Bertrice Small - Sudden Pleasures

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The third book in the Channel series, 2007

Screwed! She was royally, totally, and completely screwed. And all because that charming old man who had been her grandfather came from a generation that still believed in happily ever after. Ashley Cordelia Kimbrough, the richest woman in Egret Pointe, could have told you that there was absolutely no such thing as happily ever after.

"You can't find any way around his will?" she asked her attorneys for what was probably the hundredth time. "Nothing?"

Rick Johnson and Joe Pietro d'Angelo shook their heads at her.

"You've still got eighteen months," Rick said. "A lot can happen in eighteen months, Ash. There's still plenty of time."

"Yeah," Joe chimed in. "And it would have been a lot worse if we hadn't found out about Derek. If you'd married him, it would have cost you a lot of money, Ash. A lot of money. I would have thought a guy like that would have been smarter, but maybe it's just been luck that kept him one step ahead of the law. But once he started howling about the prenup, bells started going off around here."

Ashley sighed. "Thank God you two checked him out, but everyone seemed to think he was the perfect match for me. But then, what wasn't to like? He was tall, blond, athletic, well-spoken. He was a great dresser, and seemed to be well-fixed himself. Who knew that Derek Douglas Carruthers was wanted in Georgia and South Carolina for fraud? And that his real name was Elmer Oswald Leonard?"

"Let's not forget he is also wanted in Thailand, Italy, and Turkey," Joe reminded her dryly. "This guy was a con man extraordinaire, Ash. He's left a long trail of broken hearts and empty bank accounts in his wake."

"So now I'm back to square one," Ashley said. "You know, guys, I'm starting to be known around Egret Pointe as the Bad-luck Bride. It's more than embarrassing."

"Oh, come on, Ash," Rick said. "These things happen. Weddings get called off at the last minute all the time. No big deal."

"This is the third wedding I've planned," Ashley said, "that's been called off at the last minute. The first one was the year after grandfather died. I was twenty-four, and really should have known better, but I didn't, did I?"

"None of us knew that Carson would run off with the best man two days before the wedding," Joe said. "Usually it's the maid of honor the groom runs off with, isn't it?" He struggled to hold back the smile that was threatening to burst forth. In retrospect it really had been a comical situation.

Ashley laughed. "I thought it was so romantic that he was saving himself for our wedding night," she said. "Carson was really the nicest of them all, you know. I see him every now and again in the city. He finds these wonderful new young designers for me all the time. It's like he's trying to make it up to me. He's still with Peter, and they're very happy. They're even talking about adopting a baby."

"You've got a good heart, Ash," Joe remarked.

"Yeah, sure, but I've also got lousy taste in men. May I remind you of my second attempt at marriage? Chandler Wayne. Former quarterback for a pro team, and all man, all the time. I made damned certain he wasn't another Carson, and he wasn't. Not too inventive in the sack, but very enthusiastic," Ashley said, enjoying the fact that her two attorneys were embarrassed by her frankness, especially as both of them remembered that it had made the tabloids when Chandler had died during a bout of autoerotic sex while in Vegas with his six groomsmen for a weeklong bachelor party.

Both lawyers had been married for a long time. Both had children who were grown and out of the house, or still in college. Both were obviously content, although Ashley knew that their wives were frequent visitors to the Channel. And very few women who visited the Channel did so for sightseeing purposes only. Most women visiting the Channel did so to satisfy their sexual fantasies. Ashley certainly did. Without it she would have gone crazy after all the Sturm und Drang in her life.

Her parents had been drowned in a boating accident when she was fourteen. She and her brother made their home after that with Grandfather Kimbrough at Kimbrough Hall. Their maternal grandparents were deceased, and there were no other relatives. Her brother had graduated from West Point, and as a second lieutenant been killed in Desert Storm at the age of twenty-three. Ashley was in her freshman year of college that year. She hadn't wanted to go to college because she had an idea to open a specialty shop in Egret Pointe. But Edward Kimbrough had insisted, promising to back her venture when she graduated.

With that incentive dangling before her like a golden carrot, Ashley managed to graduate in three years' time with a degree in business. It had meant no dating, no vacations, no life. But she had done it, and true to his word her grandfather had financed the elegant lingerie shop that Ashley named Lacy Nothings. He hadn't thought much of the idea, he told her candidly, but Ashley knew her market. Egret Pointe was no longer a dull small town. When grandfather had built Ansley at Egret Pointe, his first upscale development, everything had changed. The village, while maintaining its smalltown charm, had become more sophisticated.

Lacy Nothings had been a big hit, and a welcome addition to local shopping. And as its reputation spread, women from nearby towns came to the Egret Pointe store to purchase the alluring undergarments and night garments that the shop sold. Many were original designs. Many were handmade. And everything was of the absolute best quality. And then she had done her first catalog, and the orders began pouring in from all over the United States and Canada.

"Who would have thunk women would pay so much money for so little?" her grandfather had said, surprised, but actually pleased that Ashley had spotted both a trend and a need, and locked onto it. He hadn't always agreed with her, for Edward Kimbrough was a conservative man, but he had been Ashley's biggest booster.

And now Ashley was in the process of opening two new stores: one in an upmarket neighborhood in the city, and another in a similarly good location in a wealthy suburb. But everything was being threatened by this stupid clause in her grandfather's will: Ashley Cordelia Kimbrough had to marry by the time she was thirty-five or she would lose everything. Her home. The millions of dollars her grandfather had left her. And her investments, including Lacy Nothings, because her stores were originally a part of Edward Livingston Kimbrough's investments, and the monies she was using to open the new stores were part of the estate. They were hers to use only until she was thirty-five. If at that point she didn't have a husband, then Ashley would lose it all to SSEXL, the Society Seeking Extraterrestrial Life. Not that her grandfather had believed in life on other planets. No. He had done it to please his stupid girlfriend, who couldn't be satisfied that she would get a million on Edward's death. So he had added the clause to please Lila. He had certainly never expected that his granddaughter would strike out three times trying to get a man to the altar. A gay fiancé; a sex-addicted fiancé, and a con man.

"My luck with men just sucks," Ashley said gloomily. "What the hell am I going to do, guys, if we can't break the will? Can we prove that Lila took advantage of him? Used her wiles to cajole him into the clause so her cuckoo organization would profit?"

"Not a chance," Rick replied. "Edward was not senile or delusional at all. He was in full charge of himself when he added that clause, Ash. I'm sorry. There is no way around this. You'll have to get married in the next eighteen months, or you'll lose it all."

Tiffany Pietro d'Angelo, Joe's wife, had been sitting in on the meeting. She had become his legal assistant a few years ago, when their children had left for college. "The trouble with lawyers," Tiffany said softly, "is that you don't think outside the box."

"You have a suggestion?" Ashley asked hopefully.

Tiffany nodded. "What about an old-fashioned arranged marriage?"

"An arranged marriage? What's that?" Ashley wanted to know.

"You're crazy," Joe said to his wife.

"No, I'm not," Tiffany replied. "What, you think in the twenty-first century things like arranged marriages no longer exist? Well, they do. And that would seem to be Ashley's only way out. Are you seriously proposing she turn up her toes and let SSEXL have everything? Let Lila Peabody, the old bitch, get it all? No way!"

"Somebody please tell me exactly what an arranged marriage is?" Ashley said.

"It's an old-fashioned way of matching people up by religion, economic background, ethnic similarities, that kind of thing," Joe said.

"It's a legitimate possibility," Rick said thoughtfully, "but where are we going to find a match for Ashley, Tiff?"

"Yeah, Tiff!" Joe echoed sarcastically.

Tiffany Pietro d'Angelo was a slender, petite woman with champagne blond hair. No one had realized how very smart she was until she had gone into her husband's office ostensibly to help out after their last child had gone to college. But Tiffany had been listening to Joe for over thirty years, and once in the office she had learned quickly. Now she turned her blue eyes to look at the two partners. "Your cousin, Joe. He has a client with the same problem as Ashley." Now she focused on Ashley. "Joe's cousin Raymond is a lawyer in the city. Some big fancy firm with three or four WASPy names. We had dinner with him and his wife, Rose, last week. He's got a client whose father put a similar clause in his will. The guy has got to marry soon or he loses everything." She looked back at her husband. "Remember now, stupido?"

Joe clapped his hand to his head. "Tiff, baby! You're right! I should call him immediately and find out exactly what his client's problem is. Then we go from there."

"You're suggesting that you arrange a marriage for me with a total stranger?" Ashley asked. "No. I don't think so."

"Listen, Ashley," Tiffany said quietly, "no one is suggesting we set a date and you two meet for the first time at the altar. This isn't India. Let Joe check it out with his cousin. If there is a possibility that you two might be a match, we'll arrange a meeting in our offices here. If you and the guy hit it off, then we can run with it from there. Hey, it takes all the fuss and muss out of looking for a guy. We'll have his background, because he's Ray's client. And he has to have a few bucks or his father wouldn't have put in such a clause trying to protect him and the family money. It could be an ideal setup for you."

"Then if he's rich and relatively acceptable, why hasn't he found his own wife?" Ashley wanted to know. "Sounds very fishy to me. What if the guy is weird or a perv?"

"Ray will know," Tiffany said soothingly.

Ashley sat silent for several long moments while they waited for her to say something. Finally she spoke. "Okay, check it out, Joe. And when you have all the facts-and I mean all of them-come back to me with them. I'll make my decision then." She stood up. "I've got to get back to the shop. I have a special shipment coming in today for Emily Devlin. Pure silk, lace made by nuns in a convent in Madeira, the whole thing hand-sewn. Her husband ordered it for her as a surprise for after the baby is born."

"That man is a treasure," Tiffany remarked. Then she got up too. "I'll see you out," she said, "and Joe, get on the phone now with Ray."

The two women walked arm in arm into the office's reception area.

"An arranged marriage sounds like it might be a good idea, Tiff," Ashley said. "Thanks for being so on-the-ball and thinking of it."

"Don't think badly of the boys for not coming up with a solution," Tiffany answered her. "This is a thorny problem you've got, sweetie. They're guys. They think practical." Then she grinned. "And this is definitely a night for the Channel, huh?"

"I can never thank you enough for introducing me to it," Ashley said, returning the grin. "After the debacle with Carson I really needed a serious diversion. Everyone is always telling me how calm and levelheaded I am. Well, that's because I take my means out in the Channel." She chuckled. "And someone's cute butt is going to get strapped pink and hot tonight, I can assure you."