Broken Wings (A Romantic Suspense)(5)

No limo ride. We’ll be heading one floor up to the ballroom for the reception.

It would cost a fortune if my new stepfather didn’t own the building.

I need to get down there. I belong with the bridal party, but they move without a care for me and take their places at the doors.

Jack catches my arm.

“Ellie.”

“Go f*ck yourself,” I hiss as I shake loose from his grip.

“Nice to see you, too.”

Just ignore him. Just ignore him. Just ignore him…

I can’t.

Damn him to hell.





Jack





My hand closes around Ellie’s arm and she looks at me, hard. All I can manage is her name. God, it’s even worse up close. The sight of her scars twists my guts into a knot, but the worst is the hard look in her eyes… Eye.

“Go f*ck yourself,” she says, so low only I can hear.

I’m too shocked to say anything as she shakes loose and strides down the aisle to stand with the other bridesmaids. My hand falls to my side.

I came six thousand miles for that.

What were you expecting, Jack? You haven’t said a word to her in ten years. Not since the accident.

Right now, in this moment, I could choke the life out of my father. I can see him at the end of the aisle, standing across from…f*ck, is she my stepmother? How are we all related now? I need a f*cking map. My family tree looks like an interstate cloverleaf.

My father has married Ellie’s stepmother. Knowing him, he insists she call him Dad now. They’re down there shaking hands.

Frank’s big hand lands on my shoulder.

“I had a feeling that’d happen,” he rumbles. “You’d best leave now before you start a scene. Your old man…”

“I flew over here. I’m going to talk to him. I’m done being held at arm’s length.”

“You know he pays my check, boy.”

“I know, Frank. I won’t bring this down on you.”

He sighs. It sounds like a freight train slowing down. “Try not to make me do anything I’ll regret. You know I gotta do what I gotta do.”

“Yeah, Frank. I know.”

I’m just part of the crowd, heading up. Nobody really recognizes me. Ellie has a huge family, or at least her mother does, but my father is an only child. Most of the people on the groom’s side are acquaintances, business partners, friends of friends.

Hangers on. His best man is one of his board members, not his f*cking son.

Deep breath, Jack. I’m squeezing my fists together, so I let them go before I head upstairs. I flow with the crowd, nobody special, just another tuxedo. The crowd flows through and I keep my head down and away from my new stepmother.

Doesn’t work. Dad flinches when he spots me, but I pass by too fast for him to say anything and his face goes back to being a mask.

My new stepmother…confuses me. It’s weird thinking of her as Ellie’s mom. She’s more of an older sister. When I was younger the age gap was bigger, we were just kids and she was an Adult, but now the gap doesn’t matter all that much. She watches me pass, her face neutral.

Her sister? Cousin? Whoever it is, she watches me pass with more interest, giving me a smoky look that would bring most men to full attention.

She looks familiar. I think I’ve seen her in her underwear in an ad.

I adjust my jacket and keep walking, up the stairs to the top floor of the tower, and the expansive ballroom under a huge baroque dome. It’s a breathtaking space, windows all around with one side dominated by the ominous red glow of the letters.

I slip into the crowd and wait until the wedding party makes its entrance. My father and his new wife arrive in a cloud of bridesmaids and groomsmen, and everyone heads for the tables set up at the far end, in front of the stage.

I make my move fast, tossing someone else’s place card under the table to steal their seat. It takes a full five minutes for everyone to settle down.

Dad takes his seat next to my new stepmother and the best man rises to give a rambling speech that I don’t bother to follow. I’m too busy watching Ellie watch her empty plate and avoid my gaze.

Mostly. Her eyes…

Eye, goddamn it, her eye keeps flicking up, every time she forgets she doesn’t want to look at me. I don’t look anywhere else, just at her. There is nothing here but her. My innards twist at the sight.

She’s still beautiful. She has an innocence about her, something more than the sum of her looks, even though she is and always has been very pretty. I knew girls our age who peaked in high school. Ellie didn’t. She was radiant when she was fourteen and she’s radiant now, scars be damned. Her eye is as blue as the ocean at night, her skin as soft as a cloud, dusted with freckles around her mouth.

There’s no way to ignore the scars, though. Her face…melted. When she moves just the right way I can see it, the left side of her features frozen into a rough, fleshy mask. She sits with her head up, as if daring anyone to look, but she wears her hair over the injuries, and her chin constantly twitches, like she’s trying to hide and forcing herself out into the open. Her hand sits on the table, a useless claw in a glove to hide scars even harder to look at than her face.

The man who did that to her sits not five feet away, enjoying his wedding to his gorgeous wife. Ellie’s mother is gorgeous, and that’s about all she’s got going for her. When Ellie’s father was alive and all was right with the world, I wondered what the old man saw in his bubbleheaded assistant.