated,” Angelo said without hesitation.
Danette shook her head. “Thank you, but I need to get away. I’ve lived here all my life and been protected for most of it.” She bit her lip and swallowed. “I want adventure. I thought Ray was it, but I was wrong.”
Tara’s heart broke for her friend.
“Maybe I could help find you something.” Angelo said.
A glimmer of hope sparked in Danette’s eyes. “Seriously? You mean it?”
“Yes.”
“Aren’t you mad at me?”
“You are not responsible for the malicious behavior of your former boyfriend.”
“I’ll never make another scrapbook page again.”
Tara gave her a hug around her shoulders. “Let’s not get hasty. One scheming photographer does not the death of a hobby make.”
Danette gave her a weak smile.
They talked her into staying for dinner. When Angelo discovered she spoke both Spanish and Italian, he said it would be a piece of cake to get her a job abroad if she’d like.
Danette left with a smile on her face, despite the sadness in her eyes.
Tara frowned at the closed door Danette had just walked through. “I’d like to punch Ray right in the nose.”
“I’ve done better than that. I’ve instigated proceedings against him for getting the photo under false pretenses.”
“I doubt the charges will stick.”
“Maybe not, but I’m doing my best to make sure they do and the experience of going to court and having to hire a lawyer to defend his actions definitely will.”
“True.”
“So, about this wedding.”
“Fly to Reno, get married and check into a swank suite for our wedding night?” she asked, more convinced than ever that waiting would be taxing her control on her feminine impulses.
He grinned, his expression more carefree than she’d ever seen it. “We are going to have a very good marriage, stellina. You fit me like a glove.”
Angelo looked around the exclusive wedding chapel with satisfaction. A big wedding was out of the question. Not only would it take too long to prepare, but he didn’t want the publicity that would accompany it to alert Baron Randall of Angelo’s plans to marry Tara.
When he’d seen the innuendo laden articles with pictures of him and Tara kissing, his first thought had been the money he’d paid to bribe Randall’s private detective not to mention his involvement with Tara had been wasted.
The whole flight back to Portland, he’d been worried he would only land to discover Randall had gotten to her first.
Randall hadn’t gotten to her and Angelo was determined he wouldn’t get the chance.
Hence the hasty wedding, but it didn’t have to be a shabby, hole-in-the-wall affair. And it wasn’t.
He’d offered his second in command a way to get back into his good graces…arrange a wedding fit for a princess in less than twenty-four hours. The wedding chapel was actually outside Reno, in the mountains toward the more affluent and less touristy Lake Tahoe.
The cathedral style chapel was decorated inside with dozen and dozens of white and yellow roses and purple irises. Lit with candlelight and recessed sconces that made the stained glass behind the altar glow, it was the perfect setting for his soon to be wife to walk down the aisle.
Tara’s mother and Danette were seated in front on one of the polished wooden pews. Angelo’s private investigator and long-time friend, Hawk, sat across the aisle from them.
The music of a pipe organ swelled, filling the space with the strains of the wedding march.
Angelo’s gaze snapped to the back of the church where the open double doors framed Tara, her head held high, her dark brown eyes pools of feminine mystery and her hand curled around her stepdad’s arm.
They started forward and a wave of something indefinable washed over Angelo.
Possessive desire was certainly part of it. Soon, this woman would be his to have, to hold and to make love to…over and over again.
Tara wasn’t wearing a traditional wedding gown, but the designer original filmy white concoction she had on clung to every single one of her curves. It dipped in the front to reveal the top swells of her creamy, smooth breasts. Sexy and feminine, the dress was the stuff masculine fantasies were made of.
Those fantasies vied for his attention with the minister as he went through the wedding service. Angelo managed to give all the right answers, however, and smiled in victory when Tara did the same thing.
Afterward, he took everyone out for a celebratory dinner at the five-star restaurant his assistant had made reservations at. All he really wanted to do was take Tara up to their suite and make her his completely.