A Wedding At Ruby Lake Read online

  A WEDDING AT RUBY LAKE

  Jennifer Hayward

  www.millsandboon.com.au

  Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Copyright

  Chapter One

  The wedding of the decade was to take place in Ruby Lake in seven days.

  Ariana Westwood, eldest daughter of the rugged cottage haven’s oldest and most influential family was slated to marry prominent investment banker, Jackson O’Connell, in a lakeside ceremony guaranteed to be both lavish and tasteful. A perfect union among a sea of wealth that spent its summers unwinding, socializing and indulging in activities far better left to the whispers that slipped across the lake than the boundaries beyond.

  A coup it surely should have been for Claire Westwood, the matriarch o f the Westwood clan, who stood at the railing of her palatial cottage estate looking down at the water, a glass of ice-cold Riesling in her hand. Jackson was everything she’d ever wanted for her daughter—wealthy, kind, smart and possessed of enough backbone to handle the willful and spirited Ariana. The perfect match.

  But harmony would not be the word of the day. Instead she was about to blow the illusion of perfection off this idyllic community set deep in the heart of northern Ontario. To shake up Ruby Lake like the lightning storms that ripped across the mile-wide body of water, lighting up the night like fireworks and touching every soul in its path. And hope that somewhere therein lay the path to redemption.

  A solitary figure among the hundreds of family, friends and wedding party members who’d gathered to celebrate the upcoming nuptials, Claire lifted her glass to her mouth and sipped the chilled wine. The sun was setting, casting its trademark ruby glow across the water. The urge to take her secret to the grave with her as she’d always intended came back, overwhelmingly strong. She would have done just that had she not seen her life go in that very direction just weeks ago in a small plane crash on her way to Ruby Lake. It had reminded her how short, how precious, life was. How, despite her selfish ways, she loved her family more than she loved life itself.

  How she could no longer continue to play God with her children’s lives.

  Her choice made, she turned back to the guests and located her tall, slim, vivacious daughter, Ariana, standing at her fiancé’s side. She was smiling up at him, a bright light as always, but there were shadows in her blue eyes. Claire’s fingers tightened around her glass. It was time to set the ball in motion. To make things right.

  She started across the deck toward her daughter, skirting Ariana’s ultra-efficient wedding planner, Tyra Brown, and Jackson’s best man, Nick Taylor, quaffing down a cocktail while he flirted with a pretty dark-haired member of the catering staff. Her progress was halted mid-stride by the arrival of her former husband, Bradley Westwood, a perfectly-put-together blonde at his side. Her mouth tightened. Always a flirt, her husband had spent their marriage making a profession of it until she couldn’t take it anymore. Until she’d done the unthinkable….

  Her gaze met his cool, guarded one. So winning her husband back was going to be a challenge? Her chin lifted. Fortunately she’d never met a game she couldn’t win and that’s what this was all about. Restoring the natural order of things.

  ***

  The whir of helicopter blades filled the night air. Felicity Kane, Ariana’s maid of honour, stopped in mid-sentence. She frowned and lifted her eyes skyward, waiting until the chopper had touched down to speak.

  “I thought everyone was here.”

  Ariana’s heart dropped to her toes. If she could have forgotten for even ten seconds who the last remaining guest to arrive was, it would have been a major victory. Instead she’d spent the past hour searching the sky for the big black bird he piloted.

  “It’s Hunter,” she muttered weakly, flicking an imaginary speck of dirt off her dress. “He’s the last.”

  “Oh, no.” Felicity waved a finger at her. “You do not say his name like that. You say it in a I-want-to-kick-your-butt kind of way. Like, ‘You walked out on me and left me broken-hearted and I feel nothing for you.’”

  Ariana smiled her first real smile of the evening. The fact that she had seriously cold feet on the eleventh hour of her wedding couldn’t have anything to do with Hunter… Could it? He’d walked away from her and Ruby Lake after his rogue trader father, Michael, had skipped town with half the lake’s money and built himself into a billionaire real-estate developer with a freshly minted reputation. And installed Ariana’s old rival as his fiancée and glamorous dinner party host.

  She wrung her clammy hands together, Jackson’s massive diamond sparkling in the lights. It wasn’t possible she could still care. Was it? How much more could she hurt?

  Ariana’s sister, Georgia, ran to the railing and peered over at the helipad. Her young and very impressionable jaw dropped.

  “What?” Ariana was pretty sure she couldn’t take any more right about now.

  “It’s Hunter, all right. Minus his plus one. I wonder if the rumour is true.”

  “What rumour?” Felicity demanded.

  Georgia turned around, put her fingers to her mouth and cocked a hip for dramatic effect. “Brenda Ellis at the deli told me Hunter and Rachel Banks are finished. As in unengaged.”

  Ariana’s knees went weak.

  “Sweetheart, I need you for a second.”Ariana’s mother pounced like a cat on a hot tin roof.

  Ariana held up a hand. “Not now mother.”

  “Now.” Her mother took her arm, shoved a drink in her hand and led her through the guests to the back patio off the kitchen.

  Ariana dug her heels in and pulled to a halt. “What’s going on?”

  Her mother swept a hand over her perfect chignon, her delicate chin lifting. “The night that Hunter left town, he came to see you.”

  Ariana stared at her mother as though she was speaking Spanish.

  “He wanted you to come to New York with him. I knew it. I told him he wasn’t good enough for you. To go and not come back.”

  The wooden deck swayed around Ariana like the rolling ship she’d use to love at the amusement park. “You’re joking.” She must be joking.

  Her mother’s mouth firmed. “I was having an affair with Michael Joseph. I didn’t want you anywhere near Hunter because I knew the truth would come out.”

  “And therein lays the issue with this evening’s festivities.”

  Ariana whirled around at the sound of Hunter’s deep, rich baritone, finding herself face-to-face with the deep blue eyes and six-foot-two gorgeous inches of the ex she hadn’t seen in seven years. It was all too much. Her head swam. The glass slipped from her fingers.

  She was vaguely aware of Hunter cursing, plucking her from amid the glass shards and ordering her mother to get water.

  Her gaze lifted to his. “What’s going on, Hunter?”

  He smiled that devil-may-care smile she remembered so well. “Why, I’ve come back to take what’s mine. You’ve always been the only woman for me, Ari. Surely you know that?”

  It was on the tip of her tongue to say no, surely she didn’t. That he’d left her. But then Hunter was setting her down on a bench and disappearing inside to find a broom.

  Her head spun even faster. It took about five seconds for Ariana to do what any semi-hysterical, vaguely sensible woman would do.

  She picked up her skirt and ran.

  Chapter Two

  Jackson O’Connell had made millions playing to the subtleties in life. He knew precisely when to nudge a
burgeoning client into riskier territory, when to pull back and when to tap the market to line their pockets even deeper than before. But he had yet to master the fine art of reading his fiancée. Why Ariana did what she did remained a mystery to him. A quirk of the female brain.

  In actual fact, he didn’t much care. She was beautiful, smart and cooked a mean coq au vin for his business associates. All the attributes he needed in a wife.

  He did wonder, however, where she was right about now. Tyra Brown, their ever-efficient wedding planner, was chomping at the bit to sit everyone down for dinner and his fiancée was nowhere in sight.

  He was just about to go find her when Georgia, Ariana’s younger sister, sidled up to him, shot his best man an appraising look and announced blithely, “Ariana’s gone.”

  The mouthful of beer he’d taken went down the wrong way. He coughed and struggled to breathe. “What… do you mean, gone?”

  “Outta here. AWOL. Took a boat and disappeared after Hunter told her he’d come back for her.”

  “Excuse me?”

  Georgia smirked. “Didn’t you know? Hunter was the love of Ariana’s life until he took off and left her high and dry.”

  Jackson felt the blood drain from his face. Hunter Joseph, known for his take-no-prisoners brutality in a business deal, had walked in here tonight as if he’d owned the place. Looking for something. And now Jackson knew what. His fist clenched by his side. He was going to take Hunter apart piece by piece.

  “Where is he?”

  Georgia’s eyes sparkled with amusement. “Oh, he’s gone, too. After Ariana. It’s all a bit dramatic.”

  “One could say it’s the best thing that’s happened all day,” Nick muttered under his breath. “How many ways can you say high maintenance?”

  Jackson ignored that as he watched Bradley Westwood elbow his way through the crowd, a frown on his face. Ariana’s father leaned down, told Georgia to keep her mouth shut, and pulled Jackson aside.

  “How much did she tell you?”

  “That my fiancée is missing and Hunter Joseph has gone after her,” Jackson replied grimly. “What the hell is going on, Bradley?”

  “I’m eager to find out,” Ariana’s father said curtly. “But first we need to find her.”

  He set his glass down. “I’m coming with you.” And God help Hunter Joseph if Jackson found him first.

  ***

  Jackson knew he should be feeling something as he and Bradley’s assistant, Sarah, sped out over the dark, silent lake in one of the Westwood speedboats. His fiancée had run out on him, ostensibly upset over her ex-boyfriend’s appearance, leaving him to face the fallout in front of a hundred-plus people. He should be beside himself. Yet all he felt was the same numbness that had consumed him all week leading up to this three-ring circus that was his wedding. And a strange sense of relief as the Westwood compound was reduced to a tiny speck behind them. He could breathe easier. His equilibrium was restored. And he wondered if he’d always known his fiancée was in love with someone else.

  Wasn’t his.

  Wondered if he even knew what love was.

  He and Nick had been excellent bachelors. Throw a good looking woman in front of them and they’d used their endless supply of money to wine and dine them. But as far as forming long-term attachments? Laughable until he’d met Ariana.. His friends had referred to her as a killer portfolio.

  But this was his life he was talking about. Not a business investment.

  “Are you all right?”

  The confident, self-possessed blonde who apparently doubled as Bradley Westwood’s bedmate yelled the question over the noise of the engine. A local who knew the area like the back of her hand, Bradley had sent her with him to search the old Westwood cottage, while he went to comb the other side of the lake.

  Jackson ripped his gaze away from Sarah’s million-dollar calves. “Is that it?” he asked, pointing to the rather run-down cottage on the hill in front of them.

  She nodded and cut back the engine. “You aren’t in love with her.”

  The simple, confidently spoken statement rang out on the night air like an invitation to a truth serum he wasn’t yet ready to consume. He stared at her perfectly composed face. “Pardon me?”

  She expertly guided the boat into the old, wooden boat-house slip. “If you were in love with her, you’d be livid.”

  “I am livid.” At himself mostly for being such an idiot.

  She reached for the side of the dock and pulled the boat in. “You know,” she offered dryly, flicking him a glance, “the strong, silent type went out with cigarette commercials. Emotionally self-aware men are in.”

  He brought his back teeth together. “And how would emotion help in a situation like this?”

  She climbed out of the boat and tied it up. “I’m trying to offer an explanation as to why she might have run off.”

  ‘Because I don’t talk enough?’ He flashed her a black look and stepped out of the boat. “Forgive me if I’d prefer not to take advice from a woman dating a guy twice her age.”

  She lifted a brow. “You think I’m sleeping with Bradley?”

  “Everyone seems to think so.”

  She made a face. “He’s between women, Jackson. He needed a plus one to make his wife jealous. I fit the bill.”

  She sure did. He reached down to help her secure the knot and got an excellent view of a creamy toned thigh on the way up.

  “Also that.”

  “What?”

  “Men who are in love with their fiancées don’t ogle other women’s legs.”

  His temper flared into a living, fire-breathing entity. “How about,” he suggested caustically, “we focus on finding my fiancée before we have to tell the guests she’s having second thoughts?’

  Three hours and an exhaustive search of two additional locations later, there was still no sign of his bride. Furious with Ariana for pulling such a stunt, his own doubts mounting by the minute, Jackson returned with Sarah to the Westwood compound.

  He struggled to feel something—anything other than frustration and confusion. Sarah disappeared, came back with a bottle of wine and sat down beside him on the slip. She poured him a glass without asking, handed it to him and they drank in silence for what seemed like a very long time.

  “You can’t marry her,” Sarah said quietly.

  He looked over at her, sure she was right. But how could he not? His confusion must have shown in his eyes because she put a finger to his lips, leaned over and kissed him. It was hot and it was electric.And when it was over, Jackson knew he had never, ever kissed Ariana like that.

  ***

  The official story was that Ariana hadn’t been feeling well and had retired for the evening. But by the time Ruby Lake went to bed the rumour mill had run rampant. Ariana Westwood was missing. And suddenly, the question on everyone’s lips wasn’t what dress she would wear, but “Will she or won’t she?”

  Chapter Three

  The show must go on.

  Tyra Brown, wedding planner extraordinaire to the filthy rich, had told herself that more times than she could count over the course of her ten-year career. But in the case of the Westwood wedding, she wasn’t counting on it. Ariana had been missing for more than forty-eight hours now; no one had a clue where she was and general mayhem had ensued.

  It had been Tyra’s job to handle Claire Westwood, a figure worthy of a starring role in Dynasty, a groom who seemed to have checked out of the entire process and a father who appeared to think ordering her to do something meant she had a secret bride locating technology in her toolbox that would magically unearth Ariana Westwood.

  She knew the stunning, black-haired, violet-eyed, soon-to-be bride well enough to know she wasn’t coming back until she was ready. So best to turn her attention to her next most pressing issue—the several-hundred-pound bears tearing the contents of her massive reception tent on the lakeside apart each evening.

  Thus how she found herself stepping out of a boat in front
of a big Do Not Disturb sign on Riley James’s private island and wobbling precariously over the rocky shore in Louboutins that had cost more than her entire month’s rent. Riley James, local conservation officer, bear whisperer and apparently a grizzly, cranky divorcé, was the only man who could ensure the bears didn’t make an unexpected appearance in her wedding photos. Unfortunately he was on vacation for the next two weeks and this ill-advised, counseled-against visit to his private domain was her attempt to flush him out.

  She picked her way up the grassy hill to the impressive-looking, rustic structure built out of logs. Riley James had told the owner of the property she was renting for the reception, “Hell would freeze over before I interrupt my vacation for that goddamn nuisance of a Westwood wedding.” Daunting? Yes. Stopping her? Hell no.

  She knocked on the sliding-glass doors at the front of the house. Silence glared back at her. A loud, thumping sound came from the back. The crack of an axe?

  She rounded the house and stopped dead in her tracks as she came face-to-face with the most beautiful male back she’d ever seen.

  Bare. Sweaty. Defined, chiseled muscle. Finished off by a pair of faded jeans that left little to the imagination.

  This could not be Riley James.

  The urge to turn around and leave had the soles of her feet pressing into the ground. She reminded herself why she was here. This was about saving her party favours from the grizzlies. To save something about this God-forsaken wedding before it was too late.

  She took a deep breath, squared her shoulders and walked a wide circle around him, given the piece of dangerous equipment in his hands and the force with which he was using it.

  Her heart stalled in her chest as she took him in. Okay so the grizzly part had been right if this was Riley James. He wore a few days’ stubble…and he wore it well. But the six pack could have come straight out of a men’s fitness magazine and those eyes—a piercing green—they were gor—

  Hostile. Distinctly hostile.

  He threw down the axe, pushed his long, shaggy hair out of his face and glared at her. “You’re on private property.”