Blissed (Misfit Brides #1) Page 2

  CJ coughed. “The what?”

  “The Bridal Retailers Association. All the businesses on The Aisle belong.”

  The Aisle. Right. This crazy town called their main street The Aisle.

  “The QG runs The Aisle,” the woman said. “So when this divorced guy tried to buy the party supply store, she went apeshit. She ordered the mayor to host a special Wedded Bliss Celebration that spring, married people only.”

  “So not you?” he said.

  Because he was oddly fascinated that Bliss wasn’t perfect.

  His new whatever-she-was did that delicate snorting thing again. “She had the governor sign a proclamation naming Bliss the most family-friendly city in Illinois because of the Wedded Bliss thing. Most Married-est Town on Earth, and she won’t let anyone forget it. You don’t want to know what she did to discourage people from getting within four shops of the place this guy wanted to buy. And when he didn’t leave fast enough for the QG, the town flooded. He opened a shop somewhere north of Chicago instead.”

  “And you want to live here… why?”

  He knew better than to question a woman about her logic. But since this woman had invaded his confessional, he kept making rookie mistakes. He braced himself, waiting for the inevitable You couldn’t possibly understand. That one drove him nuts.

  Instead, she dove right into the last psychological wound his sisters hadn’t hit yet.

  First there was the soft sigh. Then her shadow drooped, and her voice did too. “It’s home.”

  The sentiment echoed in the small room, her longing overshadowing any of her frustrations or regrets.

  Home.

  A hot shiver prickled the back of his neck. His parents’ farm down near Peoria would always be home, but not like the home the yearning in her voice spoke of.

  Her home sounded like family and kids and happiness. Like meatloaf and mashed potatoes. Birthday parties with kazoos and paper hats. Pets and chaos and laughter.

  Or maybe he was imagining what he’d always wanted.

  The confessional was hot as hell. Even his balls were sweating.

  “I’ve only lasted this long because my parents have done so much good for the community,” she said. “They’ve buffered me.”

  Self-loathing. Now that was a feeling he could relate to.

  He felt her shuddery breath rattle his own rib cage. He needed to stop her, maybe crash through the screen and dive out of the room into safer territory. But he’d seen his sisters in action enough to know her ears were becoming intake valves to keep her mouth running, and her brain had already launched into dump-all-my-problems-on-the-innocent-bystander mode. She’d follow him until she said her piece or until she sucked every last molecule of oxygen from the entire church.

  And he still had a few dozen female relatives waiting to wallop him with pity outside that door.

  “But my mom’s gone now, and I know I can’t live here forever. I’ve made some mistakes. But I’d like to do a few more things my parents would be proud of before the Queen General destroys me.” The yearning was back in her voice, and it did more to scrape CJ’s wounds raw than his sisters had managed in all of the last four years.

  “So if you don’t mind,” the woman continued, “I’ll just hang out here a few more minutes, and then she and her new Knot Fest poster boy can go ride off on their righteousness while I keep my mom’s shop going.”

  The defeat and anxiety and sadness in the confessional were making it hard to breathe. He had an overwhelming desire to offer her a hug, and an equally strong desire to hasten her departure from what was supposed to be his haven.

  He gripped the armrests on the chair, his palms sticking to the wood. “Takes a hell of a lot of balls to live like that.”

  “You mean a hell of a lot of idiocy? I should’ve left months ago. Those games she played with the divorced guy? It’s my turn. She rewrote the Golden Husband Games rules so her Exalted Widower is eligible to be named Husband of the Half Century. And you know what? He’s the reason my husband left me.”

  CJ squeezed his eyes shut.

  He hated the word widower almost as much as he hated mention of the Husband Games. Five years ago, after eloping here, he had played. And despite not knowing much about being a good husband himself, he’d won.

  He shoved the memory away and latched on to the injustice done to his partner in hiding.

  Some guy destroyed her marriage? And now would get honored for it?

  What kind of place was this? “Want me to kick his ass?”

  “No!” Her shadow swayed. “Please. I wasn’t here. You didn’t see me, we didn’t talk. I don’t exist.” She chuckled, but there was nothing funny about it. “And to think, most of my life, I wanted to be her.”

  A shaft of light broke through the room, and a cool draft whooshed a swell of conversation over the screen.

  “Ma’am?” Basil intoned in his holier-than-thou, constipated way. “Can I help you? Are you lost?”

  “No,” she said quickly. “Yes. I mean, we were just—Yes, actually. Yes, I’m lost.”

  There was silence. Then—“We?” Basil said.

  Hell. CJ squinted at her shadow. Don’t look this way. Don’t look this way. Don’t—

  Too late. “CJ?” Basil said. “If you’re in there—”

  “Yeah, yeah,” CJ grumbled.

  “CJ?” the woman said. And if he wasn’t mistaken, there was some horror lingering beneath her words. “CJ Blue?”

  Odd. Both being recognized in a Bliss confessional, and that it would be horrifying. “At your service,” he said.

  Basil’s long-suffering sigh made an unfortunately familiar appearance. “Marring the sanctity of the confessional, CJ? Low, even for you.”

  This, at least, was normal. “If God’s everywhere, how can one room be more sacred than anywhere else?” He liked yanking Basil’s chain, and besides, Basil’s predictable “very disappointed in you” theological lecture would be a welcome reprieve.

  Instead, another female voice broke in. “Natalie. I wasn’t aware you were Catholic. Or invited.”

  “Veil emergency.” CJ’s confessional intruder—Natalie, apparently—mustered more cheer than a hoard of drunken elves, making CJ think he’d imagined the horror. “Can’t have a disappointed bride in Bliss, can we?” Natalie said. “Guess I found the wrong room.”

  Yes. Yes, she had.

  “They’re in the cry room,” Basil said. “It’s that way.”

  “Thank you! Enjoy the wedding.”

  A shuffling told CJ his hiding companion had just left him to the wolf in priest’s clothing and whomever the new mystery woman was.

  Thank God.

  “We’ll talk later,” the woman said. Even though Natalie had hit all his sore spots, CJ felt a twinge of sympathy.

  Sounded like somebody was up for an ass-chewing.

  “Something you’d like to confess, Princess?” Basil said.

  “Jackass,” CJ muttered.

  “Careful, little brother. You’re still in God’s house.”

  True, but it was one more bit of normal he desperately needed. Besides, if he didn’t react to the nickname, his siblings were more likely to call him by his real name. Their parents, free-spirited nature lovers that they were, had named all thirteen of their children after spices. Basil had gotten the only decent male spice name. God bless Rosemary for insisting on calling CJ by his initials, and God bless, well, God for not gifting his parents with any more sons.

  CJ scooted around the screen and out the confessional, ignoring the holy look of severe disappointment that generally kept people from mistaking CJ for his eldest sibling. The woman with Basil was somewhat familiar. And not just because she looked vaguely like Hilary Clinton. She was dressed in a white power suit and had neatly styled short hair with so many different shades of color in it—most occurring in nature—that he wasn’t sure if she was blonde or brunette, though the sag beneath her chin suggested a natural gray.

  Given her erect
posture and the silent demands for acquiescence to whatever she was obviously about to say, he was surprised any of her skin had the audacity to droop out of formation.

  A tingly sense of foreboding had more than just his balls sweating now.

  Basil clicked the confessional shut.

  “Mr. Blue,” the woman said, “I have an exciting honor to discuss with you.”

  CJ scrubbed a hand over his face. Honors in Bliss weren’t his thing anymore. Whatever it was, he didn’t want it. Wasn’t so easy to say so, though. Something about the woman made his tongue want to say yes despite the fact that his brain, and one or two of his other favorite body parts, was screaming no! Took a swallow or two to find the appropriate deflection. “Appreciate the sentiment, ma’am, but I’m afraid I don’t have the necessary respect for the collar.”

  While the woman tittered—which was a demonic kind of sound—Basil’s pious disapproval hit epic proportions. He puffed his chest, showing off his own collar. “Don’t flatter yourself.”

  “Mr. Blue.” The woman offered CJ a hand so smooth it glowed, her pale blue eyes both inviting and scary as hell at the same time. “I’m Marilyn Elias. By the power vested in me as chairwoman of Bliss’s Knot Festival, I hereby invite you to participate in the Golden Husband Games.”

  Marilyn Elias. Chairwoman.

  Knot Festival.

  Queen General.

  No. No, not just no. Hell, no.

  CJ opened his mouth. No. One word, two letters. He could say it.

  He had to say it.

  The Queen General blinked rapidly several times. Her eyes went unnaturally shiny. “The entire committee, of course, wishes your wife could be beside you. Such a tragedy.” Suddenly she had a handkerchief in hand, dabbing at tears he suspected were made of cyanide. “But we believe you, a widower of a decorated military heroine and one of our most popular former Husbands of the Year, deserve the opportunity to compete to be crowned Bliss’s Husband of the Half Century.” Marilyn turned to a couple CJ hadn’t noticed lurking behind her. “Surely you know what a wonderful husband this man was.”

  CJ’s world twisted another crank.

  They weren’t random wedding guests.

  They were Serena’s parents, Bob and Fiona. CJ’s in-laws.

  He hadn’t seen them since her funeral. He’d planned to stop by their place tomorrow. Say hi. See how they were doing since the flood, since Bob’s battle with cancer last year.

  But there they were—here, now—at his sister’s wedding with the Queen General of Bliss, waiting for him to accept or decline a reenactment of his wedding week.

  This time without his bride.

  Fiona smiled a watery, wobbly, this-would-mean-the-world-to-me kind of smile, her mouth wrinkling in the corners, the sag under her eyes suggesting she’d aged more than four years since the funeral.

  Bob watched him with hopeful expectation, and CJ saw Serena’s ghost pleading with him through her father’s tired eyes. You promised. You promised we’d come back here and have a big party with our families for our fifth anniversary.

  The Queen General—apt name, that—turned back to CJ with a beseeching look that was ruined by the freaky don’t-fuck-with-me quality behind her tear shine. “Please, Mr. Blue. Please do us the honor of agreeing to participate in the Golden Husband Games in your wife’s honor.”

  The niggling thought he’d been suppressing burst forth. He cast a glance around the vestibule, but the suddenly nauseatingly irritating Natalie was nowhere to be seen.

  A sea of his sisters in their green bridesmaid dresses were, though. All his cousins. All his aunts. A handful of Dylan and Saffron’s musician buddies.

  All watching him. Waiting. Judging him.

  He couldn’t breathe.

  “Let us help you honor Serena’s memory,” Marilyn Elias said.

  This woman could take all his sisters together in the contest for crazy-scary. Hell if he’d be anybody’s poster boy—Poster boy.

  Natalie had been bitching about CJ.

  The Exalted Widower. The Queen General’s poster boy.

  None of them had a clue what they were asking.

  Who they were asking.

  “I’m certain he’ll be honored,” Basil said.

  CJ stepped back, but the plaintive hope brightening Fiona’s weathered face made him choke on his denial.

  “But of course he’ll have to give it due consideration and consult his calendar,” Basil continued.

  The Queen General beamed. “Of course, my dear CJ. Of course. And the Knot Fest committee will be pleased to offer you any assistance necessary in making your decision. Do enjoy your sister’s wedding today. And call me if I may be of any help.” She slipped a card into his vest and retreated out of the church, his relatives giving the woman a wide berth.

  He didn’t want to call her.

  He didn’t want to stay in Bliss.

  He didn’t want to play in the Golden Husband Games.

  Living with eleven sisters, though, CJ had acquired more than his share of knowledge about women. And he knew what he wanted didn’t matter. This Queen General woman had a plan. A plan for him. He could fight it all he wanted, but the truth was simple. His future was no longer entirely within his own control.

  NATALIE WAS IN her car, a cathedral-train-length away from escaping St. Valentine’s parking lot when the Queen General stepped out of the front of the church and into the path of Natalie’s car. Nat wanted to keep going. She still hadn’t caught her breath or calmed her heart after the horrific realization that she’d just bared her soul to CJ Blue. All of her soul.

  That she didn’t belong in Bliss.

  That she once wanted to be the Queen General.

  That he wrecked her marriage.

  The QG was going to kill her.

  Hang her from the center gazebo on the Bliss courthouse lawn with a giant D tattooed on her forehead and a Divorcees Be Warned, Thou Art Not Welcome in Bliss sign pinned to her dress. Because obviously Natalie would be in a dress. An ugly-ass, second-hand black bridesmaid dress, most likely.

  There was some appeal to the thought of letting her car run over Marilyn.

  But the car stopped of its own volition under the power of the QG’s frosty glare. Possibly because the car knew in a match between it and the QG, the QG would win. Or maybe the car stopped because Natalie didn’t much like the idea that her son could grow up visiting Mommy in prison.

  Still, that would be better than his growing up without her at all. Was it possible to die of mortification? She hadn’t yet, but the day was still young.

  She threw the car into park and rolled her window down.

  “Miss Castellano.” Disdain dripped from the QG’s turned-down, painted lips.

  Natalie swallowed hard. Her mother had led the Husband Games subcommittee for the Knot Festival, reporting to Queen General Marilyn for almost as many years as Natalie had been alive. By tradition, Natalie should’ve inherited her mother’s place on the committee. It was how things were done in Bliss.

  But the QG had denied Natalie the privilege of formally continuing her mother’s legacy. Were it not for Dad, Natalie would’ve had no role in Knot Fest at all. Instead, he’d convinced the QG to let Natalie represent the Castellano family for one last Knot Fest in Mom’s honor.

  The QG had ultimately relented and put Natalie on the janitorial subcommittee.

  Being the QG, she had the capability to do worse.

  Much worse.

  Especially after catching Natalie in a confessional with CJ Blue.

  She swallowed once more, harder. “Mrs. Elias, nice to see you again.”

  “It is my pleasure,” the QG said, not sounding pleased in the least, “to present to you the news that Mr. CJ Blue has been invited to play in the Golden Husband Games.”

  She stopped and peered at Natalie expectantly, as though Nat was supposed to burst into a round of applause and make a few catcalls for a kiss.

  “Fantastic,” Natalie said. The c
horus of shits and dammits in her head were quickly adding up to a few more dollars she owed Noah’s college fund. Today had been very profitable for the little guy.

  “I’m not interested in your opinion, Miss Castellano,” the QG said. “I’m informing you so that you understand that he will accept his invitation, and that you will have nothing further to do with him for the duration of his stay in Bliss. If I ever catch you in a compromising position with him again, I will not only remove you completely from the Knot Fest committee, but I will also do everything in my power to remove you from The Aisle. Are we clear?”

  As clear as the ice forming in Natalie’s veins. “Yes.”

  While the QG had formally taken the Husband Games job from Natalie, the truth of what Natalie was doing was a bit stickier. And if she were completely—and no doubt publicly—removed from the Knot Fest committee entirely, the golden anniversary of Mom’s lifelong pet project would be nearly impossible to secretly keep afloat.

  Nat never wished she’d stayed married to Derek, and she never wished she hadn’t had Noah, but being divorced was a pain in the ass.

  And that was a dime she’d happily give Noah’s college fund.

  “We all have to live with our choices, Miss Castellano. I suggest you give your future wiser consideration than you have your past. Starting now.”

  If Natalie had a couple do-overs, she’d fix a lot of things. But she didn’t have do-overs. She had do-your-bests.

  She also had an ugly suspicion that her time of doing her best in Bliss had just been shrunk like cotton in a dryer.

  Once again, she was letting her mother down.

  The QG stepped back from the car, gave a regal nod, and tucked her forearms behind her back. “Enjoy your afternoon, Miss Castellano.”

  Natalie nodded meekly. She pulled away at a fraction of the speed her heart was racing. Mortification and regret were still giving her soul indigestion, and while she’d developed a pretty thick hide over the last five years, her eyes and throat burned as badly as they had at her mother’s funeral.