The Wedding Audition by Catherine Mann, Joanne Rock Page A

friends in high places. Guess you and I are both well known in our own way.”
    Except all she’d done was bail on a celebrity marriage. He’d failed to save a good kid who’d put himself at risk to help a friend. He’d spent a lot of time thinking about that day and what he might have done differently. For the life of him, he couldn’t come up with a scenario that would have resulted in the boy walking away. But even if he’d excised some of the guilt, he still felt humbled by the way the kid had put himself on the line for a friend.
    Antony Marks had a sense of purpose. A rock-solid moral compass that was rare to find in one so young. After years of undercover work where right and wrong only came in shades of gray, Wynn found a lot to admire in that.
    “That’s why you’ve been staying in rural Alabama. So no one will see you before the trial.” Annamae peered up at him from the phone, eyes roaming his face as if testing it for signs of the man he’d once been in that pressed uniform. “No one recognizes you here so far from home.”
    He hardly knew himself anymore, either. He sure did recognize attraction though. And this hunger for Annamae wasn’t going away anytime soon. Her slow, thorough perusal of him amped up the heat he’d been trying to ignore.
    “Short of plastic surgery, there’s not much I could have done to hide in Miami unless I locked myself in a hotel room for the year. It’s taken the justice system months to crank the trial up on the docket with the Dimitri family lawyers filing continuances every damn day. I couldn’t live that way and didn’t want to put a protective detail at risk, especially for that length of time.”
    Enough lives had been lost to Dimitri family ruthlessness. They’d brought a new, effective business model with them from a global drug trade, their wealth and connections providing a protective veneer and plenty of champions among the rich and famous. They would defend Serge Dimitri with everything they had.
    “Still, wouldn’t they consider the work worth their while to make sure you’re safe to nail this guy?” Annamae kept her focus on the case, her sharp mind working through the details in a way that impressed him.
    “I have been safe.”
    “So safe I got through the front gate,” she pointed out, arching a brow at him.
    “You’re … unexpected.” Something about her had gotten under his guard before she even opened her mouth when he’d seen her at his front gate that first time. He touched her chin lightly, thinking about their kiss earlier.
    “Me?” A grin stole over her features. “I think that may be the nicest compliment anyone has ever paid me.”
    “How so?” He stroked her jaw lightly before his hand slid away again.
    “I’ve always been the normal one, the beige backdrop to my flamboyant sisters.” She laughed lightly, touching her head, “Although maybe my ever-changing hair color isn’t so beige anymore.”
    “It’s not your hair that draws me.” He wondered how anyone could see her as ordinary. Everything about her sparkled with energy, intelligence. Vibrancy.
    “Clearly, my hair wouldn’t,” she muttered self-consciously.
    He clasped her wrist. “You don’t need to say things like that.”
    “I’m not looking for compliments.” She went very still under his touch.
    He loosened his hold, his thumb caressing the inside of her wrist.
    “I know.” He stroked up her arm, his hand learning the feel of her as he skimmed a touch up to her face again. “It’s your eyes. They’ve drawn me from the start. Not wise for a man in my position.”
    But right now, with his nerves raw and his libido on overdrive, he couldn’t find the will to resist.
    *
    Have a fling, Annamae .
    She didn’t want her grandmother’s voice in her head right now. Not when Heath—that is, Wynn —looked at her like she was even more appealing than the strawberry pie she’d made. Yet she kept remembering Hazel Mae’s matter-of-fact prescription